If Facilities Management is constantly firefighting, the problem is probably not effort. It is structure.

Facilities performance does not drift by accident. It reflects how decisions, priorities, and work are structured across the institution. Executive FM provides a clear, external view of where pressure is building and what to change first to restore stability, predictability, and control.

Engaged by senior leaders to reduce volatility, clarify decision-making, and establish operating models that perform under pressure.

Facilities Management Consulting for Universities and Colleges

This is not unusual. It is structural.

Across post-secondary institutions, facilities performance is becoming more visible, more variable, and harder to control.

Workload expands, priorities shift, and issues surface faster than teams can stabilize them. Effort increases, but predictability does not.

This is not typically a capability problem, and it is rarely resolved by adding staff, implementing new systems, or tightening oversight.

In most cases, these conditions reflect how decisions, priorities, and work are structured across the institution. Facilities Management is often asked to deliver stability within constraints it did not set and cannot fully influence.

The result is a pattern seen across many institutions: strong teams working hard within conditions that produce inconsistent outcomes.

This can be clarified.

And it can be corrected.

The Scan: Start With A Clear External View

A short, structured scan clarifies where pressure is coming from and what to address first. It is designed to be fast, low-disruption, and focused on producing a decision, not a report.

Output

• Where instability is being created

• What is driving workload and risk

• The right first move to restore control

What the San Will Deliver

♦️ A clear, external view of where pressure is coming from.

♦️ A defined starting point based on structural conditions, not symptoms.

♦️ A practical path to restore stability and control.

♦️ A way to move forward without expanding scope, cost, or disruption.

Build On It With A Structured Project to Restore Control in Facilities Operations

Executive FM helps post-secondary institutions understand why Facilities Management is struggling, what must change structurally, and how to move forward with control. The work is designed for leaders who need a clear diagnosis, practical design decisions, and a credible path to implementation.

Engagements are delivered on a fixed-cost basis with clear scope and defined outcomes, giving clients certainty over time, cost, and risk while allowing the work to be tailored to their priorities.

Context and Signal Review

Focused discussions establish institutional context, surface visible pressures, and determine whether a structured diagnostic is warranted. Early signals of instability and constraint are identified.

Evidence and Structural Diagnosis

Interviews, organizational design, budgets, planning processes, service performance, and governance arrangements are assessed together to isolate the patterns driving rework, loss of control, reactive workload, and stalled improvement. Targeted surveys or focus groups are used where additional validation is required.

Governance conditions, decision rights, role clarity, service model structure, and management disciplines are defined as an integrated system designed to restore control and stabilize performance.

Roadmap and Execution Path

A sequenced, decision-ready action plan is established, enabling leadership to stabilize operations, redesign critical elements, and move forward with clarity, control, and measurable progress.

Leadership and Consulting Experience in Complex Institutions

Executive FM Consulting draws on senior leadership and consulting experience across universities, colleges, polytechnics, healthcare, and municipal government. That experience provides a practical understanding of how governance, decision-making, and operating conditions shape Facilities Management performance inside complex institutions.

Experience includes senior leadership, advisory, and transformation work in institutions where Facilities Management performance is shaped by competing priorities, constrained resources, and complex governance.

Grant Sommerfeld

Founder and CEO

Grant Sommerfeld brings 17 years of Chief Facilities Officer experience, including nine years as a university Associate Vice-President, leading complex facilities operations across post-secondary, healthcare, and municipal environments.

His work focuses on a specific problem: why Facilities Management functions become trapped in reactive service delivery despite capable people and significant investment.

Across institutions, the pattern is consistent. Facilities teams are positioned downstream of the decisions that drive workload, cost, and risk. They are then held accountable for outcomes they did not create and cannot fully control.

Grant’s approach is to diagnose and correct those structural conditions. This includes clarifying decision rights, redesigning operating models, and aligning roles and workflows to how work actually moves through the institution.

His work is practical, phased, and grounded in lived executive experience. It is designed to restore control, reduce failure demand, and stabilize service performance without defaulting to additional staffing, systems, or capital.

Credentials

MBA
Certified Educational Facilities Professional (CEFP)
Certified Facilities Manager (CFM)
Chartered Facilities Management Surveyor (FRICS)
Certified Management Consultant (CMC)

Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. President of the IFMA Facilities Management Consultants Council.

Grant Sommerfeld

MBA, CMC, CFM, CEFP, FRICS

Start the Conversation

Institutions typically begin by discussing the context they are facing and exploring whether a structured diagnostic would be useful.

If the discussion suggests that a deeper examination would be helpful, Executive FM Consulting can outline how a structured diagnostic would proceed and what the institution could expect from that process.

What Happens Next

If you reach out:

We schedule a short introductory conversation.
We discuss the institutional context and current challenges.
If appropriate, we explore whether a structured diagnostic would be useful.

There is no obligation to proceed beyond that conversation.

Contact Grant Sommerfeld

Email: contact@executivefm.ca

Mobile: 1-587-226-1205