Governments of any level stand to benefit from workplace management tools & the data they provide.
The public sector in Canada employs about 20% of professionals. Of this, the public service either owns or leases 29 million metres squared of real property floor space.
Departments like Public Services and Procurement Canada, with the second largest floor space, have 6.2 million metres squared of office space. With this massive expanse of space and employees, technologies that enable effective workplace management and operational efficiencies or savings are at a premium.
The Canadian public service is already using Archibus across more than 30 departments. With initiatives like the Fixed Asset Review that are looking to improve and optimize the real property portfolio of the Federal Government, choosing the right tools for the job is essential.
More than 30 Federal Government Departments use Archibus and IWMS capabilities to manage various operations and processes. Some notable areas of focus Horizant has identified in our work are:
- Facilities maintenance & asset management
- Space management & occupancy tracking
- Desk & room reservation tools for hybrid work
- Lease tracking
- Project management
- Sustainability & risk management
- Operational cost savings
While this encompasses a range of processes and operations for facilities managers, workplace management technology and integrated facilities management practices streamline this work with efficiency upgrades.
Enabling better decision-making for leadership with data collection, IWMS empower better space management and elevates the workplace. Using data to streamline processes and support Federal Government goals means departments can implement tangible benchmarking toward project completion and larger organizational goals.
Project delivery in the public sector benefits from streamlined processes & data sharing by implementing IWMS and IFM (integrated facilities management). Slow project delivery in real property often includes sharing of information between teams and missing data sets across several tools. Public Sector departments can use IFM and IWMS tools to house and report data under one solution and manage project delivery in the same tools.
Let’s frame it this way: a department focuses on upfitting its real property portfolio to be more energy efficient and conducive to hybrid work environments. They would need data on workplace behaviours, asset and facility utilization, maintenance, and space management to be make effective decisions. If data is collected on four different tools or solutions with separate oversight and requires information to be exported and shared, then project delivery is slowed dramatically.
Consolidation of data in these four areas where it is collected and stored with accessible reporting capabilities is going to not only speed up decision-making but also give tangible benchmarks to project timelines. These added benefits mean faster project delivery and collaboration between teams and lower expenses as only one software is in use.
Integrated facilities management is about a central tool or solution that handles all workplace or facilities management areas. The data collected from these different areas all have a significant role in optimizing operations and improving the workplace.
A specific use case of this is the Region of York application of Archibus. Here, the Municipal level Region of York team used Archibus to
With Horizant as an Archibus integrator, Region of York leveraged Archibus space management during the COVID-19 pandemic to create a safe and distanced workplace for employees.
Workplace management can act as a foundation for data collection and feed decision-making abilities. Departments across the Canadian Federal Government are leveraging Archibus for floor planning, space management, and office booking/reservation purposes.
Initiatives like the Fixed Asset review that apply to the whole real property portfolio of the Government are streamlined in delivery by integrating IWMS and IFM processes. Collecting data on asset lifecycles, facilities performance, and portfolio information regarding leases in one tool already used across more than 30 departments.
Better data sharing between departments & teams on the status of portfolio assets means that plans for renovations or work are completed faster. With Archibus OnSite, work orders are housed and completed with comments in the tool by people in the field.
All these process improvements build on each other. Starting with space management or office booking tools and expanding to include performance metrics in other areas is an opportunity for complete portfolio optimization. Data on each area of the workplace contributes to overall portfolio improvement and sustainability goals.
Efficiency upgrades in the public sector from IWMS will speed up project delivery times while lowering project costs and operating costs in departments that leverage them effectively.
Horizant is proud to service over 30 Federal Government departments and several provincial & municipal Governments.
Increased data collection and performance metrics allow faster project delivery and operations improvements across the public sector. These create a cascade into better service delivery for the public sector and the people who depend on the Government for support and services.