The International Facilities Management Association's World Workplace Conference and Expo is the largest and most exciting event of the year for facility management professionals. This year, the Greater Phoenix Chapter of IFMA hosted the event at the Phoenix Convention Center.
What We Learned at IFMA's World Workplace Conference and Expo
The theme was “Take Your Facility and Your Career to New Heights,” the event featured a full roster of events and keynote speeches. Our executive team spent last week meeting with facilities management professionals worldwide. Here's what we learned!

1. Education is the Foundation of Facilities Management
IFMA Chair John Carrillo, CFM, IFMA Fellow, welcomed a near record-breaking audience to World Workplace with a grand opening speech about the future of Facilities Management and the FM Foundation.

Advancing the Built Environment and the Facilities Management profession through Education Research Scholarships continues to be the foundation of IFMA's focus.

2. Be a "We Thinker." There is no us and them. It's just us.
Each year, IFMA invites renowned speakers to its flagship educational and networking event, which provides attendees with fresh outlooks on leadership, expert guidance on challenges specific to facility management, and inventive ideas for achieving personal and professional goals.

Robyn Benincasa, the world champion eco-challenge adventure racer and best-selling author, was this year's most energizing keynote speaker. She gave an engaging speech about leadership, teamwork, and commitment.

"What makes us valuable is what we're willing to learn along the way," says Benincasa. When things go wrong, she says, the best thing you can do to help the team is laugh... then move on and sort it out. Be a "We Thinker". No, us and them. Just us."

3. Building Technology is Getting Smarter
John Rimer of FM360consulting gave an insightful session on how building technology has changed and why it's more important than ever for facilities professionals to leverage these advancements.

4. Facility Condition Assessment and Analytics for Better Capital Planning
Derek McGarry gave an insightful session on how condition-based analytics can help facility teams make better decisions about when to allocate Capital Expenditures to HVAC expenditure and, therefore, avoid spending money unnecessarily on premature upgrades.

Not surprisingly, this was one of the most popular sessions at the show this year. Regular Facility Condition Assessments are critical for accurate capital planning. Maintaining safe and adequate facilities relies on a thorough condition assessment strategy, but an FCA is more than a simple building inspection. As we know from working with our clients, facility executives and managers often oversee multiple buildings that vary in age, design, construction methods and materials, and building codes.
Understanding the whole system is essential when performing an FCA for capital planning purposes. This will help managers decide where capital investment will have the most impact. We advise our clients to formulate an FCA strategy incorporating walk-through inspections and mathematical modeling. This strategy provides a baseline that empowers organizations to complete tasks and facilitates capital planning.
To maximize returns on equipment expenditures, the longevity of physical assets must be ensured. Therefore, determining the vitality and lifecycle of your assets is essential. Our FOUNDATION Solution employs an FCA strategy that measures critical metrics in your facilities, such as physicality, performance, probability, and productivity. This comprehensive data will help you better determine equipment vitality and ensure you have the best insights to make your capital investments in physical assets count!
5. Space Utilization and AI
Artificial Intelligence technologies are making a significant impact on both society and the facilities management industry. This session explored how Facilities Managers can leverage current AI capabilities to improve Space Utilization and increase contributions to revenue and efficiency in facilities management.

Facilities Managers will be empowered to make smarter, more informed space planning decisions utilizing AI and machine learning. These enhanced techniques help extract deeper insights from diverse data types to create enhanced workspaces, reduce costs, and increase employee retention and engagement.
Moving the Built Environment FORWARD
Meeting with so many intelligent and thoughtful leaders in the facilities management industry was a pleasure!

From Assessments to Capital Planning—Build your FOUNDATION with us.
Ready to learn more about how we can help your organization to be more productive and profitable?