Effect Of Facilities Management On Maintenance Culture Improvement In Ghanaian Real Estate

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Researcher: K. N. W.

Introduction

Facilities management (FM), over the years, has undergone a lot of transformation from being a narrowly defined set of functional tasks delivered in a mechanistic manner to meet a specific requirement to an integrated management approach (Pathirage et al., 2008). As an integrated management approach, facilities management is now seen as a significant determinant of the achievement of corporate goal (Pathirage et al., 2008) and a key driver for the development of a maintenance culture in a people.

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The prosperity of a country can be measured by the state of its physical and its built environment. In Ghana, it is common knowledge that the performance of successive governments is mostly measured by the development of physical infrastructure such as roads, buildings, hospitals, bridges and so on. Likewise, within the business community a company’s physical assets such as office buildings, air-conditioners, elevator, and so on represent a substantial long-term investment in its operations. Plant, property and equipment make up a large part of an entity's non-current assets. The costs of these non-current assets are allocated over the number of years for which the asset will be in use.

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Buildings and infrastructures are therefore important assets whose management and maintenance should not be compromised. Most often than not, that is not the case in Ghana. Unfortunately,   buildings and related infrastructure, which are the measure of national wealth and capital formation, are not adequately managed and maintained. This situation is probably because management and maintenance of these assets are regarded as unimportant and often neglected. As a result, maintenance works are carried out in a reactionary manner with few or no records being kept; low budgetary allocation and prioritization.

Rationale

With the advent of facilities management companies and the development of the facilities management industry in Ghana, it is believed that there has been a shift, however small, in Ghana’s maintenance culture, especially in the real estate industry, for the better. Nonetheless, there is very little or no data in literature on the effect of facilities management on maintenance culture improvement in the Ghanaian real estate industry. There is therefore the need to fill this gap in knowledge. Filling this gap in knowledge will help us to know the extent to which facilities management has impacted on Ghana’s maintenance culture in the real estate industry or how far FM is from significantly impacting on the maintenance culture of Ghanaian real estate industry so that appropriate actions can be taken and the right policies put in place.

Objectives

The broad aim of this study is therefore to assess the effect of facilities management on maintenance culture improvement in the Ghanaian real estate market.

Key Findings

Businesses do have a good working knowledge of facilities management. However, there is some level of difficulty in distinguishing between facilities management and property management. The age of facilities management was viewed from two perspectives – short-term and long-term.

Real estate businesses attach more importance to managing their facilities than growing their business. The study revealed that retaining corporate image was the most important reason that drives real estate business to carry out maintenance activities on their facilities.

Outsourcing and contracting was a primary strategy used by organizations to tackle the lack of maintenance culture in Ghana. This was because most of these businesses may not have set up internal FM departments yet, hence the need to outsource FM services.

Very few innovations have been introduced into the Ghanaian real estate business according to the data collected. Though all respondents declared their organizations to be innovative, many declined to pinpoint those specific innovations introduced, possibly because these innovations were either nonexistent or they just didn’t know exactly what innovation was. One key innovation introduced is a sophisticated property management software program that ensures that customers were provided with the latest information on their property in real time online.

Abstract

In Ghana, buildings and related infrastructure, which are the measure of national wealth and capital formation, are not adequately managed and maintained. With the advent of facilities management companies and the development of the facilities management industry in Ghana, it is believed that there has been a shift, however small, in Ghana’s maintenance culture, especially in the real estate industry, for the better. This study set out to assess the effect of facilities management (FM) on maintenance culture improvement in the Ghanaian real estate market. Primary data was collected through questionnaire administration. The questionnaire included both structured and unstructured forms of questions. Majority of respondents believed that the future of facilities management in Ghana was bright. Eighty six percent (86 %) of respondents thought FM has found footing in Ghana and 75 % of respondents said the future of FM in Ghana was “very good”. Most of the respondents (66 %) considered maintenance of facilities more important than the growth of a business, suggesting that 34 % of respondents felt that growth of a business was more important than maintenance of facilities. One of the reasons proposed by respondent for this stance was that an inadequately maintained business cannot grow. Businesses do have a good working knowledge of facilities management. However, there is some level of difficulty in distinguishing between facilities management and property management. Based on the findings and conclusions made, it is strongly recommended that staff of real estate businesses be given regular refresher courses on facilities management (FM) to help them keep abreast of new knowledge and trends in the industry to enable them fully maximize the potential of buildings.

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Key Terms
maintenance culture in ghana

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