Investing in the right FM skills

The current economic climate and the stringent cuts to the public services budgets are producing challenges to the facilities management and estates organisations in the health and social care sectors. The organisations are under pressure to deliver more efficiencies and their service providers are being asked to provide more for less to support service delivery.
    
This is an on-going challenge and some have questioned whether it is even possible to produce more savings, claiming that with fewer resources, standards of service will inevitably drop. However, despite concerns about service levels and the effects on services to clients, many FM and estates managers are also recognising that their organisation must have the right skills in its workforce to deliver the operational efficiencies and manage change.

INVESTING IN SKILLS
There is growing evidence that both FM clients and FM suppliers in healthcare are looking at ways to use skills development to ensure effective operations and implement the process of change. Suppliers to the healthcare sector are being asked to show evidence of investment in skills at all levels and in many public sector contracts, training requirements are becoming increasingly specific and geared towards accredited programmes such as apprenticeships. Investment in skills and particularly apprenticeships also helps support succession planning within the FM and estates teams, with directly employed or via service providers.
    
Despite the economic challenges, Asset Skills has seen increased skills activity and interest among employers during the first year of operating its new UK Academy for Business Services. In May 2010 the academy was set up by Asset Skills as a pilot to support the delivery of FM qualifications and specifically the new Apprenticeship in Facilities Management.
    
It has gone from strength to strength in its first year. Essentially, the academy is a network organisation which provides a direct service to employers looking for support on skills development and training. Employers are able to join the academy to access account management services which enable them to locate the right programmes or qualification and access a selected network of training providers and funding where this is available. The employer membership of the academy has continued to grow, initially with FM service supplier companies working in both private and public sectors but increasingly with a number of client FM organisations from a variety of backgrounds.
    
Initially one of the key roles of the academy was to establish a network of training providers willing and able to deliver the new FM Apprenticeship. One of the drivers behind setting it up was employer feedback about the challenges of finding accredited training providers willing and able to work with a demanding sector such as facilities management which requires flexibility and business focus. The initial pilot groups put forward by the first employers who wanted candidates to undertake the new qualifications helped the network to develop and the apprenticeship to gain a track record of success.
    
There is now a network of training providers working under the UK Academy banner, including further education colleges and private training companies providing coverage throughout England.  

The FM Apprenticeship
The employers who have registered staff onto the Apprenticeship in Facilities Management programme have mostly used it as a way of developing the skills of existing employees. As apprenticeships are essentially a package of qualifications, they work well for this purpose in any sector of the economy and are not just a tool to bring young people into an industry.         
As the average age profile and entry age of the FM industry is more mature, the longer term value of the apprenticeship is primarily going as a vehicle for improving the skills profile of the current workforce. This makes it a particularly useful programme for an area such as healthcare where there is a real need to address issues of succession planning and ensure the next generation of senior managers is progressing.
    
The apprenticeship now has a valuable track record as a development tool for employers who want to improve their workforce’s management skills and FM knowledge in the context of their job roles. It can also be extensively customised to an individual organisation’s culture. The programme can be adapted to the needs of the healthcare sector and units can be selected to reflect the requirements of either a property/estates based role or a facilities/services role. Customising can even include selecting whether the term ‘apprenticeship’ is actually used. Where the organisation would prefer not to use it as a title, because it might be less attractive to older employees, the training provider can deliver the programme under an internal title.

Funding
The Asset Skills UK Academy for Business Services handled more than 200 employer enquiries during its pilot year and has just produced its first annual report. Enquiries have resulted in more than 300 candidates being referred for a variety of accredited programmes including 150 apprenticeships.
    
Most of the training has been in facilities management but as the academy aims to provide a one-stop-service for employers, a wide range of programmes have been sourced including higher level programmes in FM (such as the British Institute of Facilities Management [BIFM] qualifications) and accredited qualifications in related service sectors that support FM and estates management such as maintenance operations, cleaning and support services, administration, customer services and catering, including food hygiene.
    
It is estimated that the value of these qualifications in terms of funding accessed by the employers through the academy is circa £700,000 of apprenticeship funding and £137,000 for other accredited programmes. The academy will continue to respond to the wide range of requirements and is building network capacity in any service areas required by employers.
    
Other Asset Skills projects have been successful in expanding take up of the Apprenticeship in FM. In Wales, funding was secured to deliver the apprenticeship to pilot groups with one of the key objectives to develop a sustainable network of training providers for the future who will continue to develop a profile for FM qualifications in Wales. There have also been developments in Scotland where the approval of the Level 3 Modern Apprenticeship in Facilities Management (A-level equivalent) and a Level 2 Facilities Services Apprenticeship (GCSE equivalent) by the Scottish Qualifications Authority is giving potential candidates access to qualifications and encouraging training providers in Scotland.
    
Asset Skills, through the UK Academy, has also been successful in attracting the first funding to support the employers wishing to undertake higher development programmes in facilities management. This has resulted in additional pilot groups undertaking the Level 4 BIFM Certificates. Also, as a result of this investment by government, new centres have been accredited by the BIFM which has increased national coverage for their qualifications.
    
The academy sees activity and support for higher level skills as being one of the growth areas into 2011/12. Funding support for BIFM qualifications is likely to continue and there is renewed interest in the FM Foundation Degree programmes. We are also anticipating increased activity related to carbon reduction and sustainability, which will see a new raft of accredited qualifications emerging in energy advice for the commercial sector linked to the Government’s new Green Deal policy. This will be of interest to many in the FM sector looking to formalise and develop their skills in this area.

A challenging and uncertain future
The financial and organisational challenges for the public sector and particularly healthcare will continue for the foreseeable future.
    
The facilities and estates management functions will have a significant role to play in supporting the drive towards greater efficiency. Some of this may come from a greater level of outsourcing where the burden will be placed on the service suppliers in the outsourcing industry. However, the common consensus is that the outsourcing industry will only experience minimal growth in 2011 – Treasury forecasts predict growth of just one per cent. In the longer term it is believed that the potential UK market for facilities management may increase over the next five years with the continued trend towards outsourcing potentially offering future growth opportunities for facilities management suppliers.
    
Whichever predictions prove correct there seems to be recognition that FM skills will one of the most valuable assets within the public sector, and investment in developing the skills base is essential to achieve efficiency and contribute to growth, for individual employers and for the public sector as a whole.

Karen Waterlow is Specialist Adviser for FM at Asset Skills, the Sector Skills Council for Facilities Management

FOR MORE INFORMATION
For further information on the UK Academy for Business Services, email ukacademy@assetskills.org or call 0844 822 2525. Alternatively, visit www.assetskills.org/ukacademy.