Need of Facilities Management Education in Oman

Abstract

The life cycle of any facilities or infrastructures of any country heavily relies on an efficient maintenance management support system. This in turn depends on the available quality and efficiency of the human resources in the Facilities Management (FM). Proper and regular maintenance of equipment and building reduces breakdowns, which in turn saves man-hour lost, more safety, increased efficiency and productivity. Facility management (FM) constitutes branch, jointly representing real estate market with property management and asset management. It plays a crucial role in economic activities in region as FM services are involved in all industrial and commercial activities. The Facility Management (FM) market in GCC countries has witnessed robust growth during the last few decades due to rapid economic activities in this region. It is an established fact in FM services man power cost dominates the total cost whereas material cost plays vital role in construction industries. Facilities Management, as a special branch of subjects in education sector, is continuously evolving and it is necessary for the staffs in FM industries including academics to keep on updating their knowledge and skills. This can be accomplished only by proper training course based on well-defined syllabus and curriculum. Training is a two-way process as there must be someone to learn and someone to teach. Available training facilities in education sector in GCC region to train and develop the human resources in Facilities management need proper study and evaluation. This has induced the authors to start an earnest attempt to frame the outline of the Need of Facilities Management Education in GCC countries. In this paper the requirement of specialized training courses   to meet the demand of FM professionals in a broader perspective is studied; necessity of trainers to train FM professionals in GCC regions is explained; methodologies of imparting training to the trainers identified; curriculum to train the trainers outlined and finally ways to implement it in GCC region is summarized.