5 Signs Your School Needs Facilities Management Software
Oct 14, 2025
5 Signs Your School Needs Facilities Management Software
Every school has maintenance needs. Lights burn out. HVAC systems fail. Plumbing leaks. Equipment breaks. The question isn't whether maintenance happens—it's whether your school handles it efficiently or chaotically.
Many schools manage facilities with spreadsheets, paper forms, email threads, and a lot of institutional knowledge stored in a few key people's heads. This works until it doesn't.
Here are five signs that your school has outgrown manual processes and needs facilities management software.
Sign 1: Maintenance Requests Regularly Get Lost or Forgotten
A teacher reports a broken window latch in September. By November, nothing has happened. The teacher assumes it was ignored. The facilities team never received the request—or received it and lost track.
This scenario plays out constantly in schools without a proper system. Requests come in through multiple channels: emails to different people, paper forms submitted to the front office, verbal reports in the hallway, texts to the head custodian's personal phone.
Each channel creates opportunities for requests to slip through cracks. An email gets buried. A paper form sits in a pile. A verbal report is forgotten by end of day. A text message gets lost in a busy thread.
When requests get lost, small problems become big ones. That window latch becomes a security issue. A minor leak becomes water damage. A flickering light becomes a liability.
The software solution: A proper system gives everyone one place to submit requests. Every request is logged automatically with a timestamp. Nothing relies on someone remembering to add it to a spreadsheet or forward an email. The request exists in the system the moment it's submitted—assigned, tracked, and visible.
Sign 2: No One Knows the Status of Open Repairs
A principal asks about the gym floor refinishing. A parent inquires about the broken playground equipment. A teacher wants to know when the projector will be fixed.
In schools without a system, answering these questions requires detective work. Check the email thread. Text the facilities manager. Look at the spreadsheet (which may or may not be current). Call the contractor. Piece together fragments of information scattered across multiple places and people.
This wastes time for everyone. Administrators spend time chasing updates. Facilities teams spend time answering status questions instead of doing actual work. Requesters feel ignored and frustrated.
Lack of visibility creates a perception problem too. Even when facilities teams are working hard and making progress, it's invisible to everyone else. Teachers assume nothing is happening. Administrators can't defend the team because they don't have information either.
The software solution: Real-time status tracking gives everyone appropriate visibility. Requesters can check the status of their own request without asking anyone. Administrators can see all open work orders at a glance. Facilities managers have a dashboard showing what's pending, in progress, and completed. No more status meetings, no more chasing updates.
Sign 3: You Rely on Emails, Paper Forms, or Group Chats
How do people report maintenance issues at your school? If the answer involves any of the following, you have a process problem.
Emails to one person's inbox. What happens when that person is out sick? On vacation? Overwhelmed with other emails? The request sits unread.
Paper forms submitted to the office. Someone has to collect these, interpret the handwriting, manually log them somewhere, and route them to the right person. Each step adds delay and opportunities for error.
Group texts or chat threads. These feel fast and informal, but they're terrible for tracking. Requests scroll off the screen. There's no way to assign, prioritize, or mark things complete. And they blur the line between work and personal communication.
Hallway conversations. "Hey, can you look at the water fountain in Building C?" Sure, the facilities manager heard you. Will they remember by the time they get back to their office? Maybe.
All of these methods share a common problem: they depend on human memory and manual processes to work. They lack structure, accountability, and tracking.
The software solution: One standardized submission process replaces all the chaos. A simple web form or mobile app that anyone can access. Every request follows the same format, captures the same essential information, and flows into the same system. No more variability, no more dependence on individual memory.
Sign 4: The Same Equipment Keeps Breaking with No Record
The science lab projector is down again. This is the third time this semester. Or is it the fourth? No one is quite sure because there's no record of past repairs.
Without maintenance history, every repair is treated as a new event. Technicians don't know what was tried before. Patterns don't surface. You can't see that this unit has cost $3,000 in repairs over the past two years—information that would make the replacement decision obvious.
Lack of history also means you can't hold vendors accountable. Did they actually fix the problem last time? Was the repair done correctly? Without records, you have no evidence.
This problem compounds across all your assets. You don't know which equipment is reliable and which is a money pit. You can't forecast replacements because you don't know what's approaching end-of-life. Budget decisions are based on guesswork and gut feeling.
The software solution: When maintenance requests are logged against specific assets, history builds automatically. Every work order becomes part of that asset's record. You can pull up any piece of equipment and see every repair: what was done, when, by whom, at what cost. Patterns become visible. Data replaces guesswork.
Sign 5: Your Facilities Team Feels Overwhelmed and Reactive
Talk to facilities teams at schools without good systems and you'll hear common themes.
"We're always behind." There's never time to get ahead. Every day is spent reacting to the latest urgent issue. Preventive maintenance gets pushed off indefinitely.
"We can't win." No matter how hard they work, people complain about slow response. The team feels unappreciated because their efforts are invisible.
"I have no idea what my actual workload is." Without a system, there's no way to quantify how many requests come in, how long they take, or where time actually goes. This makes it impossible to make the case for additional resources.
"If I get hit by a bus, no one knows anything." Critical knowledge lives in one person's head—vendor contacts, equipment quirks, maintenance schedules. There's no documentation, no backup plan.
These aren't personal failures. They're system failures. Even the best facilities team will struggle without proper tools.
The software solution: Software provides structure that reduces chaos. A clear queue shows what needs to be done and in what order. Assignment and due dates create accountability. Reporting proves workload and performance. Documentation captures institutional knowledge. The team can be proactive instead of just reactive.
Making the Case for Change
If these signs sound familiar, you're not alone. Most schools operate this way—not because it's effective, but because it's how things have always been done.
Making the case for facilities management software requires addressing common objections.
"We don't have budget for software." Consider the cost of the current system: wasted time, missed requests that become bigger problems, equipment failures from lack of preventive maintenance, and institutional knowledge walking out the door when key people leave. The status quo has costs too—they're just hidden.
"Our team won't adopt new technology." The right software is simpler than what you're doing now, not more complicated. Submitting a request through a form is easier than writing an email. Checking a dashboard is faster than chasing updates. Good facilities software reduces work; it doesn't add to it.
"We're too small to need this." Small schools often benefit most. With limited staff, you can't afford inefficiency. One person managing facilities needs good tools even more than a large team does.
"We tried software before and it didn't work." Not all software is created equal. Enterprise CMMS platforms designed for hospitals or manufacturing plants are overkill for schools. Look for something purpose-built for education—simpler, more affordable, and designed for how schools actually operate.
What to Look For
If you're considering facilities management software for your school, prioritize these qualities.
Simplicity. If it requires weeks of training, it won't get adopted. Look for intuitive interfaces that anyone can use.
Easy request submission. Teachers and staff will only use it if it's faster than sending an email. One link, one form, minimal fields.
Mobile access. Facilities teams aren't at desks. They need to manage work orders from phones.
School-appropriate pricing. Enterprise software with enterprise pricing doesn't fit school budgets. Look for vendors who understand education.
Quick implementation. You shouldn't need consultants and months of setup. Good software is ready to use in days, not months.
Recognize these signs at your school?
Reliant is facilities management software built specifically for schools. Simple request submission, real-time tracking, and full maintenance history—without the complexity or cost of enterprise tools.