Handing Over the Keys: Transitioning from Construction to Operational Efficiency

Would you ever hand over the keys of a brand-new car to an inexperienced driver? Guess what, the current training process, with all the new equipment installed in buildings—boasting features some operators have never seen before and expected to remember everything after just a couple of sessions—seems just as risky to me. Imagine a brand-new building, hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in the latest and greatest technology, followed by, at best, a couple of days of training. And sometimes, the already short staffed operator is gone within a few months.

At the point of substantial completion, when operators are being hired to operate the building, the construction team is likely ready to move on to their next project, having dealt with day-to-day dilemmas throughout the project. They are exhausted and ready to get off the project. Commissioning companies are looking to follow up on their punch-lists or check off that the training has been done, and installing contractors are seeking service contracts. Who has the facilities and operations team in mind?

The reality is, not many. When I worked as a commissioning engineer and had to assess how systems worked in existing buildings, every building operator I spoke with would provide different information. Most were new and hadn't been trained properly because the person who trained them hoarded knowledge, fearing their job might be taken. An unfortunate dynamic that exists in situations especially if they don't like the new hire. Drawings would be outdated—because, let's be realistic, no owner liked paying architects and engineers to update the drawings. Everyone relied on shop drawings, the infamous set of drawings that few could even read or understand. Nameplate data would be painted over, and if we found manuals, pages would be missing—removed by those same knowledge hoarders who sometimes no longer worked there. This was the reality that inspired me to start creating training videos. When some owners did invest in the videos I created, managers wouldn't share them with the staff, sometimes wanting to demonstrate their own knowledge superiority.

Fortunately, we live in a digital age now, where some of the papered nuances have been resolved and people realize that painting over nameplate data is a no-no. But unfortunately the training problem still exists because when contractors provide a video, they aren't educators, they just want to be asked questions, which has key information scattered throughout the video haphazardly. Some use their phones with crappy audio, rendering all the captured data useless.

Creating instructional videos is a skill, and until we recognize all the nuances that exist and realize the actual ROI of this training investment by skilled people who can provide a useful deliverable, we will continue to run on the hamster wheel of inefficient operations. Since it's been a challenge for us to take on all the projects at times, we are creating a training course to teach others how to do this in their own facilities. If you or your organization would like to be notified when it's available, please send us an email at [email protected]. We will be sharing updates via email.