Table of contents for Issue 4-2023 in Facility Management

The affordability of insurance is at risk without measures to reduce the risk of damage from floods and bushfires, according to the Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) in its latest annual ‘Insurance Catastrophe Resilience Report 2022-23’. As premium costs soar due to increasing disaster concern and inflation, the ICA is worried that significant portions of the insurance industry could further reduce the liability of potential payouts by restricting policy offerings, which would create gaps in some types of coverage. “We need long-term investment in resilience and mitigation infrastructure to reduce the impact of disasters before they occur,” says ICA president Nick Hawkins. Personal claims have comprised the vast majority of recent catastrophe insurance, but from the 2022 floods in Victoria, New South Wales and Tasmania, commercial claims still totalled $118…

Shane Hryhorec was in the early days of starting up Push Mobility, a business providing disability equipment, when he found himself stumped at an important primary hurdle. He had to find the right real estate to house his growing venture and, as both a wheelchair user and someone who offered a service to people with disability, he needed that space to be accessible. “I looked all over the state and it was so difficult to find accessible real estate. There's no filter at all, so you can't go on realestate.com.au and try to filter out anything accessible. It just doesn't exist,” Hryhorec tells Facility Management. So he had to ring around to find a place, which was a pain, and even when he did find suitable workspaces they were rarely…

The triumphant 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup saw more fans pack into stadiums across Australia and New Zealand than ever before in the event’s history, with almost two million total people attending tournament games, beating FIFA’s initial crowd forecasts by over 500,000. Each one of these patrons carried distinct identity signatures that may be the future of facility security. But they are signatures that, at this time, are subject to a debate around unclear tracking in Australian stadiums. As facial recognition and other biometric technologies become available to FMs, the temptation to implement security systems built upon them has grown, but ethical adoption seems abstruse. Confusing consent requirements, privacy challenges and a lacking regulatory environment complicate this landscape. Facility Management speaks to an expert about the concerns surrounding the deployment…

More Australian corporate businesses plan to increase or maintain their existing office space requirements over the next three years than those planning to downsize, according to the recently released Australian figures from Knight Frank’s (Y)OURSPACE report. The report reflects the priorities and challenges of senior leaders responsible for real estate decisions at over 350 firms, which collectively employ more than 10 million people. A total of 57 percent of businesses surveyed in Australia indicated they would upsize (45 percent) or maintain the same space (12 percent), compared with 45 percent saying they would decrease their size requirements. Knight Frank Australia chief economist Ben Burston says the results showed many companies were planning to make meaningful changes in both directions as they navigate a more complicated operating environment in the post-COVID…

Worldwide cleaning industry association, ISSA, is excited to return to Melbourne for what is set to be its largest expo to date, bringing together leading experts, innovators, professionals and over 90 exhibitors showcasing the latest products and services over two days. The show anticipates over 3000 attendees will descend upon the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre on 1-2 November, from facility and building managers to contract cleaners, healthcare and aged care representatives, as well as individuals from the government and the education sectors. “Where else in Australia can you meet with so many leading manufacturers, distributors and wholesalers in one location, demonstrating their innovations and sharing their industry insight?” asks ISSA Oceania Advisory Council chair Stuart Nicol. “The ISSA Cleaning and Hygiene Expo allows for the opportunity to meet face-to-face…

Two opposing forces are placing us in the middle of what one sustainable design expert calls a “built environment contradiction”. On the one hand, the United Nations estimates that three billion people will need access to adequate housing by 2030. On the other, buildings and construction are responsible for a monumental share of global greenhouse gas emissions. “We have a moral and ethical obligation to build. The flipside of that is, every time we build, there’s an environmental impact and it’s most often a negative environmental impact. For every square metre we build, typically we’ll commit somewhere between 400 and 1000 kilograms of CO2,” says Associate Professor Philip Oldfield from UNSW’s School of Built Environment. “For me, it’s one of the greatest challenges in our profession in the 21st century,…

Modern workplaces are placing a lot of emphasis on staff perks to attract prospective talent – and to lure existing employees from the comforts of their home offices Coffee is almost the lowest-hanging office perk, the amenity that many can agree does a lot of heavy lifting for productivity and provides small pockets of joy on long, stressful days. According to Marco Zancolò, the CEO of Franke Coffee Systems and a former executive at Nespresso, a coffee corner is even the “unofficial communication space of a company”. “That is where the unofficial chit chat happens, where you can solve problems fast,” he explains. “Instead of sending an email, you just meet for a coffee, you chat with your colleague and you get things done.” During the pandemic, Zancolò saw this…

New South Wales is introducing the new Sustainable Buildings State Environmental Planning Policy (SEPP) on 1 October 2023, encouraging sustainable development by requiring that the embodied emissions of construction materials are considered and measured. Embodied carbon describes the carbon emissions produced during construction, including the manufacturing and transportation of materials. More attention has previously been given to reducing operational carbon emissions (the carbon dioxide emitted by ongoing operation of a building), neglecting high carbon costs of upfront construction. According to the NSW Government, the policy is expected to result in 2.6 million tonnes of avoided greenhouse gas emissions over the next decade, the equivalent of planting more than eight million trees or running 54 wind turbines for 10 years. The policy includes new standards for NSW’s Building Sustainability Index, which…

Atdec’s Ora monitor arm Ora is Atdec’s new flagship monitor arm for single and dual monitor setups in commercial workspaces. It recently won a 2023 Australian Good Design Award based on its full feature performance, fast installation at scale and easy ergonomic adjustment. Equal performance with flat and curved monitors was central to Ora’s design mandate, making the arm suitable for more than 85 percent of monitors sold globally in the past 12 months, according to Adtec. Sensibo’s Airbend Airbend is a smart platform that allows facilities managers to remotely manage all their HVAC and air quality monitoring devices from one centralised dashboard. With Airbend, FMs can set smart rules and parameters to optimise air-conditioner usage and air quality in individual offices. It can alert relevant parties to polluted spaces…

Facility Management: Can you tell us a bit about what you did before you became a facilities manager? Victoria Bardsen: I actually arrived in Australia 13 years ago and I started as a cleaner at 101 Collins Street, Melbourne. I was there for a few years and worked my way up, so from a cleaner, I was a supervisor, then I was a cleaning manager at 717 Bourke Street. I worked with Consolidated Property Services for nearly 10 years. When I was there, Knight Frank approached me and asked if I would like to come and work with them and I said yes! I didn't have much experience, I do have to say that, but it was great that they gave me the opportunity and I had an amazing operations…

Workplace needs are not only constantly evolving, they differ in specificity depending on the individual office and office worker. The interior design and architectural agency Futurespace recognises this need to design office spaces that extend beyond the traditional realm of the workspace and meagre lunch room to instead encompass a fusion of requirements: spaces for working, learning, meeting with clients and guests, entertaining and relaxing. Additionally, one of the many lessons Futurespace learned from the pandemic-induced transformation of the workplace is that routines and spaces must optimise employee wellness. Affectionately dubbed ‘The Works’, the Futurespace-designed office spaces for the Australian plumbing and bathroom supplies business, Reece, demonstrate a clear understanding of these requirements. The offices, which have just been shortlisted in the Interior Design Excellence Awards (IDEA), show that a…