Divercity’s property manager, Ithemba, named among the best-of-the-best for facilities management
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- 7 July 2023
Ithemba Property Management (IPM), the property manager for Divercity, is proud to have had its commitment to facilities management recognised with two significant awards of excellence.
At the recent South African Facilities Management Association (SAFMA) Awards for Excellence 2023, we, along with our partner Pragma, were bestowed a first-place ranking for Excellence in Facilities Management and a third-place award for Technology Implementation of the Year.
Being recognised for these achievements is an honour in itself, but to have been awarded these titles out of a number of top property management companies in the country is even more rewarding.
We share the Excellence in Facilities Management Award with the South African Reserve Bank’s Churn Project team. Other top facilities management companies to have taken part in the awards include Redefine Properties, Massmart, Tsebo Facilities Solutions, Pick n Pay and PMI. We are proud to be counted among these industry leaders.
Excellence in Facilities Management
From researchers to facility operators, this award acknowledges the efforts of individuals, teams, or corporates involved in facilities management; those who have made positive impacts on the knowledge, practical application, and communication of strategies aimed at enhancing the workplace environment and sustainable performance of their facilities. This award intends to recognise the ‘best of the best’ in facilities management.
Gustav Holtzhausen, joint Chief Executive Officer of IPM, says not only did we excel in these areas due to our dedicated commitment but also through our 20 years of experience and passion for inner-city resilience. Other factors that contributed to this success include:
• Our business process reengineering and end-to-end automation and integration
• A high-performance culture among both individuals and teams
• Provision of fit-for-purpose solutions
• Our agility to adapt to ever-changing external conditions and markets
• Our scalable business model.
“Managing 6,500 affordable apartments with 20,000 occupants in the inner city of Johannesburg is a 24/7/365 effort by a highly motivated and committed team. Receiving an award for this is humbling.
“We also thank Pragma for challenging us to improve our facilities management maturity and technology,” says Holtzhausen.
Technology Implementation of the Year
This award is given to a company that has effectively and successfully integrated technology into its infrastructure and core services. We were selected from a number of companies that have used technology to streamline and enhance our current service offerings, reduced costs through sustainability, and introduced innovative and ground-breaking solutions to our clients over the past year.
Wicus Kotze, head of Reporting and Innovation at IPM, says this accolade reflects the implementation of technological advancement across all our portfolios and buildings.
“All our infrastructure and facilities services are managed through our EAMS (Enterprise Asset Management System) called ‘On Key’. The integration, which is as simple as ‘no work order, no work’, enables us to track all work requested, planned, outsourced and completed per piece of asset that we own,” explains Kotze.
Citing just a couple of examples of how this technology has streamlined and enhanced service offerings and reduced costs, Kotze says tenants are not only able to scan a QR code on the back of their doors in their units, which will automatically create a maintenance work order, but all maintenance workers will then receive their work orders on their phones. This enables quicker response times to maintenance work.
“Technology enables us to capture asset information within a system and build an ever-growing knowledge base. This assists with sustainability as any new personnel or contractors are able to access this knowledge base,” notes Kotze. Echoing Holtzhausen, he says the IPM team is “extremely humbled” by this award, especially when looking at the other winners. “It was and always will be a massive team effort.”
Partnership
This team effort also extends to the partnership with Pragma, a global company that specialises in enterprise asset management (EAM) solutions. With over 30 years of experience, they offer innovative software, consulting services, and training to help organisations optimize their asset performance and achieve operational excellence.
Pragma’s EAM solutions enable businesses to streamline maintenance processes, improve asset reliability, and extend asset lifespan by leveraging advanced analytics, machine learning, and IoT technologies. They serve various industries and focus on transitioning from reactive to proactive maintenance, reducing costs, and maximising asset performance.
We thank them for their partnership.