FM - not for the feebly managed

Looking to diversify into a new multi-billion market? One with margins (reportedly for some, 15%)? Why not try facilities management? It's a logical offshoot from contracting, you know the clients already and the potential is simply huge. Attaboy!

If this all sounds too good to be true, you're right. The truth, as our survey starting on page 24 shows clearly, is that this is a market which must be viewed with extreme care. Facilities management, or FM as everyone refers to it, is a complex, sophisticated and extremely demanding business that will stretch even the best contractors in all sorts of unexpected ways. With a parent company reputation on the line, FM divisions should not be set up lightly as an easy option to losing money in construction.

That's the downside. To be more positive, FM could be the perfect opportunity to all contractors that take the concept of client service seriously. For empathising with others is the key. To those contractors who have genuinely discovered through fee contracting what being on the client's side really means, then FM will indeed prove a logical extension of that win-win concept.

To those who pay lip service to the service mentality, FM will be as disastrous as management contracting was to the mediocre builder. Given there are many excellent non-building disciplines eager for a slice of the FM cake, it is up to construction to prove that its vast experience of managing diverse activities makes it uniquely well placed to lead the way.