With proper facility management plan, businesses will experience smooth operations and thereby focusing on their core areas of specializations and achieving the organizations’ goals seamlessly.
The facilities practitioners need to acquire the right knowledge and skills to be able to effectively deploy facility management practice.
The built environment is made safe and lively for all user by integrating people, place, process and technology.
The question that arises now is that do we have competent practitioners that can handle these facilities? There are many people calling themselves facility managers but in the real sense, they don’t really know what facility management is all about.
In a developing country like Nigeria, awareness is generally low.
The general public should be enlightened on what facility management is and why it should be embraced.
Facility management curriculum should also be taught in our schools. Presently, there is no higher institution in Nigeria that is offering facility management at the first degree level, and only two universities are offering it at master’s level.
Facility management is a profession, has career paths, and should be taken and recognized as a full standalone discipline in our universities as it has the potentials of high employment rate. It is a huge industry and will play a very important in our nation building.
Facility management professionals from various associations in Nigeria should come together and design curricula for our education systems in Nigeria.
Now,
The International Organization for Standardization has published an international standard for Facility Management, ISO 41000 series.
Also, the Nigerian Senate recently passed a bill establishing the “Facilities Management Council of Nigeria (FMCN) (Est, etc) Bill, 2018 (SB. 340). This is yet to become a law.
These two publications should act as catalyst for us to push through facility management education.
With this, the facility management industry will be regulated, and only competent professionals will be allowed to practice.
Government at all levels should also have a functional facility management department.
All tiers of government in Nigeria (federal, state and local) invest huge amount of money and human resources into infrastructures and construction of public spaces such as secretariats, stadia, roads, airports etc. These infrastructures are not well maintained, they are in dilapidation state. Secretariat, stadia etc are now habitats for all kind of animals because they are not being taking care of.
Facilities are not just for a few years, these structures are to be managed by professional facility managers to ensure their operations meet their respective objectives.
Facility managers will develop strategic plans and implement effective ways in ensuring the smooth operations of the facilities.
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Kazeem Olugbade, ProFM, is a facility management professional who has extensive knowledge and skills in the subject areas.
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