Survey data in the newly released Facilities Technology Trends & Buying Best Practices report shows a nearly unanimous (99%) belief of facilities decision-makers that the importance and use of technology will only continue to grow. Released by ARC Document Solutions (NYSE: ARC), the industry research reports insights into the evaluation and acquisition of technology that facilities teams use to meet operating objectives.

According to survey respondents, the top four most valued technology tools are emergency & life safety (69%), communications or collaborations (63%), work order or ticketing (60%), and mobile productivity apps (59%).

Facilities leaders agree that increasing productivity and delivering higher levels of customer service are the top two drivers for choosing the types of technology tools to purchase. Survey results indicate a significant opportunity for improving productivity by adopting mobile technology solutions.

"We expected the research to confirm that buying technology tools to increase productivity and deliver higher levels of customer service are top priorities," said ARC Facilities executive vice president, Brian Bailard. "We didn't expect to discover such a significant opportunity to improve productivity - that teams could complete up to 30% more work orders by using a mobile solution."

Large facilities teams (25 or more team members) purchase nearly twice as much technology (10 or more annually) as small teams. Surprisingly, larger budgets is not cited as the reason; both large and small teams face similar challenges in purchasing tech. Five factors emerged as the keys to successfully buying tech, including ease of use, a pilot, mobile capability, and involving both IT and the budget approver in the product evaluation.

Data for this research was compiled from responses to a survey conducted in September 2018 of 229 U.S.-based facilities decision-makers who have purchased technology within the last three years. The goal of the research was to understand the priorities, drivers, barriers, and best practices to using and purchasing technology tools to optimize facilities management and operations.

For more survey findings, download the full industry research report.