This quarterly note coincides with the end of another year, of the financial type. So first and foremost, on behalf of the team at Strata Sense I would like to thank all the communities that have entrusted us as their Strata Manager during the past twelve months. We take this responsibility very seriously and are driven by our purpose to enable communities to be proud of.
We are very grateful for the support of the many Strata Committee members who give up their personal time and strive to facilitate harmonious living and a well-maintained asset.
Secondly, and as importantly, I would like to thank the Strata Sense team who are not only seeking to deliver service that is a level above all others and striving to be more than just a manager but, most importantly are always seeking to prioritise the communities we serve.
The Strata industry continues to experience reputational challenges. In particular the understanding that long-term and sustainable community loyalty is based on consistently operating with integrity as defined by;
a) Should we, not could we, and,
b) by doing the right thing when nobody is watching
is yet to be fully evidenced in the servicing of strata communities.
Over the past 12 months Strata Sense has continued to focus our resources on prioritising the communities we serve but we have also sought to engage and advocate where we see a clear commitment to improvement, as defined by the strata communities the industry exists to serve. Strata Sense participated in the strata industry Roundtable that brought together a diverse group of industry participants (Strata Managers, Owners, Developer, sector and Government bodies, banks and Insurers). The goal of the roundtable was to identify the key elements of a roadmap towards measurable best practice and sector wide commitment to excellence. A comprehensive report and set of recommendations have been published that seek to address medium to long-term industry challenges.
While participation in these industry initiatives will not immediately impact our communities, we at Strata Sense believe we have a role and responsibility to invest in the improvement of the industry. Some of the key areas of focus from the forum include education, protecting and maximising owners’ investment, and sustainability. These are not only areas which the forum is focusing on but also that Strata Sense has as priorities within our own roadmap.
For strata communities the challenges continue on a number of levels including: economic and in particular increasing costs of industry labour, material supply, social including the changing mix of owners re demographics, exposure and experience to community living and environmental/technological including things like EV charging, e-scooters/ bikes and renewables. All these things alone and in combination require an understanding and respect from the community members to not only contribute and participate in a strong community but to ensure that Owners Corporation obtains the best service and most value from key suppliers including Strata and building managers.
Over the past year Strata Sense has continued to develop and evolve its Strata Management services and some of the key outcomes have been;
Transparency – Strata Sense has a long and widely recognised reputation for transparency and during the year we implemented a new system to address a gap in the reporting of non-routine fees to communities. While the average level of non-routine fees for Strata Sense communities is significantly below industry average; we want complete clarity for communities on the fees they pay.
Additional Specialist Services – Defect management and the increasing complexity in remedial works are challenges for our communities, particularly around the legal/compliance/regulatory considerations and in managing medium to large scale projects. To support our communities with these challenges we are investing in a Defects specialist role and establishing a project management service. We are in pilot for both services and have allocated experienced resources to enable better outcomes for our communities
Improved Services – We have implemented additional systems and processes for our day-to-day interactions with our communities.
We allow our communities to communicate directly with our team (as opposed to a reception or call centre) and we are always striving to improve that experience regardless of workload or need to engage fellow team members. Correspondence is now visible to multiple members of the team and we also have improved reporting to ensure we meet our target of same day service.
Seamless compliance with legislative changes – The regulatory, compliance and legislative changes to an industry create an impost, regardless of whether a provider is doing the right thing, as is the case with Strata Sense. These changes have the impact of increasing supplier cost to service regardless of historical standards. The benefit to our communities is that there has been very minimal distraction for the team and this has allowed us to continue to focus on prioritising our communities.
Strata Sense continues to grow the number of communities that we support, most pleasingly we continue to see a significant proportion of our new communities engage with us by way of a referral.
We are also appreciative of the consistently positive feedback we receive from the many owners and the many new communities that have entrusted us as their new manager. Equally we appreciate the constructive feedback we receive on opportunities to improve. While we are consistently striving to deliver service that is a level above all others, we do sometimes miss that goal, we are disappointed that, in some case, we may not have reached the expectations of community members, but we see these as an opportunity to learn and improve.
We look forward to the next financial year and in continuing in our commitment to: prioritise our communities, seek to be more than just a manager, and, in striving to provide service that is a level above all others.