Francis Lyons, CEO at ECAT, reports.
Completing cleaning and maintenance jobs accurately and efficiently is an essential part of facilities management. But there are numerous challenges facing teams including regulation and oversight, standardisation and customer satisfaction. Smart auditing solutions, in the form of electronic compliance software, can help facilities management teams meet and overcome these challenges.
What is a smart auditing solution?
In a digital world, smart auditing solutions tend to be cloud-based software systems that enable facilities management teams to capture important compliance information in an accurate and consistent way. That ensures managers have real-time access to comparable performance data, giving them a robust picture of their operations.
How does that help enhance facilities management?
Near-field communication (NFC) technology, in the form of traceable tags and barcodes, can be assigned, and discretely located around buildings, enabling teams to demonstrate proof of presence. Using the same kind of tech that enables consumers to pay for goods with smartphones, facilities teams use their mobile device to scan NFC tags or barcodes during cleaning cycles. This accurately demonstrates proof of presence and can be referenced during cleaning audits. Building on NFC tech, facilities teams can also use their mobile device to take and upload proof of quality images. An additional unexpected benefit of proof of quality is that it’s been found to consistently raise cleaning and maintenance standards because team-members can demonstrate the quality of, and take pride in, their work.
Enabled by technology, facilities teams can consistently record and upload comparable information, which standardises performance reporting. It also creates clarity and enables managers to adopt evidence-based decision-making, leading to increased productivity and profitability. Elsewhere, it also builds trust. And, as we all know, teams with high levels of trust have high levels of engagement, consistently perform well, and experience low employee turnover. This leads to a high-performance environment, which further enables consistent, high standards of facilities management.
A further benefit of smart auditing tech is that managers can review performance data to identify potential ‘hotspots’ and make corrective actions. This is achieved by analysing historical data to identify key trends and then further investigating them to understand the root-cause of a problem. This type of ‘altitude reporting’ is also valuable for identifying areas of excellence and replicating ‘best practice’ examples in other areas, thereby improving overall performance and satisfaction.
Finally, smart auditing solutions support sustainable business practices. Paperless, cloud-based systems enable companies to reduce their carbon footprint and creating substantial savings. A real-world example is St Luke’s General Hospital in Kilkenny, Ireland, which reduced compliance-related paperwork resulting in savings of 302.4kg of CO2 per year.
Smart auditing solutions enable facilities management teams to demonstrate proof of presence and performance, consistently raising cleaning and maintenance standards. That not only empowers and engages team-members but leads to high levels of customer satisfaction. Smart auditing solutions also provide managers with an instant, accurate and complete picture of their processes and to manage their business operations.
https://www.ecat-group.com