TECHNOLOGY TOOLBOX

orkplace churn can present major headaches for corporate managers. That’s particularly true with firms in industries in flux such as the pharmaceutical sector, whether it’s movement brought on by internal consolidation or by M&A activity.

Companies such as Bayer use FM: Interact to solve workplace management issues.

Fortunately for them, some tools make the task easier.

   Steve Baumgardner, manager of engineering and facilities at Bayer Healthcare‘s New Jersey facilities, vouches for one such piece of software, Raleigh, N.C.-based FM: Systems’ flagship product, FM: Interact, a Workplace Integrated Management System. He has used it for about six years, dating back to when his group was part of Berlex. Bayer acquired Berlex in late 2006. Baumgardner uses FM: Interact for tracking space and assets at Bayer Healthcare’s three facilities in Montville, Wayne and Fairfield, N.J. The three campuses total about 600,000 sq. ft. (55,740 sq. m.) and are home to about 2,500 employees. /

   “I use it for tracking my space, doing chargebacks for space, for move management and for tracking assets such as furniture,” Baumgardner says. “I use its strategic planning module from time to time when doing ‘what if’ scenarios, for example if I want to determine if I need to add another building to a site.”

   Baumgardner used FM: Interact to move 80 percent of the New Jersey employees during a restructuring prior to Bayer’s acquisition of Berlex. He was able to move 90 percent of his people within four months. He says the software provided real-time access to accurate information on workplace utilization, maintenance and assets.

   Today Bumgardner faces a similar move as Bayer is reconfiguring the New Jersey operations, including a 90,000-sq.-ft. (8,360-sq.-m.) addition. He says he will be overseeing another 80 percent churn and Bayer will be adding 300 employees to its New Jersey operations. In an average year, without a large move project, the New Jersey operations average a churn rate of about 18 percent, he says. Including new hires and moves, that translates to about 15 to 20 people per week.

   But Baumgardner says the job is much easier with a multi-functional workplace management software. He praises FM: Interact’s reliability.

   “It makes things a whole lot smoother. We used to do a lot of this by hand. [Now we] have accurate information of where employees are, what the space looks like, and we can look forward within the strategic planning module. It sort of pulls all of your facility info into one box. We can track where people were before, and we have floor plans that show departments and hierarchies. It’s a powerful tool.”

   FM: Systems’ client base primarily includes companies with 500 or more employees, particularly in the financial services sector; companies that are involved extensively in research and development, such as the pharmaceutical industry; and aerospace firms.

   FM: Systems President and CEO Mike Schley says these types of companies share two characteristics: They are dynamic, and they are historically early adopters of technology.

   “Industries that have a high rate of change and are heavily regulated use our software,” Schley says. “Some sectors are driven by the need for reporting. That’s also true of large universities. With space as a base, we look at other aspects such as inventory and assets like furniture and lab equipment. Bayer has made good use of our capabilities there.”

   FM: Interact users typically purchase a perpetual license, and the software is used through an intranet application running behind a firewall. Some companies opt to have FM: Systems host in a secure environment. The software is configurable to accommodate an individual company’s needs.

   FM: Systems issues updates annually, adding functionality, and has one coming out in several months.

   “In the software business, you never get to rest,” Schley says. “We are also getting a lot of interest in work flow and using technology to improve the process.”