Facilities manager: job description

Facilities mangers: Salaries | Employers | Qualifications and training | Key skills

Facilities managers are responsible for keeping buildings properly maintained, clean and safe. The role combines management tasks such as supervising contractors and more strategic responsibilities such as managing budgets and advising on long-term energy efficiency.

Typical duties include:

• overseeing and agreeing contracts and providers for services including security, parking, cleaning, catering and IT.
• supervising teams of staff including cleaning, maintenance and security.
• ensuring that basic facilities, such as water and heating, are well-maintained.
• managing maintenance and staffing budgets.
• ensuring that facilities meet government regulations, health and security standards and energy efficiency requirements.
• overseeing building projects and renovations.
• helping businesses relocate.

While many facilities managers take on a varied range of responsibilities, it’s possible to specialise in ‘hard’ facilities management services (anything to do with the physical building, such as electrical systems) or soft services (people-related work such as catering and security).

Working hours tend to mirror those of building users (eg 9.00 am – 6.00 pm). However, extra hours are sometimes required for emergencies or to meet deadlines.

Graduate salaries

salary survey websites suggest that graduate facilities managers earn between £20,000 and £27,000. Salaries grow with experience and additional qualifications.

Typical employers of facilities managers

Facilities managers may work in-house (directly for the organisation for which they’re managing services) or for a company that provides those services to individual businesses.

Typical employers include:

• specialist facilities management companies.
• property firms and property management companies.
• construction companies.
• large public organisations, including schools, colleges, universities and the NHS.
• other large organisations with properties that need to be maintained and kept secure, such as airports and hotels.

Vacancies are advertised via targetjobs, by university careers services, by specialist recruitment agencies, and on construction and property-related websites.

Qualifications and training required

There are routes into a career in facilities management for both university graduates and school leavers.

Many facilities management graduate schemes and graduate-level entry roles are open to students from all degree disciplines – but some employers will require, or prefer, a degree related to the built environment (particularly building services engineering) or business studies.

As a school leaver, you can get into facilities management via an apprenticeship. It’s also possible to gain an entry-level job in facilities management, particularly after gaining an HND or other higher education qualification. However, you can work your way up into a facilities management career, too: many move into the role after previously working in office administration or engineering.

Key skills for facilities managers

To succeed, facilities managers must have:

• Communication and influencing skills, in person and in writing.
• The ability to work with people from all backgrounds.
• Analytical and problem-solving skills.
• Decision-making skills.
• The ability to lead and manage teams and projects.
• Teamworking abilities.
• Attention to detail but also the ability to see the bigger picture.
• Commercial awareness.
• Time management skills including being able to handle a complex, varied workload.
• A good knowledge of IT packages.