FMJ Facilities Management magazine providing industry-specific intelligence to FM and property professionals
James Wanless has joined Houlihan Lokey’s Business Services Group as a Director, focusing on the built environment and facilities services sectors.
Wanless joins the global investment bank from DC Advisory, where he was a Director in the Business & Tech-Enabled Services team, with a focus on the professional services and built environment sectors. Recent transactions that Wanless has worked on include Rockpool’s sale of Mecsia to Synova; YFM’s sale of RGE Services to Equistone; Equistone’s sale of Acuity to Permira and OMERS’ acquisition of Bionic. Prior to joining DC Advisory in 2021, he spent over eight years with Deloitte where, having qualified as a chartered accountant, he was a member of the M&A advisory team.
The appointment, sees Wanless join a 40-strong Business Services team in Europe, headed by Managing Directors Simon Gluckstein, James Local, Oliver Vaughan, Axel Bauer and Kristoffer Kalleskog. The global Business Services Group, led by Ranon Kent, now has some 180 bankers covering 13 sectors and over 130 subsectors.
In 2023, according to LSEG (formerly Refinitiv), Houlihan Lokey’s Business Services Group was ranked once again as the No. 1 investment bank for all global business services M&A transactions, having successfully completed some 63 assignments for its clients during the year.
Frontline workers form the backbone of facilities management services, serving as the face of the brand and interacting directly with customers. Yet research by both L&G and the Living Wage Foundation reveals the majority feel overlooked and expendable.
Accelerating the problem is a growing technology gap. Despite having 2.7 billion deskless workers worldwide, representing 80 per cent of the global workforce, only one per cent of software and technology investments has been allocated to this segment. This means there is a huge disconnect between frontline workers and their headquarters, leading to lack of sufficient training, communication challenges and low employee retention.
For this webinar, FMJ has teamed up with frontline training platform Lingio to bring together a panel of experts, to discuss how easy-to-use and efficient AI tools can help create engaging and gamified learning experiences that fit the needs of underserved deskless workers. The result? Better software and learning experiences lead to improved staff engagement and reduced staff turnover by up to 95 per cent, according to McKinsey.
To register for the webinar taking place on 11 September at 11:00 am click here.
