The IFMA Foundation has announced appointments to its board of trustees for the 2018-19 fiscal year, which begins in August. The executive committee includes chair Nancy Johnson Sanquist, IFMA Fellow and Vice President of Global Strategic Marketing for Planon, as well as Joseph Archie as first vice chair and Tony Piucci as second vice chair. Michael Schley, IFMA Fellow, has transitioned to the role of immediate past chair. Bill O’Neill, CFM, past chair of IFMA’s global board of directors, completes the foundation’s executive committee. New advisors to the Foundation include Erik Jaspers from Planon Europe and Roscoe Hightower, a professor at Florida A&M University.
“It’s a great honor to step into the role of chair and to continue the important work we have been doing for the past few years since we created the Global Workforce Initiative (GWI),” said Sanquist. “We look forward to building on the momentum of recent successes, such as the United States federal government’s recognition of the significant and unique role FM plays in the built environment, as well as the amazing work we are doing with the California Community College Foundation with the GWI. I believe this new board has never been stronger and more poised to bring new energy to our mission of making FM a career of choice.”
In January, the U.S. Department of Labor officially issued the new Standard Occupational Classification list which, for the first time, included a stand-alone designation for facility management (Bureau of Labor Statistics code 11-3013). Previously, facility management had been grouped under administrative services which made it hard to track the occupation.
This change, the culmination of years of work by the IFMA Foundation and IFMA’s government affairs team, has significant ramifications for the foundation’s mission. First, the U.S. federal government will finally begin tracking industry trends recording workforce data for facility management . The workforce shortage that has been predicted from inside the industry for years will finally become a subject of national importance. Second, educational curricula designers and career guidance counselors will finally have a formally recognized designation to highlight the opportunity facility management offers students looking for exciting and profitable careers.
The IFMA Foundation’s 2018-19 Board of Trustees includes:
- Peter Ankerstjerne, MBA, COP, FRICS, IFMA Fellow – IFMA Second Vice Chair
- Regina Ford Cahill – Pratt Institute
- Bob Dills – Western Allied Mechanical Inc.
- Samson Lee – Alliance Bernstein Hong Kong, Ltd.
- Alexi Marmot – Bartlett Global Centre for Learning Environment, University College London
- Deborah Rowland – Sodexo
- Case Runolfson – American Institute for Research
- Andrea Sanchez – SparkStory
- Irene Thomas-Johnson – JLL
A separate entity from the International Facility Management Association (IFMA), the IFMA Foundation promotes education for the facility management profession around the world and making facility management a career of choice. The IFMA Foundation is supported by the generosity of the facility management community including IFMA members, chapters, councils, corporate sponsors and private contributors who share the belief that education and academic research improve the profession.
