FEATURE
programme, the software looks at what it is they do and then the companies are offered sustainability learning options that are tailored to their personal requirements.
For example, it knows that a demolition worker doesn’t need to know about sustainability in the build environment. Conversely, though, they will get to know things that are important to them and their needs.
WHAT SPARKED THE NEED
FOR AN FM SCHOOL? There was a real push from some of the partners in the school that had FM interests to expand. Skanska, Carillion and Kier were all part of the Construction School but had quite big FM roots, so the thinking was we can’t really run a sustainability school without an FM sector. You can’t have construction companies building a building and then not knowing how to look after it properly and in a sustainable way, hence the FM School was born.
That once again has been a success, we’ve had a number of companies that have joined us now just because they want to join the FM school. We’ve got companies like Sodexo who have joined us quite recently, Emcor and Grosvenor who has a really big interest in FM so it’s really brought a new dimension to the school, and has meant we have had to completely redesign the whole web delivery system to differentiate between the various sectors within the school.
We’ve got new e-learning modules, a new self-assessment programme, a whole raft of different materials and case studies all aimed at FM so it’s all very exciting!
THE SUSTAINABILITY SCHOOL OFFERS BADGES, HOW HARD ARE THEY TO GET? WHAT DO YOU HAVE
TO DO TO QUALIFY? Self-assessment; the system gives you learning at an appropriate level, through the 500-odd resources in the school, then it gives you an online action plan, you do another assessment and receive another action plan and so on.
www.tomorrowsfm.com
LOOKING AT YOUR ROSTER, THERE’S A LOT OF BIG NAME PARTNERS INVOLVED, HOW DID YOU CHOOSE THEM?
WHO APPROACHED WHOM? It’s been a combination really – we don’t have a very loud pedal on marketing, it tends to be more word-of-mouth. In the case of Sodexo for instance, we were introduced by a mutual friend at a company called Covance that supplies laboratory facilities for the pharmaceutical sector.
DO YOU HAVE ANY INVOLVEMENT WITH TEACHING OR IS IT JUST
SEMINARS AND WEBINARS? It’s a bit of both, we have about 70% delivered through 30 e-learning modules. We also have workshops and supplier days that are really useful where groups come along and we introduce them to the school.
For the more advanced learners we are starting to develop best-practice workshops, whereby people who are self-assessing at higher levels are being asked to pass on their skills to those at a lower level. We bring in a facilitator and they help each other and they go from being students to net contributors to the school.
When you reach the top of the self- assessment tree, we ask you to do things like; make video case studies, or run a workshop, so it starts to become a sort of iterative learning process where people are learning from their peers.
HOW DO YOU ENCOMPASS THE VARIOUS SCHOOLS INTO
THE SELF-ASSESSMENT? We have just launched a new website, it’s quite intuitive in that you click or touch on whatever is relevant and that takes you to your section. Once you’re in the FM section it’ll give you the FM assessment and the FM learning packs, alongside more common elements like sustainable procurement, climate change and change management that are largely relevant across the schools,
then there are additional things like Energy Management, which is very different in FM to in Construction.
The website development is continuing as we are opening a construction school in Australia next month. Similarly, you might not think it but Wales has some pretty localised elements.
YOU WERE CHAIR OF SUSTAINABLE LONDON 2012, PEOPLE ARE ALWAYS TALKING ABOUT ‘THE OLYMPIC LEGACY’ DO YOU THINK SUSTAINABILITY HAS EXPERIENCED THE SAME
INCREASE IN PROFILE? Obviously I have a vested interest in the Olympics, but there is no doubt that London 2012 raised the bar and made people realise just how difficult it is to achieve some of these objectives!
Just telling the suppliers to ‘get on with it’ and expecting them to, when you’re asking them to do something completely new is a bridge too far, so projects like the Olympics and Crossrail have really raised the bar.
Corporate expectation also had an impact; from Balfour Beattie, Skanska and Sodexo who have their own CSR policies now, they are really starting to drive things. On top of that, we have to look at the ‘right place right time’ factor. In the past the sort of techniques that have been used to try and drive sustainability were made like the health and safety policies from back in the day; instructions in contracts and questionnaires are audited to death to make sure they’re doing as they’re meant to. It worked for those industries but it doesn’t work here because sustainability isn’t so systematic; it’s a much broader concept, and constantly changing.
So for me a process of supply chain development rather than enforcement is the right strategy, and the school is the embodiment of that. We just apply a little bit of thinking and say ‘this is the way to go about it’.
www.supplychainschool.co.uk TOMORROW’S FM | 23
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