Over the last few years a myriad of software applications and mobile apps have come into the facilities management field to help occupants to report maintenance issues or any incidents in buildings. Great idea from the face of it. Making it convenient for the occupants and empowering them does make sense, doesn’t it.
However, the reality is something else. The hidden complexities of the lifecycle of reported issues is not talked about by these app providers. Because these apps barely touch upon these complexities and architecture of these apps is not built to handle steps beyond the reporting step.
This reality is not hidden from the stakeholders who are supposed act and respond on these reported issues. They are left to connect the dots in the thin air.
All reported maintenance issues or incidents have a lifecycle to get these to the resolved stage successfully. Let’s quickly go through each stage in the lifecycle of any issue or incident.
Lifecycle Stage 1 – An Incident or Maintenance Issue gets reported with initial information provided by the reporter.
Lifecycle Stage 2 – Care-taker or First Responder in the building attends the issue. The information is enriched and the issue is qualified by the Care-taker. Additional information including photos may be added or initial reported information is corrected at this stage.
Lifecycle Stage 3 – From here issue moves to the building management team who decides if the issue needs to be assigned to a trade expert (i.e. professional cleaner, plumber, electrician) or a formal work-order is required. The information linked to the issue is now further enriched.
Lifecycle Stage 4 – Issue now moves to the relevant trade expert with all the relevant data. Trade expert can further enrich the information by including work required details. Further communication relating to the issue can happen with the building management team.
Lifecycle Stage 5 – Resolution stage. Trade expert resolves the issue.
Lifecycle Stage 6 – Information now needs to flow backwards. Building Management is notified, reporter of the issue or anyone tagged to the issue is informed about the resolution. Work-order if created is closed.
Lifecycle Stage 7 – The most important stage. Here maintenance record is saved against the location, facility and underlying equipment at that facility. To keep track of the work done and any warranties if applicable. This data is extremely important for analytics and cost control.
Now we can see why admin teams are not excited about just being notified about facility issues. Moreover, the unstructured reporting adds to the complexity rather than bringing any efficiencies. This type of superficial feature makes life of the admin teams even tougher.
To go beyond this initial stage, we need an application where facilities data is connected and there is enough depth to not only making it easy to record an issue by the occupants but to allow admin teams to carry it through various stages in structured manner and resolve the issues.
NowYouCan has mapped all the stages in the lifecycle of issue resolution to give real boost to the productivity of building management teams and improving occupant satisfaction and comfort. Mapping of all stages also mean data analytics are available at your finger tips.
Check this video how data flows and what is captured at different stages and how it links back to the specific facility or equipment. Give your teams a powerful integrated facilities management system.
