The Reporter: February 1996, Vol.7, No.1
Facilities Operations Gets Personal

Bash Parvez wants your calls-but only if you've tried the maintenance control center first. Mr. Parvez, a two-decade veteran of the Health Sciences Division, has a new role as manager of customer services with Facilities Operations. But his reason for bei ng is for more than fielding complaints: It's to make sure Facilities Operations has done everything possible to make its customers happy.

Bash Parvez is well-known to many on the Health Sciences campus. He manages the mail room, the receiving department, and laborers. "We recognized that we needed to get closer to the Health Sciences community," says Bob Maffia, director of Facilities Oper ations. "With Bash's new role, the concept is for us to contact you before you contact us."

Facilities Operations is the banner for a variety of services ranging from janitorial to carpentry. Some services are part of the standard facilities maintenance (upkeep of the physical plant, for example) and others are contracted as extra services (off ices painted, for example). Part of Mr. Parvez's new role is to let people know when certain services have been completed. He does that by sending a notice to the appropriate person, who then verifies that the work has been done satisfactorily. "I want th e whole facilities department to be perceived as responsive and helpful," he says.

Mr. Parvez is also putting together a service guide that lists what Facilities Operations does and who to contact for each service. He also hopes the guide will answer other questions presently on the minds of those in the Health Sciences community.

Also, Mr. Parvez has started releasing one-page bulletins on various topics regarding facilities management. Subjects will tend to answer commonly asked questions, says Mr. Maffia. The last bulletin listed the functions of the maintenance control center and the next scheduled bulletin will be on customer communication.

"When someone complains about a service, I go directly to the particular facilities manager and take care of it right away," says Mr. Parvez. He believes that after more than 23 years, he knows the ins and outs of the department, so people are comfortabl e talking to him. "And besides," he says, "I always follow through because my name's riding on it."