Facility software management is really one decision made twice: whether you want tools or a system. A tool solves a job in front of you, a spreadsheet that prices this year's plan or a form that captures this week's requests. A system holds the record between the jobs, so that a question about last March can be answered without asking anybody. Both are legitimate, they cost very differently, and buying the second when you needed the first is how software ends up unused six months later.
What facility management software tools are for
Tools are the right answer while the pressure is a specific calculation or a specific form. Working out what a year of preventive work costs from the asset count, the intervals, the hours and the rate is a tool problem. So is turning a deficiency list into a backlog and an index for a budget meeting. Nothing about that needs a login, a rollout or a training session, and treating it as a system purchase delays the answer by months for no benefit.
What a facility management software system adds
A system earns its cost at the moment somebody has to answer for the past: when was this last serviced, who did it, what did it cost, what is still deferred. That is a question about continuity rather than calculation, and it cannot be answered by any tool, however good, because the tool was never there for the events in between. If nobody is asking that question yet, the system is being bought early.
Running both, which is what most single buildings actually do
The honest arrangement for one building is free tools for the arithmetic and a paid record for the continuity, and it is worth being deliberate about which is which. Keep the calculations where they can be redone from scratch by anybody, and keep the register, the schedule and the history where they cannot be lost when a person leaves. The failure to avoid is the reverse: a system holding the calculations and a spreadsheet holding the history.
Questions people ask about facility software management
Is a spreadsheet a tool or a system?
A tool, always, however carefully it is built. It can hold a list and do arithmetic. It cannot derive a due date when work is closed late, and it stops being true the moment the person who maintained it changes job.
What should be bought first?
The calculation, because it is free and it produces the number somebody is about to ask for. Then the register, because everything else in a system hangs off the asset list existing.
Can one product be both?
Most claim to be. Judge it on the system half, because the tool half is easy to build and easy to replace, and a product that holds the history badly cannot be fixed by a better calculator.