Campus Management

Changing expectations and stakeholders for a smart campus

The convergence of new technologies, increasing demands and expectations, the need for life-long learning, and new business models have created new challenges for universities and their campus management strategies. Real estate and facilities management professionals must be able to coordinate all activities to provide an attractive and future-proof learning experience and environment for all different kinds of stakeholders.

Even the traditional profile of a student is changing – with the increase in remote students and online coursework, as well as older generations enrolling for the first time or re-enrolling to improve skillsets or change career paths. Universities that want to remain competitive when faced with these new challenges are moving towards creating and promoting a more connected campus experience for their stakeholders.

The global research and advisory company, Gartner, Inc. has defined this connected “smart campus” as:

‘A smart campus is a physical or digital environment in which humans and technology-enabled systems interact in increasingly open, connected, coordinated and intelligent ecosystems. Multiple elements, including people, processes, services and things, come together to create a more immersive, interactive and automated experience for students, staff, faculty and stakeholders of a university or college.’

What you need to know about integrated campus management solutions

Planon’s integrated campus management solution is based on our market-leading integrated workplace management system (IWMS), but includes best practices that are carefully fine-tuned towards higher education requirements. Implementing an integrated campus management solution can help your institution to unify all stakeholders, processes, data and technologies in a single platform that enables significant cost savings and encourages continuous improvement. It benefits educational institutes that are looking for increased efficiency, transparency, flexibility, and student and staff satisfaction in their real estate and facility management processes.

Today, integrated campus management solutions are deployed frequently as a service (SaaS), to lower total cost of ownership, reduce the time it takes to deploy, and improve integration and scalability.

The importance of a business case when selecting an integrated campus management solution

Before selecting and implementing your campus management solution, we recommend creating a business case, including internal and external costs and monetary and non-monetary benefits like a reduction in space-related processes and campus property management, services and maintenance costs, and improved student and staff satisfaction.

Some campus buildings within the United States can be vacant up to 65% of the time, which points to a huge opportunity for universities to find cost savings around more efficient space utilisation. (Higher Education Facilities Forum Article – ‘Higher Ed Facilities: Navigating Through Disruption’)

In many cases the campus management software costs are a minor part of the total investment. Data collection and management, change management, internal costs, IT infrastructure and project management should be considered.

Also, specific customisation or integration can impact the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) heavily, depending strongly on the vendor and solution of choice. The deployment of a campus management solution and support model is also a part of the business case. For instance, your team must be able to answer questions such as, ‘will the campus management solution be installed within our organisation or hosted by the vendor as a service (SaaS)?’ or ‘Will application management be handled internally or outsourced to the solution vendor?’ These questions and your team’s choices will impact both costs and benefits.