SERVICE

01

Facility management (FM) is one of the management foundations that support the business of an organization, along with human resources, ICT, and finance. It is an in-house management activity that comprehensively plans, manages, and utilizes all facility assets owned and used for the organization's activities and the environment in which they are used, from a strategic management perspective.

As a facility management consulting company, Index Group provides services in all aspects of the PDCA cycle, from facility strategy planning to project management, and works closely with clients to provide the best possible sustainable solutions. In addition, we also undertake the work of overall facility management on behalf of our clients.

02

CRE/PRE consulting services

CRE (Corporate Real Estate) is an activity to strategically manage and utilize real estate owned and used by companies and organizations to achieve overall optimization. Real estate owned and used by public organizations is called Public Real Estate (PRE), and activities to reorganize cities from the perspective of urban development are being run mainly by local governments.

CRE/PRE is an activity that is integrated with the business and financial strategies of an organization. Based on strategies from a corporate financial perspective, CRE/PRE uses FM financial evaluation methods such as facility asset evaluation and facility investment evaluation to realize the acquisition and sales of real estate assets, sale and leaseback, and conversion to a leasing business through a change of use. In the U.S., this is done by the finance department under the CFO (Chief Financial Officer), but in Japan, since the organizations are divided vertically, and the finance department is rarely involved in facilities strategically, there is often no understanding of the real estate owned and used by the organization, no database construction, and no overall optimization.

In recent years, organizations that own and use multiple properties, especially global companies, have been introducing this technology. Further on, there are traditionally many companies that manage their own real estate leasing purposes in addition to the real estate used for their core business (business real estate). Although the purpose of these real estate management activities is different from the original FM activities that aim to effectively use facilities to support the conducted business, they are important from the perspective of corporate financial strategy and are included in FM activities.

At Index Group, we use FM financial evaluation methods to create portfolios of real estate owned and used by corporations and municipalities, evaluate their utilization and internal value in line with business strategies, and support the formulation of CRE/PRE strategic plans, including ownership, integration, leasing, securitization, and sale. We also provide consulting services for maximizing the asset value of owned and used real estate and optimizing the overall use through optimization of facility management systems (daily building management methods, long-term repair and construction plans, energy management, legal compliance, etc.).

03

Support for Strategic Workplace Construction with Work Style Reform

Due to COVID-19, many people have experienced work-from-home, and this has undeniably accelerated the reform of workplace. As a result, people are considering reducing office space by decreasing the rate of office attendance and relocating offices from the city center to the suburbs. It has been proven that the relationship between the way we work, and the office is inextricably linked.

Until now, office relocation, a major event for an organization, has in many cases been a mere physical relocation. However, it is necessary to view the formation of a workplace, which involves a large investment, as an opportunity to change the way the organization works and their attitudes, and as an important project to complete its mission and business strategy and take it to a higher level. To achieve this, it is necessary to link the mission and business strategies with the work style and awareness of its employees, and to build a workplace that embodies and supports these in a comprehensive and strategic manner.

At Index Group, we clarify management's thoughts about the mission and business strategy of the organization, analyze the gap between employee work styles and awareness and management's perceptions, identify issues through surveys of the actual conditions of existing workplaces and behavioral research, and formulate and establish improvement measures (reform of work styles, awareness, systems, information systems, etc.). Based on the surveys, we provide a series of consulting services, such as the formulation and establishment of a workplace improvement plan (work style, awareness, systems, information systems, etc.), its reflection in workplace design, and project promotion and management.

In recent years, more and more companies don’t formulate medium- to long-term plans to flexibly respond to drastic changes in the social environment. In this context, our services focus on flexibility and agility in the creation of strategic workplaces and provide services that incorporate the SDGs perspective.

04

User Satisfaction Survey

By nature, all facilities should be comfortable for users to use to increase productivity and creativity in the conducted activities. To achieve this, it is necessary to quantify users' sensory evaluations to ascertain the quality of the facility and to maintain and operate it in a sound manner.

By repeatedly surveying user satisfaction levels for all facilities of an organization over a certain period of time using methods such as web surveys, we can reflect the dissatisfaction and requests of users in the daily maintenance and operation of facilities, and to budget and project issues that require improvement. In addition, the results of the aggregate analysis can be made available to users via intranet to further engage their interest.

For large projects, a detailed user satisfaction survey can be conducted before and after the project to measure the effect of improvements and clarify the cost effectiveness of the project. It is advisable to conduct the survey at least after three months and preferably after six months, as the “honeymoon effect” may be both positive and negative immediately after the realization of the project.

Index Group conducts a series of user satisfaction surveys, from the formulation of the survey-to-survey analysis and reporting. If a project for improvement becomes necessary, we can also provide project management support services.

05

Facility Cost Optimization Consulting

Facility costs are the direct and indirect costs of maintaining, operating, and managing facilities that are owned or leased by an organization and used for its business. These costs are often disaggregated by divisions, and it is often not known how much facility costs are incurred by the organization as a whole.

Index Group identifies facility costs by facility, grasps them as a management accounting mechanism, analyzes them using MN cost charts and other tools, and provides consulting services to clarify and improve issues in the cost structure.

In order to grasp the latest facility costs in a timely manner, the use of a company-wide cross-sectional data management system for facility assets is ideal. In the past, computer-aided facility management systems (CAFM) were the mainstream, but in recent years, integrated workplace management systems (IWMS) linked to BIM, IoT, and AI have become top players in Europe and the U.S., and we are preparing to take full advantage of them. By linking with financial and human resource information of the entire organization, such as ERP, Facility Management can be more effective.