Why is management so important when creating communities?

We rarely stop and think about the impact that we as property managers have on the environment and on the communities who live in the schemes we manage. But if we take some time to think about what our developments would look like with just a year without management. Grounds would be completely overgrown, lifts and other services would have been switched off and/or vandalised. Payments of charges would all but cease and the appearance of just about every aspect of the schemes would devalue the asset considerably. Behaviours of occupants would change significantly too. It quickly becomes obvious that far from being the irritant that managing agents are sometimes seen as, we are in fact essential to the feel and the quality of the built environment and this in turn has an effect on the well being of the communities that live there.

Terms such as 'placemaking' are often attributed to design and build inputs at the outset and this is an important element. But it must also includes how managing agents keep their schemes looking good and feeling safe and inclusive, and how they bring neighbours together with a common purpose.

Increasingly the mixture of tenure types challenges how managing agents interact and deliver services to a wide range of the community, some of whom will have very different needs and ambitions for their living environments. All such challenges will need to be met by sophisticated solutions. Some of these solutions will be achieved by bringing the whole community into the discussion and others by a combination of soft and hard services that allow the collection of funds and maintenance of the quality of the environment. As ever this is a complex role that we property managers have been doing instinctively for a long time but subtle changes mean that we must begin regard ourselves as important factors in the delivery of wider well-being of our customers.

What is this change? New schemes may routinely include leasehold and shared ownership, market rented, fair rented and social rented tenancies. Price pressures will see shared renters next door to families and older people trading down living next door to young professionals, key workers or those previously in housing need. In such mixed communities there is a new responsibility for the managing agent and that is to listen to the needs of all and ensure there is a continuous and community wide discussion taking place. This includes allowing full representation of different groups and engaging with community leaders. Allowing collective action gives managers the power and support to make changes and improvements significantly more efficiently.

As an industry we remain bogged down in technical jargon, regulation and limited working patterns and defensive behaviours that curtail the real improvements that we are able to bring. Whilst continuing to recognise the importance of the safety and technical elements of our role, we need to embrace the wider opportunity to be the hub around which communities, particularly in large developments, can control and bring continuous improvement to their environment.

What an opportunity that must represent to further our importance as the experts in the residential built environment.