7NOX Blog
Insights and helpful tips for facilities managers and property owners
6 Tips for Managing Remote Workers
Remote work has presented challenges for both workers and their companies. Challenges include adopting flexible schedules and conducting video interviews. However, managing a team of remote workers can be a challenge, but it can...
What Are Database Schemas?
Although often overlooked by building managers and engineers, data schemas are essential to the efficient building management, data analysis and system automation. That’s because schemas are the building blocks of effective...
5 Icebreaker Tips for Networking at Tradeshows
You stride through a bustling conference hall, alive with excited chats and enthusiastic handshakes. In your pocket, a stack of freshly printed business cards. In your head, a well-rehearsed elevator pitch. You're confident and...
BACnet Basics: What are Device Profiles?
In this article in our BACnet Basics Series, we look at Device Profiles, why they’re important and how they’re created. We’ve also included a real world example that illustrates how to use device profiles to accurately specify...
5 Beginner Tips for Video Job Interviews
Today more job interviews are being held via conference call apps like Zoom and Teams. Those looking to nab their next gig are jumping on a Zoom call to chat with prospective employer half way around the world. While a video job...
BACnet Basics: What are BIBBs?
Every complex topic or field needs a helpful naming system. Scientists name flora and fauna by genus and species. Even astronomers have their own planetary nomenclature. Standard naming conventions do just that—they standardize...
Effective Cybersecurity Habits for Your BAS
Properties need effective cybersecurity measures. Cybercriminals don’t just attack high profile companies and governments; they target small to medium businesses too. Computer viruses range from annoying adware infiltrating your...
The Metaverse, Digital Twins, and Building Decarbonization
After the former-company-known-as-Facebook rebranded itself in late 2021 to Meta, much of the world discovered the “metaverse”—the next generation of human connectivity that would fundamentally transform how we socialize and...
Open Building Systems are a Hedge Against Future Uncertainty
The social, environmental and technological challenges for the commercial real estate sector are significant. Many building owners and managers are still adjusting to the disruptions of the COVID pandemic, lock downs, remote...
Help Decarbonize Your Building with After-Hours HVAC Automation
Buildings are responsible for a significant chunk of emitted green house gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere. Therefore, they're a leading contributor to global warming. In the U.S., buildings account for 40% of all U. S. primary...
Hands-Free Building Tech You Probably Didn’t Know Existed
In a post-COVID workplace, “hands-free” is the new buzz world. It’s also the new hygiene standard. At times, it may seem the pandemic has turned everyone into Adrian Monk. But you needn’t be an OCD-suffering detective to solve...
What is an Overtime HVAC System?
If you have commercial tenants, they've likely scheduled heating or air conditioning outside of your building’s usual business hours. Managers and owners commonly refer to these extra hours as overtime HVAC, after-hours HVAC,...
Light Flicker and Its Effects on Tenant Health
Successful properties have lighting that suits the needs of their occupants. Proper lighting can boost productivity, mood and an overall sense of worker wellbeing. While bad lighting can do the opposite. Light flicker is...
5 Tips for Surviving Supply Chain Issues
Are you finding it hard to procure office equipment? Is your supply closet running short on toilet paper? Supply chain issues are a global problem, and shortages are hitting every sector. Office managers in the U.S. are finding...
3 Ways Your HVAC System Impacts Fire Protection
Fire protection systems are one of the most complex and ubiquitous structures within facilities today. They contain many parts intertwined with other building components. For example, emergency lighting and smoke detectors wire...
HVAC Systems and Hydrogen Peroxide Decontamination (Deprox)
The COVID pandemic increased awareness and use of relatively new decontamination methods for medical facilities. In addition to standard surface cleaning and disinfection, hospital managers employ vaporized hydrogen peroxide...
Prepping Your HVAC System to Lower COVID Transmission this Winter
Colder weather often brings spikes in COVID-19 and influenza cases. With this in mind, we should continue promoting vaccinations, mask wearing, social distancing, surface cleaning and handwashing inside your buildings. However,...
Best FM Online Learning Resources for 2022
In our quest to compile a list of the best FM online learning resources for 2022, we looked at several important factors. For one, we wanted a good mix of quality and convenience. Some FMs will be looking for professional...
4 Common Types of Touch Screens and How They Work
Touch screens are ubiquitous. We use them at the grocery store to check out, and at the airport to check in. They’re at visitor center kiosks, our banks, our homes and even in our cars. And today, because they’re the primary...
What is the Niagara Framework?
The Niagara Framework (NF) is developed by Tridium, and if you visit the company’s website, you will learn Niagara is a “comprehensive software platform for the development and deployment of connected products and...
How to Use Knowledge Transfer to Lower the Impact of Retiring Staff
Today baby boomers and seasoned FM pros are retiring at a hasty clip. According to IFMA Foundation’s Global Workforce Initiative (GWI), more than 50% of FMs will retire over the next decade or so. The change is having a dramatic...
Positive vs Negative Pressure Rooms
Many industries use pressurised rooms to stop cross-contamination between one area of a building and another. For example, semiconductor makers use positive pressure rooms (PPR) to ensure their integrated chips are free of...
Communication and the Art of Influence
In every act of communication, we strive to influence others. Even when our communication is simply to inform, we seek to align someone else’s view of reality to ours. While we can influence others’ behaviors, the higher aim is...
The FM Checklist for SaaS Procurement
Software-as-a-service (SaaS) is a growing trend in FM because of several advantages cloud-based services deliver over in-house development. For one, it’s generally cheaper to outsource your software needs rather than spend time...
