FMJ.CO.UK FACILITIES SHOW DAILY
LATEST EVOLUTION The Facilities Management world is constantly evolving, spurred on by workplace
trends, best practice and technological developments
FACILITIES SHOW DAILY JUNE 2019 5
As a result, there are higher than ever
expectations of CAFM/IWMS technology,
with facilities managers needing a level of
integration, intuitiveness and joined-up
thinking like never before.
To keep ahead of this, the global leader in
Facilities Management software, FSI, have taken a
unique approach to future-proofing their products.
The award-winning company has conducted indepth
research into what facilities managers want
and need, using this insight for the new generation
of its product range.
Version 5 of Concept Evolution, FSI GO and
Intuitive BI will be available for demonstrations
at the Facilities Show 2019. Visitors to FSI’s stand
(FM5660) will be given a taster of the new suite of
products.
Paul Durant, Head of Product Strategy, explains
why FSI paid particular attention to the user
experience: “The people who use the software six
to seven hours a day for their main job, are the
people who pick up on something that slows them
down a small amount - and if they’re working on
100 tasks a day then that accumulates and impacts
on productivity.
“We have looked at making it much easier and
quicker to get to the data and see the things they
want to work with. You don’t have to go through
four or five pages to get there – it’s there at the
click of a button.”
The focus has been on making the products
easier-to-use, with a look and feel that mirrors the
technology we all use day-to-day. And, of course,
if the software is easier-to-use, there are fewer
frustrations, leading to greater take-up, therefore
increasing efficiency, productivity, and profit
margins.
The new innovations brought to Concept
Evolution initially concentrated on appearance and
usability before boosting its administration and
technical power.
FSI had to balance bringing a new version to
market, while being loyal to the product’s 15-year
heritage and customer base.
One of the key aspects the developers had to
consider was the changing role of CAFM/IWMS,
which takes it beyond the limits of the physical
infrastructure of buildings and into the realms
of smart buildings, workplace wellbeing and
corporate culture.
As well as tangible asset management, facilities
managers now provide intelligence - for business
development, procurement decisions and
branding – and are increasingly responsible for the
employee experience.
With the level of information and data available
in Concept Evolution, facilities managers can give
clear visibility of their essential services to the
Board.
This thinking is also behind the version 5 update
to Intuitive BI, FSI’s business intelligence partner
product. The dashboard takes complex data and
presents it in simple graphical forms, ie gauges, bar
charts, pie charts, etc.
The software focuses on bringing together data
into one centralised source that everyone can work
from, digitally and in real-time.
As Colin Stocker, Head of Product Management
at FSI partner Intuitive BI, explains: “These
programmes are highly-functioning and rely on
a huge amount of data. But Intuitive BI is simple
and doesn’t require lots of training to understand
what’s going on. You can quickly and efficiently
manage vast amounts of data without becoming a
data analyst.”
The ability to personalise this data for particular
purposes is an important aspect of the product.
facilities managers can quickly and easily create
linked dataset filters and pivot tables, enabling
quick interrogation of data and easy performance
management.
Jennifer Haythorpe, FSI Technical Sales
Consultant for Intuitive BI, said: “This is not a
‘one size fits all’ and static dashboard. You can
personalise the data depending on who you are
and what you do, whether you’re the facilities
manager, the finance manager, the engineer or
a contractor. You can filter down to an individual
building, which is particularly useful with multisites
or contracts so the user only sees what they’re
interested in.”
Taking into consideration the technological
environment Facilities Managers are working in
everyday, the product is fully HTML 5 compliant so
the user experience continues, seamlessly, across
platforms, whether an interactive screen in a
boardroom or a smartphone.
The way we use technology in our day-to-day
lives, switching between devices depending on
where we are, is fuelling the evolution of FSI
products. The internet, mobile apps and cloud
computing have spurred on developments in
workplace technology.
Version 5 of FSI GO provides a range of FM
delivery apps to enable a connected workforce.
The apps are easy and intuitive to navigate around
there is GPS tracking through job milestones,
configurable completion questionnaires and
timesheets that can be completed on-screen in
the app. All the information is then there for the
facilities manager to track progress, report back
to the customer and monitor, transparently, the
performance of contractors against SLAs.
As Karl Greenfield, Product Owner of FSI GO,
explained: “We live and breathe these products
and advances in technology but it’s important to
find out what the users are experiencing and what
they need, whether they are facilities managers
looking after a big building like a football club or a
service provider with a workforce spread out over
multiple sites.”
With their trademark attention to the user
experience, FSI are using the Facilities Show 2019
to launch Version 5 of its three leading products,
with a continuing commitment to engage and
inspire facilities managers.
For more information about FSI, visit STAND
FM5660