Why Owners Should Stop Treating Building Technology as an IT Problem

Commercial real estate owners frequently ask their IT managers to handle building operations technology, but industry experts say this approach is failing and costing them significantly. The problem stems from a fundamental misunderstanding that there are two distinct categories of technology within a building: Information Technology (IT) and Operational Technology (OT).

Bill Douglas, CEO of OpticWise, explains that IT manages organizational infrastructure like servers, email, and cybersecurity, while OT encompasses the systems that physically run the building, such as HVAC, lighting controllers, access control, and leak detection sensors. “IT is very skilled and very necessary at running the organization’s systems, financials, security, access, and all of that,” Douglas said. “But operational technology is a completely different thing. And most ownership groups have no idea these two categories exist.”

When no one inside the organization explicitly owns OT, vendors step in by default. A property manager, already stretched thin, might purchase a system from a trade show that solves one immediate issue but fails to integrate with other building systems. Over time, a typical quarter-million square foot building accumulates a dozen disconnected systems, redundant networks, and scattered data that the owner cannot access. “They have strategies to build properties, to buy properties, to sell properties, to lease up, to increase rent roll,” Douglas said. “But they often just ignore the digital. So the vendors run the roost.”

The consequences extend beyond inefficiency. Each system generates operational data that belongs to the property owner, but when vendors manage the systems, they retain that data. The owner pays for services without receiving the valuable intelligence those systems could provide. “You lose control of your expenses,” Douglas said. “And you lose the data you should be able to use to operate more efficiently and drive more revenue.”

Douglas emphasizes that property managers, IT managers, and asset managers are all capable professionals, but they are being asked to handle tasks outside their expertise. “We are asking the wrong people to do the right tasks,” he said. “A property manager’s job is to take care of tenants and lease up the building. Not to manage networks they never designed and probably cannot document.” He uses a sports analogy: a pitcher should not be expected to pinch hit, and a running back should not play middle linebacker. OT management requires a dedicated digital strategy, a digital architect, and someone accountable for the data.

Douglas and OpticWise founder Drew Hall developed the Peak Property Performance framework to give owners a structured process for auditing existing systems, connecting them, collecting data, and using it to improve performance and profitability. The payoff for properly managing OT includes utility savings from precise energy consumption data, lower insurance rates through documented maintenance history, and enhanced tenant experience from reliable building operations. When OT is unmanaged, lights stay on in empty buildings, water damage goes undetected, and systems run on default settings for years.

The data is already being produced by systems the owner paid for. The challenge is whether anyone is positioned to use it. This is not an IT problem or a property management problem—it is a strategy problem. Recognizing OT as its own discipline with specific requirements and returns is the first step toward solving it.