9 Benefits of Space Management That Will Impact Your Bottom Line Big Time

Back in the nineties, CAFM consisted of Space Management, and some supporting modules. By integrating other functionalities to manage facility and real estate processes CAFM evolved to IWMS. Space Management however, still plays an important role in every IWMS. As most organizational processes are closely tied to spaces, space optimization pays off, big time!

Below you will find 9 benefits of Space Management using an IWMS that will impact your bottom line.

1. Identify under-utilized spaces

Almost 45% of your space portfolio is vacant at any point in time. This implicates that your organization pays a vast amount for NOT occupying space. To me, this is absolutely ridiculous. I only want to pay for something I actually use, not for anything I don’t use.

Your organization can directly impact the bottom line by reducing under-utilized space. To reduce under-utilized space, I recommend using an IWMS. Before you can reduce under-utilized space, you need to identify which spaces are under-utilized. Without an automated solution this is impossible.

2. Align workplace initiatives with business goals

Over the last five years most organizations have created vision documents including sustainability goals. Your organization is going to do more, using fewer resources.

Although this has a direct impact on the bottom line, it creates a challenge for FM and RE. Without a firm grip on your space occupancy, organizations can’t align their workplace initiatives to their business goals. Effective space management is a fundamental requirement for impacting bottom line result.

3. Forecast Future Space Requirements

Today’s economical climate is extremely dynamic. Since you want to reduce under-utilized space, you also need to be able to forecast future space requirements. This is challenging as future space requirements have a direct relation with organizational growth or contraction.

Space management through an IWMS helps you to create reliable forecasts about future space requirements. In addition to that, IWMS’s allow you to create what-if scenarios and compare associated costs based on business evolution variables.

4. Simplify Chargeback Process

From time to time organizational disputes about charged space usage occur. These disputes are frustrating for many stakeholders. You need to solve them quickly. Space Management can help you analyze historical space usage and create accurate chargeback reports.

What’s more important, when departments are held accountable for their actual space usage, they tend to be more defensive in their space usage which will have a direct impact on your bottom line.

5. Simplify space analysis

Space analysis using spreadsheets = misery.

Particularly historical data is extremely hard to capture in spreadsheets, let alone the analysis of it. Space Management using an IWMS helps you to analyze your actual space usage, compare it with the planned space usage and make informed decisions that will impact your bottom line.

6. Streamline the move process

Moves are expensive and move costs quickly grow out of control. Due to the very nature of the move process, moves have a large impact on every organization. Just think of the organizational impact of a departmental move, in terms of resources.

If you want to impact your bottom line through effective space management, you also need effective move management. This means streamlining the entire move process from request to completion in order to optimize churn rates and reduce costs.

7. Compare actual with planned space utilization

Although you have carefully planned your future space requirements, real life can always throw surprises at you. Therefore it’s very important to constantly compare planned space utilization with actual space utilization.

By using dashboards and business intelligence reports, you need to monitor the actual space utilization, and make changes in usage accordingly. Closely monitoring actual space usage helps you to intervene when necessary.

8.  Increase efficiency

Your organizational goals and business needs ensure individuals or departments have to cooperate with each other. These affiliations (or the lack of) have a big impact on your bottom line.

Let me explain.

Suppose two departments are depending on each other (e.g.  Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable).  What do you think will be the impact on organizational effectiveness if they were:

• Located on the same floor in the same building close to each other?
• Located on separate floors in the same building?
• Located on separate floors in separate buildings?

Most Integrated Workplace Management Systems can graphically create scenarios based on interdepartmental relations. These scenarios are used to increase efficiency which has a direct impact on your bottom line.

9.  Utilize Building Information Modeling

Building Information Modeling (BIM) is the process of generating and managing building data during its life cycle [1]. Typically it uses three-dimensional, real-time, dynamic building modeling software to increase productivity in building design and construction.[2]  The process produces the Building Information Model (also abbreviated BIM), which encompasses building geometry, spatial relationships, geographic information, and quantities and properties of building  components. (Source: Wikipedia)

A lot of information required for Building Information Modeling is already in the IWMS which will in the near future be the dominant management approach for generating and managing a building. Therefore it’s to be expected that all IWMS vendors will include geospatial information to create cost-effective space occupancy scenarios.