Blogs

The Framework for Improving Building Operating Decisions is a research project being conducted at The University of Reading in partnership with Penn State. The goal of the research is to develop a concise and practical web-based decision support tool to help facility managers and facility management...

The change in administrations in Washington, D.C., is likely to mean many changes in the way federal agencies and departments operate, and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) probably is no exception. OSHA’s aggressiveness in enforcing workplace safety laws tends to vary by...

Admit it. Maintenance and engineering management generally hasn’t been considered a trendy profession. And the shortage of front-line technicians that has plagued maintenance and engineering departments for years is pretty strong evidence people generally don’t see jobs in facilities maintenance...

Presidential candidates make a lot of promises. It’s part of the game, so nobody believes they’ll keep most of them. Presidents-elect do the same thing, but maybe there’s a difference. Maybe — given they’ve already won election — there is reason to hope a president...

I was wondering whether to buy tomatoes as I walked through the mid-sized grocery store in my neighborhood the other day. Like everyone else, I was concerned about getting sick from eating contaminated tomatoes. In the produce section next to the tomatoes was a sign. It reported the concerns about tomatoes...

One day, facility designers will learn it pays to listen to maintenance early in process of designing a facility. Unfortunately, that day still seems far away for many organizations. Chris Matt, the associate editor of Maintenance Solutions , recounted a recent conversation he’d had with a maintenance...

In some form or fashion, all information seems to be on the Internet. For more than a decade now, managers have been able to tap into its power and find information on solving nearly any problem that arose in their facilities. One problem with this information explosion — finding exactly the information...

The April cover article in Maintenance Solutions magazine helped me better understand a harsh reality for managers in commercial and institutional facilities. Despite their knowledge of facilities and an understanding of what it takes to make building operations successful, maintenance and engineering...

I’m almost three years removed from my educational experience at the University of Minnesota. But the first time I saw the Twin Cities campus is still fresh in my memory. I signed up for a campus tour in the dead of winter – my first mistake – as a high school senior. We began our chilly...

It’s easy to see why many organizations are drawn to the designs of famous architects. Their buildings can generate good publicity for a company and go a long way in defining its image. But a big name on the front end of a project can lead to huge problems on the back end. Cities are dotted with...