Last night saw the close of my three week online consultation with the Facilities industry into their skills issues (and hopefully solutions) . More over the coming weeks on this, but I wanted to give the headlines.

Over 200 individual responses to the survey which is a fantastic amount. Most of these came from key individuals; leaders of their companies and professions, in the industry and includes feedback from employers, employees and freelancers. More impressive was the depth and detail in the comments – with individual questions eliciting over 70 free text comments! It will take a while to go through this rich data – I can cut it by sub-sector, by location, by employment type, but the when asked to prioritise the issues this is what I got (with the highest priority first):

1 Improve and recognise the skills of those already in the workplace (i.e. look at continual professional development and accreditation’s schemes facing those already in work)

2 Improve Leadership and Management skills in the industry

3 Bridge the gap between education and employment (i.e. focus on “finishing schools” and new entrant schemes)

4 Improve Further and Higher Education

5 Inform aspiring entrants of the realities of the industry (i.e. careers advice)

So what’s interesting to me about this list? Well, most people complain to me about colleges and universities; this is given much lower billing than we predicted. With continual professional development getting top billing it seems that the facilities industry are much more in need of solving their immediate problems facing them than getting it right for the next generation.

And I have talked about it here before but now we have some numbers to talk about regarding Leadership & Management. 85% of respondents reckoned we need a campaign to convince managers of the need to improve their skills in this area, with 81% wanting appropriate provisions for all levels within the industry – from Runners to MD’s.

Watch this space for more analysis but let me know if you think the priority list is right or wrong.