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This paper examines the creation and delivery of real estate strategies in the corporate environment against the not unusual backdrop of management unwillingness to focus on non‐operational subjects, the problem of business inertia and the protection of old demarcations. While there are often barriers to delivering a co‐ordinated, business‐wide accommodation plan, this paper looks at one route to success:the marketing of the strategy and its delivery to internal customers emphasising the corporate, business division and staff benefits. The tangible proof of the strategy through new and flexible buildings, new ways of working, performance measurement and benchmarking gives the real estate team a powerful array of marketing material. The key is to communicate endlessly about the progress and the benefits that are brought to the business through this targeted approach to space management and delivery. This is an interesting facet of corporate real estate management and one which is essential to a more rapid and less stressful delivery of a programme to provide the optimum portfolio of space and, as a result, competitive advantage to the business.

The purpose of this paper is to outline the development of public sector real estate asset management in the UK from the 1980s to the present day.

The paper is a narrative based upon a chronology of a selection of the reports, studies and research of the subject by academics, audit bodies, consultants, government departments, eminent business people and economists. The principal findings of the referenced reports/research are drawn out and highlighted. It should be noted that the extensive reference schedule is arranged in date order and not in the usual alphabetic sequence.

The analysis shows cycles of asset management focus across the public sector over the 30 years of the narrative. The attention of government changes, often reflecting straitened economic times, from influencing local authority asset management to highlighting the better use of the assets used by its departments. A strategy to involve private sector‐generated solutions to improve efficiency and generate cash is currently under development.

This is a narrative paper. In‐depth research of the referenced reports would produce valuable insights to inform future strategies.

Strategists should be aware that some asset management issues identified in the 1980s remain unsolved and are still evident today.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the link between rationale, practice and outcomes in municipal property asset management and through this to gain an improved understanding of the emerging discipline of public sector asset management.

An analytical framework was developed comprising models to measure why councils carry out asset management (rationale); how they do it (practice) and what is achieved (outcomes). This was applied through an extensive survey of 18 councils and an intensive survey of three councils in a comparative study of UK and Russia. This paper draws on the UK field work only.

A weak but discernable link was found between rationale and practice, but the link between practice and outcomes was unproven. This lack of empirical evidence to show good practice leads to effective asset management remains a problematic area requiring further research and reinforces the orthodoxy that the adoption of practice is used as a proxy for measuring outcomes. Four “change factors” were identified as important in the transformation from property management to asset management and a broad typology was advanced to position cases in their path of evolution or level of maturity in this transformation process.

Cases were chosen to provide a mix in terms of their status, size and perceived maturity in asset management.

There has been limited examination of the linkage between rationale, practice and outcomes in asset management and the analytical framework and typology present some innovative conceptual thinking to explore the nature of an emerging discipline which remains problematic to define easily.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the current practice of facilities management (FM) in Botswana, particularly as it relates to building maintenance.

Both qualitative and quantitative research methods (observations made from visual inspection of buildings and questionnaires) were used to obtain data in order to meet the objective of the study. A survey involving a self‐administered questionnaire to facility managers was used.

The study revealed that there was generally a lack of information on facilities managed due to a number of factors. The study also found that maintenance expenditure was not in accordance with recommended best practice ratios, that there was a lack of knowledge on the different types of maintenance and that the focus was mostly on emergency and day‐to‐day maintenance. Top management in some organisations also seemed to lack an understanding of the importance of FM, while maintenance departments suffered from under funding and budget cuts.

From the key findings, recommendations are made in this paper to improve the practice of FM in Botswana.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a conceptual framework that can be used to identify capabilities needed in the management of infrastructure assets.

This paper utilises a qualitative approach to analyse secondary data in order to develop a conceptual framework that identifies capabilities for strategic infrastructure asset management.

In an external business environment that is undergoing rapid change, it is more appropriate to focus on factors internal to the organisation such as resources and capabilities as a basis to develop competitive advantage. However, there is currently very little understanding of the internal capabilities that are appropriate for infrastructure asset management. Therefore, a conceptual framework is needful to guide infrastructure organisations in the identification of capabilities.

This is a conceptual paper and future empirical research should be conducted to validate the propositions made in the paper.

The paper clearly argues the need for infrastructure organisations to adopt a systematic approach to identifying the capabilities needed in the management of strategic infrastructure assets. The discussion on the impact of essential capabilities is useful in providing the impetus for managers who operate in a deregulated infrastructure business landscape to review their existing strategies.

The paper provides a new perspective on how asset managers can create value for their organisations by investing in the relevant capabilities.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce concepts of branding applicable to the corporate real estate management (CREM) service and present early results of a study of branding concepts to address a credibility‐positioning problem in CREM.

The paper presents case studies of CREM in Australia and Malaysia analysed from the branding perspective.

It is found that the CREM credibility‐positioning problem inside organisations depends not only on the technical performance of CREM service, but also involves the relationship between CREM and its customers.

These are the early results of a study limited to a few case studies selected from four industry sectors in two different countries. Further findings might explain cross‐cultural perceptions for CREM's credibility‐positioning in emerging and mature real estate markets.

The research clearly identified the application of branding elements in CREM's relationship with customers. The findings of this paper are useful to CREM executives in increasing their credibility in their organisations.

The paper introduces branding theory as being useful and important in CREM practice.

ONE OF MY oldest friends in the profession of librarianship retires next month from the post he has held for the last 19 years —that of City Librarian of Westminster.

The purpose of this paper is to show that general‐ and special‐purpose properties have to be dealt with differently by the public sector.

Application of standard economic theory concerning pricing of properties and infrastructure. The issues are analyzed based on experiences from Swedish state‐owned properties.

The distinction results in quite different public property management strategies. Special‐purpose properties have no short‐run alternative use and have limited rental and capital values, unlike general‐purpose properties. Thus, to apply a required rate of return based on assumed capital values universally will lead to inefficient use. For special‐purpose properties, short‐run marginal costs (SRMCs) should be charged – no more.

General properties owned by the state represent a suitable case for privatization. For special‐purpose properties, only SRMCs should be charged.

The paper makes a distinction between two kinds of state‐owned properties; general‐ and special‐purpose properties, and analyzes the important consequences in property management.