CHALLENGES

Aging Infrastructure & Financial Recovery

Due to the shifting of resources to the operational budget in previous years, we are continuing to work our way back from the deferment of infrastructure upgrades. We continue to experience failures of critical systems resulting in increased service interruptions for student residents and building damage due to flooding, leaks, and loss of heat, air conditioning, or water supply.

Staffing Shortage, Recruiting & Compensation

We continue to experience staffing shortages across units. We are proud of our efforts to overcome last year’s unprecedented vacant position rate in Building Services which now stands at 3%. Despite this achievement, recruiting remains one of our biggest challenges. Finding qualified applicants is difficult, particularly when wages are not competitive with the local job market. In addition to housekeeping staff, we are experiencing shortages and recruitment difficulties in Procurement and Employee Services. The lack of fair compensation for our top-performing staff is another factor that heavily affects our staff morale.

Purple Line Construction

The construction of the Purple Line has affected our ability to manage stormwater in the Leonardtown community. This has led to flooding and water damage in several buildings. Both the construction activities and the frequent storms have had a negative impact on the storm drainage system.

Lack of Project Management & Capital Planning Software

While the university will soon implement a new Integrated Work Management System (IWMS) across facilities units, our department will not fully reap the benefits for another two years. Without project management and capital planning software, it is difficult for our department to gather the necessary data to fully understand the current conditions of our facilities. This interferes with our ability to efficiently prioritize facilities budgets, request necessary capital funding, and develop multi-year capital plans to align with the new DSA Facilities Strategic Plan.

Limited Staff Capacity

The implementation of numerous university systems has impacted our ability to meet the departmental mission. Concur Travel, SHIFT, and Elevate implementation have been cumbersome and time-consuming, resulting in decreased staff capacity. While we understand the need to move the university forward, the time commitment is still a burden.

Organizational Culture Differences in Facilities Departments

We continue to contend with differences in organizational culture, workflows, and decision making processes when working with Facilities Management (FM). Oftentimes, this results in a significant amount of time, effort, and cost to resolve differences and complete projects.

It is not uncommon for large universities to have more than one facilities organization serving the main campus and another serving auxiliaries. A divided, tailored approach is structured to serve specific communities’ needs. The current organizational structure follows this approach with FM and Residential Facilities. The two cultures developed differently, aligning with the clients they serve.

FM is structured to serve a larger population in academic and administrative buildings, while we serve the student population living on campus and engaging in student activities. This cultural difference is impacting the reputation of both facilities organizations with the clash of cultures causing inconsistent and poor service to those that we jointly serve.