As hospitals compete more and more aggressively for patients, facility managers are finding themselves in fiercer competition for funds, according to an article on the Facilities Net website.

So it's incumbent upon facility managers to make their voices heard to keep sustainability and energy efficiency as an organizational priority. Several strategies can help them push their efficiency goals to the top of the priority heap, the article said.

The first and most critical is to have good data. "I can't emphasize enough how important it is to have solid data for driving programs, tracking progress, and doing internal and external comparisons," said Don King, vice president of facility operations for Kaiser Permanente, the nation's largest healthcare system. "Without data, decisions become highly politicized and emotional. Data removes that emotion."

At Kaiser Permanente, where utility bills can top $200 million a year system-wide, utility bills are transmitted to a third party, where they're reviewed for validity. "But more importantly, the system allows us to capture the data," said King.

Read the article.