Más del 50% de la gestión de todas las instalaciones ahora se subcontrata. Antes de seguir el ejemplo, decida si es un diferenciador para su negocio

It turns out that this trend has been on the upswing in recent years. According to Mackenzie, “outsourcing has now surpassed 50 percent of the total facilities management market in several regions, including Europe, Middle East, and North America.”

What does this mean for technicians, facilities managers, internal teams and the future of maintenance? Well, I think there are two main things to consider. First, I think there’s an organizational question of whether outsourcing is the best decision for a particular company, which depends upon how it works in concert with advanced Internet of Things and predictive maintenance technologies as well as whether it serves as a differentiator. And, second, I think it’s interesting to consider how outsourcing may shift existing labor resources.

In combination with IoT, outsourcing may be a powerful solution

Over the past several years, we've seen many examples where the Internet of Things can be successfully combined with predictive maintenance strategies. An Industry Today article cited a survey that showed PdM improved 60 percent of participants’ uptime by an average of 9 percent and reduced costs for 45 percent of the participants by an average of 12 percent. Nearly half of respondents were able to extend the life of aging equipment by an average of 20 percent as a result of fewer equipment breakdowns and as-needed maintenance.

When this technology is combined with outsourcing that’s provided by equipment manufacturers or their service providers, I think the results could be incredible. Not only do equipment manufacturers have a higher level of expertise, but with IoT technology, they will be able to remotely monitor and optimize thousands of pieces of the same equipment. This means they can now have access to near real-time equipment health, allowing for extremely targeted and effective predictive maintenance services. Although this may be a bit more costly to the manufacturing customer, the quality could be exponentially greater.

I think companies that can take advantage of that kind of scale may want to seriously consider outsourcing as an excellent cost cutting alternative. For example, commercial boilers that are used as part of a major heating, ventilating, and air conditioning system may be served well by the commercial boiler manufacturer. That service provider not only understands the boiler equipment intimately but may be able to use sophisticated sensors to monitor real-time health of boilers throughout their customer base. As soon as a boiler performs outside of an acceptable, predefined range, that service provider can be immediately notified and send out a qualified technician to perform predictive maintenance before significant damage occurs. 

Be Careful Before Outsourcing As It'll Commoditize Your Business

While outsourcing can be a good solution for some organizations, I think that it can be a big mistake for businesses trying to use their facilities to differentiate. For some of our customers, maintenance and facilities management is part of their core business and serves as a powerful differentiator in an increasingly competitive marketplace. For example, one of our customers is an upscale mall on the west coast. They have chosen to keep all of their facilities management in-house because part of the overall mall experience includes the cleanliness, presentation, and operation of the facility overall. A high-performing facilities management team serves as a differentiator for that customer.

I've seen this happen where best-in-class facilities are known for their management. Everyone in the industry knows that their internal maintenance department is responsible for lowering overall costs, increasing reliability, and producing higher quality products. Maintenance and facilities management is part of their competitive advantage.

In this case, I think outsourcing transforms a competitive advantage into simply a commodity. That’s why I think companies should carefully consider whether maintenance and facilities management can be a differentiator before pursuing outsourcing alternatives.

Outsourcing may shift the labor pool and present better career opportunities

On a related note, I think internal maintenance teams are becoming more difficult to staff because they require generalists, which are too often jack of all trades, master of none. In addition, artificial intelligence and machine learning are beginning to automate basic tasks that have frequently been performed by generalists. It may be difficult to achieve the desired wage growth as a generalist for a company or even remain relevant as technology continues to grow in sophistication.

On the other hand, opportunities for field service technicians are growing. According to Zippia, the projected job growth for field service technicians is 4 percent from 2018-2028 and salaries have increased 16 percent for field service technicians in the last five years. Maintenance technicians who are experts on a specific, complex asset will be in high demand. I think we may see an increase in these types of positions as equipment manufacturers add service offerings with the maturing of IoT and predictive maintenance technologies. Both opportunities and wages might go up in this area. 

Conclusion

I think it's clear that the trend toward more outsourcing will continue as facilities seek ways to reduce costs. As an organization, it will be important for you to weigh the benefits of outsourcing combined with sophisticated IoT and predictive maintenance technologies against the question of potential commoditization that outsourcing can cause.

At the same time, I think it will be interesting to see how outsourcing will affect the existing labor pool, talent shortages, and upskilling initiatives moving into the future.