4 Tips for Developing Facilities Management KPIs

“You get what you measure. Measure the wrong thing and you get the wrong behaviors.”
– John H. Lingle, Co-Author of Bulls-Eye! Is Measurement Worth It?

4 Tips for Developing Facilities Management KPIs

The quest of businesses for the next decade will be the search for quantitative, measurable performance proof points. Facilities Management (FM) is no exception. In many ways, FM companies are under increased pressure to demonstrably prove value via solid performance metrics. In a densely populated market, selecting a FM company that rigorously measures the right Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) becomes a competitive advantage for firms looking to streamline operations while maintaining corporate values, quality standards and operational efficiency.

Selecting the right Facilities Management KPIs for your company is simple if you follow these 4 tips:

1) Align KPIs to your company’s strategic goals

All metrics are measurements, but to qualify as a KPI, the metric must be a targeted measure that maps to the strategic goals of your company, your critical success factors, and your client expectations. KPIs that map in this one-to-one way help firms optimize FM operations, considering them a part of strategy rather than just tactical events.

2) Always remember that your KPIs Must Facilitate Decisions

KPI reporting can be a challenge, since by nature KPIs are living units of measure that change on a day-to-day basis. Typical reporting is a monthly snapshot of where a company is, or what it’s achieved. This static reporting robs your KPIs of their decisive power. It’s critical for monthly KPI reports to be supplemented with daily and weekly reporting to facilitate better-informed decisions and rapid re-adjustment if performance is lacking. For this to be effective, there must be commitment from the ground up that:

• All reports are actionable
• Issues will be followed up on, escalated, and resolved in a timely manner
• Everyone is accountable to defined performance standards
• Client expectations will be shared and understood by all

3) Make sure your partners are fully aligned with your KPIs

At Lakeside Project Solutions, we understand that the KPIs we measure internally are not always important to our clients. That’s why we work collaboratively, early in the client engagement process, to establish meaningful KPIs that represent the client’s strategic goals. We work to establish a reporting cycle that is meaningful to them, and meets the project objectives and timelines.

When you’re working with a FM company, collaboration is key. You set the tone with the KPIs that matter to you—but to make it work, your partners have to be fully committed. Be sure to select a Facilities Management partner that will understand your goals and work together with you to ensure everyone is aligned. Make sure your FM company establishes a reporting cycle that’s meaningful to you, so that all of your project objectives and timelines become theirs.

4) Be Critical of your own KPIs
Tracking your KPI results should yield insights that lead to quality improvements, efficiencies in execution, cost savings, improved revenues, etc. If you find that your reports have KPIs that are not yielding any insights, it’s ok to re-evaluate that unit of measure. The FM company and client should establish check-in dates where KPIs are reviewed to see if they are the correct measures for certain projects, if they need to be calculated differently, or cast aside all together for a better measure.

Five Example Facilities Management KPIs

• Reactive Response Time (Days)
• Emergency Response Time (Hours)
• Completion Time
• Average Project Cost
• Average Invoice Time

The concept of performance measuring comes natural to Lakeside Project Solutions; we take our cue from the great service professionals we have on the job sites who know to always measure twice, and cut once. KPIs provide insights into our daily operations, allowing us to see opportunities for improvement to internal and client facing processes. With over 10 years of experience in business, and literally hundreds of years of combined experience among all of our affiliate FM service professionals, Lakeside Project Solutions has cultivated a proprietary list of winning KPIs that informs our decision making at strategic, operational, and tactical levels, and drives our company growth.

Contact Mike Reid today for more information on how Lakeside can help.