“Work smarter, not harder.”
We’ve all heard this slogan and I’m sure many facility executives tell it to their staff members frequently. I know I’m guilty of proclaiming it to my team. Cliche or not, it’s the first thing that came to mind when looking over this year’s class of Vision Awards winners.
If you’re not familiar, every year we honor product innovations in the industry through the FacilitiesNet Vision Awards program. A panel of judges recognizes three winning submissions, as well as a couple runners-up who just missed the high score, in 12 different product categories.
The theme of many winning products this year is to find ways to maximize labor. In an industry where any help, let alone qualified candidates, is scarce, any option to do more with less is welcomed. By utilizing the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI), these new innovations are capable of monitoring facility operations and alerting users when the tracked data doesn’t add up, indicating something is about to go wrong. Whether it’s tracking environmental quality, water usage and pressure, or suspect visitors, smart technology provides eyes and ears remotely 24/7, giving facility executives assurance their buildings are running efficiently and securely, while also freeing up time to focus on other issues.
Other Vision Awards winners help teams replace manual labor for new, skilled positions. For example, operating power-washing drones or running autonomous mowers. These new tech-based positions require skill sets marketable to a new generation of workers, which would help attract younger professionals into this aging industry.
Facility managers can see innovations like these — including Vision Awards winners — at the NFMT Remix show in Orlando, Florida, this October. This event is a great opportunity to learn about the new technology disrupting the industry. In addition to the exhibit hall where these products will be on display, several conference sessions will discuss how to leverage AI, IoT and other technology to be more proactive with facility operations.
Dan Weltin is the Editor-in-Chief of the Facility Market for TPMG. He has more than 20 years of writing for the facility industry.
