Facilities Management and Performance of Office Buildings in Lagos Metropolis.
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2013
Authors
Koleoso H.A.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
The real impact of facilities management (FM) varies with the socio-economic context of its application and invariably with the degree of effectiveness of the service. This research is motivated by an attempt to develop a scale of measures for evaluating the effectiveness of FM that is relevant to the Nigerian socio-economic context and using this scale, evaluate the direct effect that FM has on the performance of office buildings in the environment. This would guide organisational executives in making strategic decisions and the legislative arm of government in formulating policies that will enable FM play more important role in economic growth. The research adopts cross sectional survey design. Data were obtained using self-administered questionnaires that were served on users of purpose-built office buildings in Lagos metropolis and the facilities managers or support service providers (SSP) of these buildings. Multi-staged sampling combining stratified and random sampling was used to select the sample size of 492, made up of 369 building users and 123 SSPs respectively. Statistical tools employed include means, ranking, factor analysis, multiple correlation and multiple regression analyses. The four hypotheses that were postulated were tested using one sample t test, Wilcoxon rank signed test, t test for significance of correlation coefficient and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) of F ratio respectively. Using respondents’ perception on the importance of the featured measures, this research developed a multi-item scale of 41 measures for evaluating effectiveness of FM. This scale brought to light a new category of measure (crisis response and management) with two dimensions which makes it appropriate for the peculiar Nigerian context and by extension to the context of the developing world, where infrastructural provisions are inadequate and regulatory and standardisation policies and enforcement are poor. The two dimensions “response plan to public and building service emergencies” and “response plan to poor regulatory policies and standards enforcements” which evidence shows that have not featured in any previous researches, comprise 12 different measures. Four (4) of these were rated among the first 10 most important measures, further justifying the inclusion of this category as an innovation in this study. It was also found that the performance of office buildings in Lagos metropolis is significantly less than satisfactory. The study indicates that buildings in the study performed most satisfactorily in aspects of internal ambient comfort, flexibility of internal layout and physical control of equipment, while issues of health, safety and management of emergencies were of major concerns. The study established that there are sufficiently marked differences between the performance of building attributes in this study and those of past works, probably because of the differences in the contexts of the researches. Hence supporting the notion that researches on performance in FM must be context based, to be informative. Office buildings that are managed using strategic FM principles were found to be performing significantly better than those where non-strategic FM principles were applied. Another key finding is that there is a direct strong positive relationship indicated by a correlation coefficient of 0.8 (at 99% probability), between the effectiveness of FM and building performance. It was also indicated that the effectiveness of FM is responsible for 63% of the variation in office building performance and is therefore a significant predictor of this variable. A mathematical model with the equation BPV = 3.60 + 0.37SCAE + 0.31GQP + 0.23TP + 0.12PSBE + 0.14PRSE is proposed for predicting a numerical score for performance of buildings based on FM service input and reflecting challenges of the Nigerian context. Thus, providing a tool for quantitative comparison of building performance and FM effectiveness, and a means for qualitative FM decisions. It is recommended that the legislative arm of government and other stakeholders should be sensitised to the potential gains of this tool and FM as indicated in this research. Furthermore, appropriate regulatory and standardisation policies must be formulated and implemented to improve facilities managers’ response and management of building and public service emergencies in the spate of accident, fire, health and other emergencies in buildings across the country.
Description
A Thesis Submitted to the School of Postgraduate Studies, University of Lagos.
Keywords
Facilities management , Office Building , Lagos metropolis , Research Subject Categories::TECHNOLOGY::Materials science::Construction materials
Citation
Hikmot, A.K (2013), Facilities Management and Performance of Office Buildings in Lagos Metropolis. Thesis Submitted to University of Lagos School of Postgraduate Studies Phd Thesis and Dissertation, 315pp.