Facilities managers juggle a lot of priorities every day as they balance reactive work orders with preventive maintenance, all while keeping downtime low and facilities running at peak efficiency. With constantly shifting priorities and rising stakeholder expectations, the pressure is on to keep buildings performing without burning out the facilities team.
Smart buildings leverage integrated technology and automated systems to save money, reduce manual workload, and improve overall building performance. However, smart buildings aren’t the endpoint for building intelligence. “Self-healing buildings” go further, closing the loop between insight and action by actively responding to issues rather than simply monitoring and reporting them.
What Are Self-Healing Buildings?
Similar to smart buildings, self-healing buildings use data to monitor facility performance. The key difference is that they automatically sense when something is wrong by using the data collected from sensors and comparing it to historical usage patterns to detect anomalies (like unwarranted spikes in energy usage or abnormal temperatures) and diagnose the root cause. Self-healing buildings can then take action to mitigate the impact of the detected fault and either fix it on its own or instantly initiate the process of getting it repaired.
What this looks like in practice: A facility’s computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) integrated with an Internet of Things (IoT) monitoring platform detects an HVAC system refrigerant leak, reroutes airflow to maintain comfort, and alerts the team to repair—all before occupants notice. By the time a technician arrives, the system has already contained the issue, preventing downtime and costly repairs. That’s the power of a self-healing building.
For facilities managers, this workflow means less time spent spotting issues or making calls, and more time for higher-value tasks. Self-healing capabilities also enhance preventative maintenance, reducing manual effort and the associated costs of delayed repairs.
Less Downtime, Greater Impact
By combining automated asset monitoring and self-correcting actions, self-healing buildings reduce unscheduled downtime and deliver measurable ROI. Downtime is more than an inconvenience; it carries real financial and operational consequences, leading to higher operating costs, lost productivity, and added strain on facility budgets.
Beyond financial impacts, unplanned outages can disrupt tenants, create safety risks, and drive-up maintenance needs. Self-healing capabilities help prevent these scenarios by initiating fixes and assigning the right resources, while also strengthening preventative maintenance. By analyzing asset performance data and detecting early warning signs, systems can address issues before they escalate into outages, saving facilities managers time and money.
Implementing Self-Healing Systems
With any new technology, implementation challenges are to be expected. For self-healing capabilities, a smooth rollout starts with identifying the highest-impact areas where workflows can be automated. This requires leveraging the right data and aggregating it effectively. Facilities managers have access to a wide variety of information, so the priority is isolating the most relevant, actionable data that points to opportunities for efficiency gains.
For instance, occupancy pattern data that is analyzed against energy consumption patterns can indicate inefficient energy consumption in underutilized spaces. If self-healing buildings are given agency to adjust temperature thresholds and lighting in these areas, it can lead directly to energy efficiency gains. When it comes to maintenance and repairs, this layer of occupancy data can also help the building automatically prioritize repairs in high-usage spaces and schedule them at times that are less inconvenient to its occupants.
The more data that is available through various integrated systems—CMMS, space intelligence and IoT remote monitoring platforms, event and meeting scheduling platforms, integrated workplace management software, and more—the more complete a picture a self-healing building has of a facility’s needs and priorities.
Another key to success in forging a path to self-healing buildings is prioritizing change management. Greater automation will introduce changes into people’s workflows and daily tasks, but it’s designed to complement, not replace, the work of facilities teams. Planning for change, communicating properly with the team, and providing the proper training is crucial for adoption.
The Future of Facilities Teams
As highly automated buildings continue to become the norm, facilities teams will remain critical to everyday operations and long-term strategic planning—but like many other industries experiencing high levels of innovation, their roles will continue to evolve. The knowledge of facilities managers remains invaluable, especially as the industry faces a widening talent gap and an oncoming wave of retirement with the age of the average facilities manager being over 50 years old.
In a self-healing building, facilities professionals will embrace a more strategic supervisor role, ensuring systems are performing as expected and providing input when needed. They will be the adopters and trainers, guiding teams through new workflows, supervising and refining automated systems, and ensuring frictionless collaboration between people and technology. The building itself will be another team member.
When self-healing systems are achieved, more bandwidth will be given to facilities teams to focus on complex problems, strategic priorities, and long-term planning. Even with advanced technology, there will be problems that only humans can solve, including unique equipment failures and situations that require human judgement and expertise.
Looking ahead, facilities professionals will take on a new role as innovation partners, working to expand the scope of automation, implement new technology and scale proven use cases across facilities.
Overcoming Skepticism and Ensuring Success
As automation picks up across industries, skepticism is natural. Start small by automating specific, manageable tasks to gather quick insights and measurable results. Demonstrating success early helps build confidence and drives broader adoption.
To the facilities team, emphasize that automation is not about replacing jobs, but letting people focus on higher-value, less repetitive tasks. By reducing time spent on reactive maintenance, teams can fully concentrate on proactive priorities like ensuring safety, advancing innovation, and improving the occupant experience. Self-healing buildings are no longer a far-off vision or experimental concep—the foundation for this future is being laid now and already delivering tangible results for facilities teams that embrace this vision.
Noah Reding is VP and GM of real estate and facilities at Accruent, a provider of intelligent solutions for the built environment.