DIN EN 15221-7:2013-01

Effective delivery of Facility Management support is a critical component in the working of most organisations. It impacts on the organisations' own ability to deliver consistent products and services, supports the core business and can be a component in achieving competitive advantage. However, effectiveness and efficiency in Facility Management have been notoriously difficult to assess because there have been no common methodology and no standard data collection methods. This standard on Performance Benchmarking, along with others in the EN 15221 series, is a major step forward in addressing those gaps. Benchmarking is part of a process which aims to establish the scope for, and benefits of, potential improvements in an organisation through systematic comparison of its performance with that of one or more other organisations. It is a tool in common use across industries worldwide, but has often been misused and misunderstood within Facility Management. Benchmarking is often associated with the term 'best practice'. Comparison with the best company or process within an industry is one of the most intelligent ways to improve one's own performance. Best practice can refer to adequate outcomes at the lowest cost, but this is not always the case. It can also refer to the best possible outcome, or the speediest process, or the one with the least environmental impact. What is common to all these is that no judgement on where one's organisation stands can be made without a valid comparison. Before starting an FM Benchmarking operation, it is highly recommended to clearly position it regarding to the four main aspects presented just below and then use the content of this standard to prepare and perform the benchmarking operation. This standard takes as a starting point the idea that Benchmarking can take very different forms depending on four aspects: a) the perspective of the initiator performing the benchmarking process; b) the objectives of the benchmarking process set by the initiator. These objectives are usually linked. They might include the following broad categories of objectives, which are set out in more detail in the standard: 1) find new ideas; 2) get data to prepare a main decision or to resolve disputes; 3) to reduce costs while maintaining a similar service level received or provided; 4) improve the service level received or provided while maintaining similar costs; 5) improve the use of resources; c) The point in time at which the organisation is considering performing an FM benchmarking operation; d) The benchmarking sample used for comparison, mostly: 1) similar sector of primary activities, where comparisons are easier; 2) other sectors of primary activities where the interest is mainly to find possible improvements. Financial comparisons can be an appropriate basis for a benchmarking process as quantitative data are often more easy to reach and more easy to relate to than qualitative data. Historically most benchmarking in Facility Management has focused on this kind of "hard" data. However, what one can learn from quantitative data may be limited. This standard therefore tries to establish Performance Benchmarking as a data comparison method to support development and learning processes through some types of qualitative knowledge sharing. This standard seeks to simplify a notoriously complex process. Until now, benchmarking projects have often been confused, over-ambitious, and lacking in effective data analysis. By establishing a coherent and comprehensive process for benchmarking, along with useable and logical comparators, and by clarifying the many pitfalls in the comparison process, this standard provides practising facility managers with a range of key indicators to identify areas in which there might be a need to improve the performance of their own team, their supply chain, or the entire organisation in which they work. It is this coherent approach within the EN 15221 series which supports the basis of the Benchmarking standard. It is hoped that this platform will, in a short time, lead to a demand for more commonality in reporting of a range of comparators - financial, quality, and so on - which will make the work of facility managers more easy, and more easily understood by the organization for which they work. The standard is applicable to Facility Management as defined in EN 15221-1 and detailed in EN 15221-4. This standard gives guidelines for performance benchmarking and contains clear terms and definitions as well as methods for benchmarking facility management products and services as well as facility management organisations and operations. This standard establishes a common basis for benchmarking facility management costs, floor areas and environmental impacts as well as service quality, satisfaction and productivity. The responsible German committee is NA 041-04-02 AA "Facility Management (SpA CEN/TC 348 und ISO/TC 267)" ("Facility Management (mirror committee of CEN/TC 348 and ISO/TC 267)") of the Heating and Ventilation Technology Standards Committee (NHRS) at DIN, the German Institute for Standardization e. V.