Why do you need a Data Management Platform?

These days we are surrounded by more and more data. But data is only useful if it can be collected and analysed in an effective way. Data management tools are an ever more crucial component of success. Across many industries, workload demand is increasing, resulting in a mounting pressure to save on cost and maximise the effectiveness of your property assets. Data management solutions can help an organisation to effectively organise and make the most of their data, to ensure that estates are efficiently managed and outputs are optimized.

Organising data can be a daunting prospect but using it in the right way can benefit your organisation significantly. By collecting, analysing and presenting data in an efficient and engaging way, it is possible to observe where operations need to be streamlined and where there is room for improvement. By using data driven asset management you could:

• Improve the efficiency of data collection
• Improve the accuracy and consistency of your data
• Enable analysis of data at different levels, from strategic to local
• Benchmark your estate to identify issues and drive improvement

So, what might you use a data management platform for? Read on to find out the options for your organisation.

Energy Management
Energy management software can be a fundamental tool for managing your estate. It enables you to analyse your energy consumption, identify problem areas and understandwhere there may be opportunities to save money. It works by collating, reporting and analysing the data gathered from smart meters, on site renewables and utilities bills. This allows you to benchmark and compare your energy usage against similar organisations. Energy management software can empower you to make strategic changes to your policy, such as shifting user behaviour, buying your energy more cheaply, or implementing energy saving strategies.

Asset management
Asset management tools store your asset information in a consistent way. They can be essential for asset managers that need to keep pace with the value of a portfolio or it’s ongoing operation and maintenance costs. At an operational level Asset Management or Computer Aided Facilities Management (CAFM) systems can help track and organise assets and help prioritise capital spending.

Compliance tracking
Keeping track of statutory compliance within your portfolio becomes more complex as the size and diversity of the estate increases. Add in a constantly-changing regulatory landscape and the ongoing training needs of staff and things can easily get missed. Using a structured and partially automated process can minimise risk, make repetitive tasks more efficient and create resilience in a system.

Incident reporting
Incident reporting software raises awareness about any potential sites of risk. This allows for preventative and corrective actions to be taken. This can make workplaces safer. But recording and keeping track of incidents and sites of risk can be a complex undertaking. It often requires filling out confusing and complicated forms – this can demotivate the reporting manager from filling them out.

An incident reporting tool makes this process easier by improving the user experience. Managers can easily record incidents by day, type and severity. The user can then quickly view and understand historical incidents and trends so that it is possible to pre-emptively intervene and avoid significant incidents.