Conference review

Citation

(2006), "Conference review", Facilities, Vol. 24 No. 13/14. https://doi.org/10.1108/f.2006.06924mac.002

Conference review

The venue for the CIB W70 Conference for 2006 (Plates 1-3) was Trondheim in Norway. Despite Norway's reputation for being the most expensive country on the planet, the conference itself proved to be a very affordable and worthwhile experience.

Plate 1Delegates reviewing the exhibition space

Plate 2 Members of the CIB W70 Committee discuss future plans

Plate 3 Researcher from University of Greenwich (Apeksha Desai) during the coffee-break

For those unfamiliar with CIB (International Council for Research and Innovation in Building and Construction – www.cibworld.nl) it is unique in being the only truly international research network concerned with research in the built environment. The Working Commission W70 deals with facilities management and maintenance. The Working Commission has been able to undergo a transition from a traditional “bricks and mortar” perspective of maintenance management to a more customer-focused interpretation of facilities management over its 20 year existence.

The conference was chaired by Professor Tore Haugen of NTNU and involved three days of presentations and workshops and papers from around 20 countries linked to the CIBW70 network.

The theme of this year's CIB W70 Conference was “Changing user demands on buildings: needs for lifecycle planning and management”.

The sub-themes of the conference included:

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  building conservation and refurbishment;

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  sustainability in FM and design;

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  FM – operation and service management;

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  changing user demands on adaptability and flexibility;

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  workplace management – innovation and implementation issues;

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  FM in health care; and

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  usability of workplaces.

With over 70 papers presented at the conference it is not possible to summarise such a diverse range of presentations. However, it was interesting to see how strongly the theme of building conservation came through at the conference, with a particular interest in heritage buildings in Scandinavia, Italy and Eastern Europe.

Perhaps, my only suggestion regarding scheduling of the conference was the need for more debating time to discuss many of the importance issues raised.

The conference included a city reception at Erkebispegården, and a dramatic symposium dinner at Monk's Island (Munkholmen) on the penultimate day. Twenty-four hours of daylight offered plenty of opportunity to network and socialise, leaving many exhausted yet fulfilled delegates by the end of the conference.

Edward Finch