The Survey
This report summarizes the results of an international survey developed and produced by the IFMA Foundation and FMLink. The survey was sponsored by ABM Industries, Inc. and Planon, Inc. Planon, Inc. The purpose of the survey was to provide feedback related to research topics of interest to facilities managers worldwide. The survey results are used by the IFMA Foundation to rank the production of its educational white papers and by FMLink to help prioritize content of its web site. The survey was divided into two components: one related to information about the respondents; and the second related to content (e.g., topics of interest to respondents organized by FM category). The survey was promoted both to FMLink subscribers as well as through a variety of IFMA marketing channels. Results were received from 219 individuals.
Respondent Profile
There were three questions relating to the respondent: current position as it relates to FM, size of facility managed, and professional affiliations. In terms of position, by far the greatest number of respondents were Facility Managers (see Figure 1 below).
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In terms of facilty size, the largest group of respondents managed buildings from 100,000 to 499,999 sq. ft. of space (36%) followed by 500,000 to 999,999 sq. ft. (19%) and Under 99,999 sq. ft. (18%).
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Major organizational affiliations of respondents included IFMA (33%), BOMA (11%), ASHRAE (8%), AFE (7%), and BIRMA (6%) with Other account for 35%.
Survey Results
The initial content question on the survey asked respondents to rank, in terms of importance, each of fourteen different FM subject categories on a five-point scale. The scale ranged from Not Important to Extremely Important (5). Results ranged from a low of 2.5 (Outsourcing) to a high of 4.3 (Energy Management). The weighted score for each subject category is presented below:
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Research Subjects
As indicated above, only three FM categories received an importance score of 4.0 or higher: Energy Management (4.2); Security, Emergency Planning, Disaster Recovery (4.0); and Maintenance and Operations (4.0). After the respondents rated the categories, they were asked to rank a variety of topics within each category. Below are the topic results for the top three subject categories:
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Summary
The overriding theme of the survey relates to the importance of economics. Whenever the issue of money was presented, whether it related to energy costs (the highest scoring response of the survey), maintenance and operations, determining life cycle capital planning or budgeting, performing better financial planning, etc., facility managers rated its importance highly. Besides the importance of Energy Management, the survey also indicated that facility managers are still very much concerned with topics related to security. Topics such as workplace violence , continuity of operations, emergency preparedness, etc. are still very much of concern to the profession.
Also of interest to the authors were topics that ranked of low interest. These include Outsourcing, until recently of high FM interest, Legal Aspects of FM, Benchmarking and Metrics and, perhaps most surprising of all, Training, Certification and Education. This is in the context of the growth of the IFMA Foundations Recognized Degree Program and the current shortage of qualified facility managers that exists. The authors caution that just because a topic scored low on this survey, it does not necessarily mean that there is little interest in it for FMsit may simply mean that FMs are satisfied with their current knowledge of this topic and dont feel that they need to learn more.
Finally, the survey indicated that sustainability is still not yet a mainstream topic for facility management or, perhaps, that it takes a back seat to economic issues such as Energy Management. We anticipate that this issue will most certainly be in the top tier of next years survey.
Survey Developers and Sponsors
The IFMA Foundation is a non-profit corporation whose primary functions relate to grants and scholarships as well as research and educational opportunities for the advancement of facility management.
FMLink is a comprehensive online facilities management publication with over 10,000 pages of news, feature articles, benchmarking data, links, directories, calendars, a job mart and much more to support facilities professionals in their jobs.
ABM Industries is one of the world’s largest leading facility services contractors listed on the New York Stock Exchange. ABM provides a broad range of facility services including janitorial, parking, security, engineering, maintenance, lighting, energy, and comprehensive facility management solutions throughout the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
Planon’s Integrated Workplace Management Software offers comprehensive and accurate information that enables FMs to monitor, measure, and manage facilities while maintaining an overall view of operational commitments.
