EuroFM woos leading European FM suppliers

22 April 2010

In a move to engage Europe’s leading multi-national FM service providers more in the aims and activities of EuroFM, its chairman Wayne Tantrum hosted a round table in London last week.

Senior management representatives from Sodexo, Coors, Johnson Controls, JLL, SMI, Hays FM, Compass, Hochtief, GSK, ISS and Facilities Services Group attended the event at the Bank of America in Canary Wharf.
Tantrum explained that that EuroFM’s membership of 91 organisations comprised 34 national associations from 13 countries, 41 research and educational establishments in 13 countries, and 16 corporate associates from nine countries comprising both suppliers and clients. He said that corporate associates could play a larger role in the organisations in promoting FM in Europe.
Among the common issues facing FM service providers in Europe are
 Understanding the European FM standards
 Growing the size of the market
 Equality and diversity
 Managing labour laws
 Cost of doing business across borders
 Lobbing on EU policy
EuroFM’s workplan for 2010-11 includes several themes of these as well as developing expert White Papers and developing contacts with the EU parliamentarians and policy makers. He explained how EuroFM had contributed to the development of new CEN standards on facilities management published under EN 15221. He said work was also ongoing on the EU standardisation of competency profiles for BA, MA and PhD qualifications in FM.
To support its planned expansion of lobbying activity at EU level, EuroFM is also developing European FM market data report which will help to demonstrate the continental scale of the European FM business sector.
The delegates welcomed the opportunity for FM service providers to have Europe-wide influence at the EU particularly to highlight the variable application of EU labour laws in different countries. They put consistency and simplification of the application of EU regulations in different European countries as a high priority aim for EuroFM. Delegates agreed to develop an agenda for a CEO level meeting in 2010 to take forward key objectives.
EuroFM’s annual conference, EFMC2010 is to be held in Madrid from 1-2 June. www.efmc2010.com. The finalists in the European FM Awards Partners Across Borders category are reviewed on page 26 in this issue. In 2011 EFMC event will be held in Vienna and EFMC 2012 will take place in Copenhagen.
Photo: (l-r back row) Jens Rasmussen, Coor Service Management; Steven Quick Johnson Controls; Gordon McMillan, GSK; Daniel Frutig, Compass Group; Bala Raveendran, SMI Services; Tim Tourville, JLL, Hans Gennissen, Facilicom; Steve Gladwin, Hochtief FM; Peter Ankerstjerne, ISS; (front row l-r) Fred Kloet, Villa FM; Sylvia Metayer, Sodexo; Wayne Tantrum, New World Sustainable Solutions; Coleen Cloherty, Hays FM.