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Compliance Games, the world for FM in 2012

Facilities Managers play an increasingly important role for their organisation’s compliance and not just with the obvious area of health and safety. The scope has widened in recent years to cover environmental, financial and energy related risks; each having its own set of new and changing rules and regulations.

On your marks..

With the Olympics looming large on the horizon and uncertainty still present in the global and national economic markets, what does the compliance crystal ball for 2012 look like for FM?

Professor Löfstedt’s report for the government on health and safety has provided much to keep everyone guessing. A major change is likely to be the formation of a new “challenge panel” that allows business to address cases of incorrect or over application of health and safety legislation by inspectors.

Alongside this should come the opportunity for sector specific consolidation of regulations in 2012.

There may be some changes to bring greater alignment between the enforcing authorities especially to address apparent inconsistencies in enforcement between HSE and local authorities. This will help FMs with a range of property responsibilities that include high and low hazard mixes such as offices and separate manufacturing sites.  To help FMs in smaller organisations a review of all Approved Codes of practice (ACOPs) has been called for and an initial phase is due to be completed by June.

How all these changes will provide for something better than previous “simplification plans” will be interesting to see and only time will tell, when this race is run.

Get set..

On the environmental side of compliance, there is again the potential for considerable change next year. With the Olympics, sustainability in the form of legacy is the theme, for organisations environmental sustainability has been more about ethos and image. With increasing regulation however clear lanes of compliance based performance are also being painted in.

FMs will do well to remember that allowances under the Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRC) will need to be purchased in April 2012. The recent publication of the first league tables under the CRC was largely met with silence by the broader media as well as our own market sector media, so FMs may need to explain again these allowances to a board of directors still ignorant of their obligations.

Finally, if 2011 is anything to go by, we will also see further inconsistencies in our local climate with unseasonably warm periods coupled with spells of high precipitation. Be the latter rain or snow, it will no doubt again cause problems for those not prepared.

Go!!

These are just some of the compliance areas FMs cover as part of the day job. The on going responsibilities don’t go away and we live in an increasingly litigious society meaning that FMs need to keep on their toes to avoid unnecessary and wholly avoidable actions against them and their organisations. The need for truly trusted advisers has never been greater and is likely to increase in 2012 and beyond.

Compliance is not about peaking at the right time (that is for our Olympians) it is about ongoing consistency and purpose. For those wanting to take a proactive stance it is about intelligent risk management and making sure you have the right level of control in place to manage your risks competently, effectively and demonstrably.

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