THAT DM
A project manager on a fee is measured on cost, programme and quality against a brief. Those are the right measures for the job they have been given. But the brief ends at practical completion, and the asset does not.
So the decisions that trade a little capex today for a lot of operating cost later tend to go one way. Cheaper fan coil units that need a room out of service twice a year. A back of house layout that adds two minutes to every plate leaving the kitchen. A laundry contract that looked keen and left no room for a linen change.
An owner weighs those decisions differently because an owner holds them. When we sit on the development side we are still doing the operator's arithmetic in our heads, because we will be the ones running the building, or advising the person who does.
Ask any prospective partner a simple question: what happens to you if this asset underperforms in year three? If the honest answer is nothing, you have found the limit of their advice.