by Brianna Crandall — August 18, 2014—The Washington County, Minnesota, Department of Public Works has selected space management software from ARCHIBUS, global provider of real estate, infrastructure and facilities management software, to facilitate accurate collection and centralization of key building service information and automating business processes for the county’s one million square feet of space, 16 buildings, assorted parks, transportation maintenance facilities, and county service centers.
“When I started in the county, the main way of submitting and tracking work orders was with three-page handwritten, carbon-copied forms,” explains Eric Jalowitz, the county’s Assistant Public Works Manager. “The engineers would just write it down and send it through interoffice mail. Our craftspeople would take it, do the work, put it in their notes, and then use interoffice mail to send it back. We used phone and two-way radio to contact people, but it’s hard to track that. At other times, we’d just make a verbal request in the hallway. Utilizing e-mail, there was no way to know who opened the e-mail work orders. So it created a lot of confusion and frustration for us in management and for engineers.”
Managing space information was also a challenge at a county with many computer-aided design (CAD) drawings, and no one on staff with CAD training at the time, according to Public Works Supervisor Mandy Leonard. With the help of ARCHIBUS Business Partner Talisen Technologies, the county was able to define the required system capabilities and design the best implementation approach.
The ARCHIBUS system reportedly met that need with an initial implementation that included Space Inventory and Performance, Personnel and Occupancy, On Demand Work, and Preventive Maintenance applications.
The six-step implementation plan began with defining organizational processes, employee/SLA/equipment data gathering, and drawing preparation. The second phase addressed administrator training, and system testing and piloting. Finally, the project targeted system refinements and end-user training prior to system launch.
Asset Portal provides the means to improve data accuracy of the asset registry, increase asset utilization, and optimize asset acquisition and disposal decisions within an overall capital plan.
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The transition from a reliance on manual facilities management processes and calculations to more automated, online processes has already allowed the government of Washington County to increase its space metrics accuracy from a 20% margin of error to accuracy within .004%, says ARCHIBUS. In addition, space, employee location, and work order information is now current, easily accessible, and managed more efficiently, and Leonard says the department has moved “into the modern era.”
“Reaping the benefits of the ARCHIBUS implementation,” adds Leonard, “we received the IFMA Technology In-Use Award from the local IFMA chapter in Minneapolis/St. Paul for the significant change we made in the county and the amount of money we saved with the system. And more departments want to be part of this, so we’ve raised our profile and gained staff, which in government is virtually impossible.”
The awards may continue, too, as the county adds Service Desk, Asset Portal, Energy Management and Move Management applications to improve operations and lower costs, notes ARCHIBUS.
Headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts, ARCHIBUS, Inc., has pioneered computer-aided infrastructure and facilities management technologies since 1982. With ARCHIBUS, organizations use a single, comprehensive, integrated solution to make informed strategic decisions that optimize return on investment (ROI), lower asset lifecycle costs, and increase enterprise-wide productivity and profitability. More than 7,000,000 ARCHIBUS users manage over 18 million buildings and properties, with organizations reporting facilities-related cost savings as high as 34 percent. With over 1,700 ARCHIBUS Business Partners, local and regional support worldwide is available in over 190 countries and more than 30 languages.
For more information, see the ARCHIBUS ad on FMLink.
