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Operation and maintenance (O&M) processes projects such as identification, assessment, planning and execution, embody a variety of standards such as technical (method of statement), environmental, economic (campus development) and social (health and wellbeing). Because these standards have proven to be challenging to integrate, local governments are increasingly experimenting with social innovation (SI) as a bottom-up form of standard integration. This study aims to apply the concept of SI to the O&M processes of facilities management at polytechnics in Malaysia to identify problems with conventional working practices in this area and to recommend potential solutions.

The paper reviews evidence that conventional working methods generate significant problems related to paper-based forms, improper database management and flawed decision-making processes. Because of the lack knowledge about different ways of how standard integration is achieved, the comparison of three polytechnic institutions which are Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) and Southern Polytechnic College of Engineering and Engineering Technology (SPCEET) in USA as well as Seberang Perai Polytechnic, Pulau Pinang (PSP) in Malaysia shares the ambition to realise standard integration of O&M through SI.

The findings reveal that SI leads to four ways of standard integration: computerised maintenance management system, online customer complaint, electronic form and relational database. Application of the concept of SI reveals the need for more sophisticated management solutions in the O&M processes of facilities management.

These standard integration arrangements unfortunately seem to mainly contribute to greater alignment between standard rather than true standard integration. The concept of SI will guide future improvements and developments in maintenance management systems to fulfil requirements in this area.

In the context of the study, soft skill means identifying efficient and effective approaches for improving operation and maintenance (O&M) processes in facilities management and extending the management of building facilities and infrastructure. Applying the concept of soft skill to the O&M processes of facilities management at polytechnics in Malaysia, the paper aims to identify problems with conventional working practices in this area and to recommend potential solutions.

The paper reviews evidence that conventional working methods generate significant problems related to paper-based forms, improper database management and flawed decision-making processes.

The paper finds that the application of the concept of soft skill reveals the need for more sophisticated management solutions in the O&M processes of facilities management.

The concept of soft skill will guide future improvements and developments in maintenance management systems (MMS) to fulfil requirements in this area.

The conventional e-complaint method provides a platform that contains multiple data sources of an infrastructure project, including building facilities, associated asset documentation of the asset. However, the conventional e-complaint method practised by the Development and Facilities Management Unit (UPPF) faces issues due to management deficiencies and negligent staff to handle operations and maintenance processes within facilities management at Malaysian Polytechnic. This paper aims to identify the different maintenance management system (MMS) approaches using information and communication technology that is equipped with decision-making processes.

This research presents eight cases of the use of e-complaint in major facilities management platforms in Malaysian Polytechnic, identifying the major problems using the conventional e-complaint method, the current technologies realised, as well as the procedures for learning and improving e-complaint to the Polytechnic institution. The major conclusion drawn from the interview results was that there is a lack of comprehensive MMSs that integrate operations and maintenance processes within facilities management and software programming to provide guidelines for decision-making processes.

The findings demonstrate that the conventional e-complaint method cannot be used effectively to support the defect diagnosis process during maintenance assessment and development. The case studies further demonstrated that the conventional e-complaint method will be particularly led to inadequate strategic decision-making to analyse information to improve the maintenance project outcomes for Malaysian Polytechnic’s buildings, thereby, ignoring the accuracy and reliability of information for operations and maintenance. New MMS tools are suggested from the findings and lessons learned as a good practice to reduce defect repetition on the design specifications used and construction methods practised.

Due to the increasingly complex nature of projects in terms of size and information technology, realising these current technologies would require a learning process for all stakeholders involved in financial and managing assets. This research proposes stepped change and learning opportunity for maintenance value maximisation and delivery, management and operation efficiency using MMS. The new MMS can potentially transform operational and maintenance processes within facilities management into one of the most sophisticated technologies by accommodating data recordings, such as complaints and specific items needed for maintenance through the internet and intranet to facilitate improved execution of Polytechnic’s building activities.

DURING the past fifteen years technical literature has garnered as much information as in all previously recorded history, and man has grown very adept at quickly converting this knowledge into machines and processes. Doing so has provided him with more material comforts than the greatest in the land enjoyed a few centuries ago. This increase in knowledge and the employment of sophisticated technology over a broad field means that every industrialized country can echo the old Swiss boast: ‘Got any rivers they say are uncrossable? Got any mountains you can't tunnel through? We specialize in the wholly impossible, doing the things that no others can do.’

A troublesome tool may represent capital investment standing idle and the toolroom itself, therefore, calls for efficient management if capital expenditure is to be successfully deployed. Production engineers may cast around for means of saving costs but seldom pay attention to the toolroom. Is this because toolmakers are craftsmen and it is implied, therefore, they always work effectively when making tools or repairing old ones? This may be so, but there are many cases in the past, the present and, no doubt, in the future where tools costs are far too high relative to the product involved.

TO all our readers we can wish a happy and prosperous New Year with greater confidence than usual that the coming months will translate the familiar hope into reality. The reason for that optimism is National Productivity Year. There is growing evidence that the public understands and appreciates its central theme. Naturally the official Guildhall opening attracted wide publicity. Since then it has been reinforced through the addresses given by prominent personalities at meetings up and down the country; meetings which will continue and build up a favourable climate in industry.

THE Electronic Computer Exhibition and the B.I.M. conference have provided material for serious contemplation. Sir Harold Gillett, Lord Mayor of London, opening the Exhibition suggested that we are living in the age of the second industrial revolution. There are some who share the Lord Mayor's view and others who take the whole matter in their stride. One thing is certain, we shall be able to do more—and do it more efficiently.

Using strikingly different managerial techniques from conventional organizations, 12 Step Fellowships, most prominently Alcoholics Anonymous, provide useful clues to producing more effective, functional and humane organizations in contrast with our many dysfunctional firms which abuse their employees, behave unethically towards their customers, damage their social and ecological habitat and find it difficult to complete in a turbulent global environment. The founding Fellowship, Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), extends to 131 countries with 1,550,000 members while the second largest, Al‐Anon/Alateen, has 414,000 members in 84 countries. Without advertising, government support or experts, AA is widely considered the most effective method for treating alcoholism. This success story was produced by members who, prior to AA, were themselves severely dysfunctional and often unemployable. Examines facets of the Fellowships (organizational structure, culture, communication and problem solving techniques) to demonstrate a powerful, little studied model for organizational learning and transformation.

FOLLOWING our repeated denunciation of the Bullock Report proposals, there were some readers who expresed their belief that we were against it not from conviction but because ‘we were on the employers' side’.

The “categorization as a theoretical tool” framework is delineated to clarify how innovation is possible even though candidates for exchange face a “categorical imperative” – pressure from their audience to adopt the conventional practices associated with existing categories. The key insight is that categorization is generally a useful tool for sorting and screening exchange opportunities. This insight is developed to suggest how the nature of the imperative varies with the audience’s objectives and the theory of value it espouses and how the strength of the imperative varies with the social challenges and opportunities for engaging in, and learning from, experiments with unconventionality.