Building to Meet Business Objectives

CONTEXT AND RATIONALE Needs Based Planning Our experience as architects and planners has arisen out of a realisation early in our careers, that many building designs and development plans represented (and still far too often represent) solutions in search of a problem - or even solutions in spite of a problem. All too frequently, phenomena such as the recent lemming-like spate of central city office development and the outgrowth of architectural post-modernism which sees design primarily as a form of high art, have been generated more by greed or ego than by a search for the best planning and design solutions. The community's social and business aims can only be effectively met and quality targets achieved - in the context of the built environment - by adopting best practice approaches to planning, design and facilities management. We share a conviction that in order to deliver these objectives the built environment should serve the needs of its users and respond to the policy setting (including business aims). The best plans and designs for the built environment can only arise from these foundations. Simple Planning - Adaptable, Relevant and Customised (SPARC) We also note from our experience that - perhaps because of the intrinsic variability of this user / policy nexus each facility planning problem is unique, despite a number of similar elements and themes, and therefore cannot effectively respond to standardised or off-the-shelf solutions. each facility planning solution is merely an episode within an ongoing management context, and therefore must facilitate and reinforce management aims and processes by empowering individual managers to address the issues arising from the solution outcomes. each facility planning situation is dynamic, in terms of three important factors: the data variables involved (personnel numbers, space standards, inventory, discount rate etc), the involvement of personnel responsible for the management and planning process (who will often move on and be replaced, either during the planning phase or in the subsequent management of the plan outcomes), and the underlying nature of the problem itself and the appropriate methodology to be adopted (as the business environment, corporate strategy or policy framework evolves); and can only satisfactorily be served - over any period of time - by adaptable solutions which are capable of evolving within this dynamic context. To satisfy these characteristics of facility planning therefore, our stock-in-trade as planners is to provide customised facilities planning consultancy, supported by simple, adaptable solutions tailored to be relevant the management context and objectives. Data Handling and Information Modelling We have also come to realise over the years that, while our expertise and focus is based in our professional background of architecture and planning - and the relevance of what we do is founded on practical knowledge of the built environment and development processes - our core business is in fact data handling and information modelling. Within our business therefore, computer based information systems have progressively been developed over the era of the desktop computer (14 years in our case) to respond to the particular needs of our client base. In the 1990s, we have integrated these disparate planning tools, with the aid of rapidly converging computer technologies, into a generic computer aided facilities planning (CAFP) methodology which we now employ as the core approach for many of our projects. Generally, the processing of information within any planning or management context proceeds according to the following model. The logic and processes implied by this model, as it applies to facilities planning information, presents a demanding discipline - both on the data modelling operations themselves and also on the planner and the client and their approach to the problem - but this foundation to facilities planning makes it possible to address four cardinal planning and management principles: responsiveness consistency quality accountability The full achievement of these principles also requires the integration of planning information during the planning and the management phases. Integration of Planning and Management Information The construction industry sector's Holy Grail of data integration is EDI - Electronic Data Interchange - a similar level of seamless technology to that used in the banking / retail industries for electronic banking and EFTPOS. While the facility planning and management professions are a long way from that goal, useful steps toward integration are never-the-less readily possible with the technologies at hand to all of us. We categorise data integration objectives as being either: Problem related, Process related, or. Life-cycle related. Problem Related Data Integration Problem related data integration occurs within the facility planning and management team. The current generation of computer software tools - database, computer-aided draughting, spreadsheet, project management and even word processing - all permit the structured interchange of data, subject to careful initial planning and process management control. Similarly, the major desk top computer operating systems and hardware configurations no longer present insuperable barriers to mixed computer platform team environments or to higher level corporate databases or remote external data resources. Process Related Data Integration Process related data integration occurs over time, between the various phases of the facility planning and management cycle. Traditional facility planning and management phases do not readily lend themselves to the integration of information. When these phases are represented in a cyclic model however, there is an obvious, ideal continuum of activities which relates the ongoing facility management processes to facility planning functions and in turn, to individual facility project initiatives. Projects are undertaken only periodically, but feed new or altered facilities back into the management cycle. The following diagram illustrates this cycle. In real world terms there are a number of data handover thresholds between these phases which present problems for process related data integration. These thresholds occur at the points traditionally associated with the hand over of responsibility from one party to another during the cycle - for example, architect to building owner, facility manager to planner, planner to real estate team, planner to designer, designer to builder. Each of these discrete phases of the process have their own particular demands and requirements for data and management information. Data handover and integration between these phases is intrinsically difficult to arrange and manage due to the different players and their limited objectives. Without careful pre-planning this process can be further complicated by many factors, including: the scope, structure and accuracy of the data; proprietary expertise, intellectual property and copyright; contractual obligations, professional liability and confidentiality; the cost of the handover and of the ongoing use of the data; and computer technology issues associated with file translation from one system to another. Life-cycle Related Data Integration The facility planning and management cycle is, of course, traversed many times over the life of a building, as initial construction, churn, change of use, re-fit, extensions, building services replacement projects and the like are undertaken. While planners and managers at large have embraced the information age and facility information systems only since the mid 1980s - properties, buildings and facilities in general tend to endure over extended time frames. Facility planning and management information systems therefore, to be useful beyond the immediate term, must be capable of retaining and passing on enduring information during the whole life of the building or of a facility complex. This presents challenges, when the vehicle for data storage and manipulation - computers - represented by their component parts: the hardware configuration (Intel based PC, RISC processor, Macintosh, workstation, mainframe, file server, local area network etc), the media on which the data is stored (hard disk, removable cartridge, archival magnetic tape, magneto-optical, CD-ROM etc), the computer operating system (MS-DOS/Windows 3.1, Unix, Macintosh System 7, OS/2, PIC etc), and the applications software (proprietory variants of database development environments, spreadsheets, CAD systems, dedicated facility management packages, etc) have obsolescence cycles of from three to ten years. Because of this, during the life of a building or facility complex, many successive migrations of data, information, and in future knowledge, will be required from one computer system to subsequent computer systems and yet-to-be developed computer technologies. Information systems must be sufficiently open, robust and flexible to accommodate the progressive handing on of enduring facility related data. Integration Strategies for Planning and Management Information To serve the objective of integrated planning and management information systems, there are two main strategies, each with radically differing philosophical and operating characteristics: Centrally integrated data systems Distributed and incrementally integrated data systems. The first is the classical management information systems approach. In our experience it is characterised by the following factors: management control is remote from both the required skill base and the problem at hand, facilities planners and managers are not required, or encouraged, to have any computer management or software customisation skills, it is more suited to large, stable management contexts, unresponsiveness to user needs, it often provides unsuitable or inappropriate user interfaces to the data, high capital costs, discouragement of new initiatives, long lead times, and a sense of alienation and resignation on the part of the facilities planner / manager. The second is the emerging standard approach, a data democracy, driven by the availability of cheap, powerful and ubiquitous desk top computers and local area networks. This approach is characterised by: management control within the required skill base and the problem at hand, facilities planners and managers must have some computer management and software customisation skills, it is more suited to articulated, dynamic planning and management contexts, intrinsic tailored responsiveness to user needs, user-designed interfaces to the data, low, incremental capital costs, self motivation for new initiatives, short lead times, and a sense of ownership and direct control on the part of the facilities planner / manager. We believe that the second is, almost invariably, the most appropriate approach to computer based facilities planning and management information systems. Continuity and Endurance of Facility Information For this reason, the methodologies and technologies developed for facilities planning and management should be: Simple Open Adaptable Simple, so that the planning and management team itself, along with new or replacement team members over time, are able to fully understand the role, structure, uses, operation, maintenance needs and future potential of the information systems. The user system should not require external maintenance support and should never depend completely on generic computer systems experts who lack direct facility planning and management experience. Open, so that the data contained in the system is always available for review, verification or export to other systems, and so that the internal workings - the system functions, design and logic - is intelligibly documented and familiar to system users. Adaptable, so that the system can be modified and developed over time to meet specific local and progressively changing circumstances - wherever possible by the system users themselves. Go the the next section Go back to key word index