Effective use of blockchain technology for facilities management procurement process
Hasni Gayathma Gunasekara, Pournima Sridarran, Dilakshan Rajaratnam
Abstract
Purpose Facilities management (FM) has become a revolutionary profession, which adds value to the built environment. Compared to other industries, the development of the FM industry is at a preliminary stage owing to poor adaptation of digitalisation. Although FM procurement process has improved over time, it is still complex, inefficient and challenging with the lack of digital innovations. Blockchain technology has emerged as a revolutionary digital technology under “Procurement 4.0”. The purpose of this paper is to develop a framework that enables the effective use of blockchain technology for FM procurement process. Design/methodology/approach Data collection using interviews was performed in two stages adopting a mono method qualitative methodological choice using case studies and survey strategies. Template analysis and content analysis techniques were used to analyse the collected data. Findings Through the findings, main steps in the current FM process were identified. It was revealed, manual procurement has issues related to, efficiency, data security, communication and transparency. Similarly, e-procurement systems also have issues related to data security, poor integration and transparency. FM industry has identified the requirement of transforming into an advanced digitalised technology-based procurement system. This study revealed, blockchain features to overcome these issues and the application of blockchain technology in different steps of the procurement process through the developed framework. Originality/value The developed framework offers a solution for the future technological transformation of FM procurement using blockchain technology.