Innovation in Motion: How Virtual FM Used Technology to Become a Model for Business Growth and Trades Innovation

After more than three decades in the trades, Dawn Lawrie, the Group Systems Director for Virtual Services Group and Managing Director of Ignite Consultancy – a Simpro partner – has seen the industry transform from clipboards and callouts to connected data and digital visibility. And through it all, she’s remained laser focused on one thing: discovering smarter ways to work and building the systems, processes, and teams needed to be successful in the trades.

It’s a mindset that has paid off – to say the least.

This year, Virtual FM — part of the wider Virtual Services Group — was named the winner of Simpro’s Innovation in Operations Award at Simprosium 2025. Just months earlier, the group had also taken home the national Facilities Management Award for Innovation and Technology End Users in the UK.

And while all of that is undoubtedly worth bragging about, for Dawn, those wins weren’t about trophies — they were validation that innovation, done right, drives real business growth.

For the team at Virtual FM, small and big wins added up along the way that helped concrete strategic, consistent business growth:

• A 20% faster job intake through direct-to-system digital form submissions meant booking more business and filling pipeline faster
• At the field level, over 50% of contractor jobs self-closed, saving time in the field, freeing up office admin, and drastically improving live status updates for operational visibility
• Office staff spent 30% less client admin time on internal reporting thanks to BI dashboard insights
• Even customers felt the growth benefits: The team saw a 30% drop in client inquiries regarding maintenance schedules, thanks to self-service tools, with customers receiving progress notifications and status updates automatically - improving transparency and service confidence across the board.

“Innovation and operations are the key to business growth,” she says. “You can’t stay static. There’s always room for improvement.”

That relentless approach to embracing technology, innovation, and improving operations has fueled Virtual FM’s rise from a single-operator business to a multi-division group leading the charge in facilities management and technology consulting. Whether she’s building bespoke training modules, integrating systems across departments, or helping other businesses succeed through Ignite Consultancy Services, Dawn and the rest of the team approaches innovation as both a habit and a responsibility that should be baked into the business strategy, not an afterthought.

In the trades world, innovation isn’t just about keeping up — it’s about setting the pace.

Decades of Perspective, One Relentless Vision

“Growth doesn’t happen by accident. You need to be smart with your systems and relentless about your processes.”

Dawn’s career began in the trades — welding, electrical, construction — long before “digital transformation” was part of anyone’s vocabulary. Over 35 years, she’s seen every phase of the industry’s evolution, from hand-written job cards to cloud-based systems, from faxed purchase orders to real-time dashboards.

“I’ve worked in the trades since I was 16, and I’ve seen how much it’s changed. Everything used to be paper-based. Things have hugely evolved since then — it’s so different now. Things are faster, things happen quicker, and the technology that comes along makes everything easier.”

That breadth of experience gave her something rare: deep business insight and industry perspective.

After two decades in property management, Dawn stepped away briefly to raise her son. Her return is what led her to join Virtual FM, founded by a former colleague with a single-person operation and a big vision.

“I love business growth. I love working with entrepreneurs that move fast. I like solving problems and finding better ways to work.”

Building the Backbone of Innovation

When she joined Virtual FM, a capable team kept the business moving using the tools available to them. Quotes and jobs were tracked in spreadsheets, and most processes were guided by shared experience. While a practical setup for the stage they were in, growth eventually outpaced it. There was room for better ways to work — and Dawn was sure of it.

“There were no systems,” Dawn recalls. “Quotes were in Word documents, job cards on paper. I knew straight away we needed structure — something that could grow with us.”

That clarity — a mix of intuition and experience — became the foundation for the company’s next chapter. Dawn began evaluating platforms, mapping every workflow, and asking one question: How could technology connect every part of the operation?

By the end of 2017, Virtual FM had begun implementing Simpro, marking a turning point not just in efficiency, but in how the business thought about operations, including future innovations.

“I looked at four different systems at the time,” she says. “None of them ticked every box. Some were strong in one area, weak in others. Simpro was the only one that covered everything we needed end-to-end.”

Still, the journey didn’t end at implementation. With a new trades platform in place, processes began evolving in a way that formed a culture of constant improvement — one that demanded every business system, process, and person stay connected.

“Once we got Simpro in, everything ran through it — quoting, jobs, billing, reporting. It brought the structure we needed.”

The way Virtual FM employees worked and the business operated began to drastically improve. Fast-paced but manual, ad-hoc processes gave way to consistency and control. Engineers in the field captured detailed digital job cards and photos that fed directly into client dashboards. Reporting evolved from static spreadsheets into live data insights, giving teams and clients visibility across every asset, site, and service. These efforts resulted in fewer bottlenecks, faster decision making, and increased accountability across the organization.

“I tell people all the time, it’s not just an operations tool — it’s the way we work.”

Today, Virtual FM’s connected ecosystem supports more than 100 staff across multiple divisions — and the benefits ripple outward. What started as a facilities management company is now part of a wider services group that uses technology not just to manage operations, but to continuously improve them.

”You can’t manage what you can’t see, and once we had that visibility, everything changed.”

For Dawn, it’s proof that operational innovation isn’t about one tool or moment. It’s about designing a system — and a mindset — that scales.

From Foundation to Ecosystem: A Culture of Continuous Innovation

Once the systems were in place, growth became less about adding headcount and more about sharpening how the business worked. With Simpro as the central hub, Dawn and her team began optimizing the platform so that it worked the way their respective teams needed it to: as a linked ecosystem, connecting every process, integration, and person under one digital roof.

“It gives us the visibility we need to keep improving — every part of the business connects through it.”

On top of that, Dawn keeps a close watch on the industry:

“I’m always looking at what’s out there — what’s changing, what’s new, what could make us better,” Dawn says. “You can’t ever get comfortable. There’s always room to improve.”

This ethos is threaded into the heartbeat of Virtual FM’s operations. Every challenge became a test case for smarter design.

Training new staff? Dawn built tailored learning modules that reflected how the business actually ran and used Simpro and other tools, rather than relying solely on standardized system guides.

Managing assets and maintenance schedules? The team connected Simpro’s maintenance planner directly with SFG20, the British Standard for maintenance, ensuring every inspection aligned with strict compliance requirements.

“We’ve integrated SFG20 so that when the engineers go out in the field, they know exactly what to do when they get there,” Dawn explains. “The job cards that come out are really full-on for the clients to see what’s been done. You just can’t get that level of visibility without a proper platform.”

The improvements didn’t stop there. Using Simpro’s BI reporting, Virtual FM began surfacing real-time insights that once took days of manual reconciliation. Dashboards now visualized performance, costs, and maintenance data across the entire group.

Clients gained instant access to the same information through the customer portal — where customized dashboards, job attachments, and color-coded maintenance reports gave them full transparency into work completed.

“We’ve made the visuals interactive,” she says. “Clients can click through the data — see their maintenance schedules, documents, everything they need. It’s all there.”

A commitment to continuous innovation turned Virtual FM’s system architecture into a living, evolving network — one designed to reduce friction, increase accuracy, and give every person in the company the visibility they need to make better decisions.

“I’ve never found another platform that covers as much as Simpro does, end-to-end.”

And while many businesses stop at digital transformation, Dawn’s team treated it as just the beginning: a foundation to keep building on, one integration and improvement at a time.

“The open API is huge — not every platform gives you that level of access. It means we can build, link, and innovate the way we need to.”

Innovation Beyond the Business: Building Systems and Setting Standards That Work for the Entire Trades Industry

Interestingly, innovation isn’t confined to the walls of Virtual FM.

Once the company’s digital foundation was solid, Dawn shifted focus to include helping others in the trades achieve the same clarity and efficiency that had transformed Virtual Services Group’s operations.

“I’ve gone in and helped a few companies that were struggling with implementation,” she says. “Sometimes the issue isn’t the software — it’s that teams don’t have a true champion in the business. They just need someone who knows the system and can show everyone else what’s possible.”

It was this level of support and expertise that led directly to the creation of Ignite Consultancy Services, the group’s technology and operational advisory arm. Through Ignite, Dawn now supports businesses across the UK — guiding them through system optimization, training, and bespoke integrations. In many cases, her work fills the gap between vision and execution, helping leaders connect the dots between people, processes, and technology.

“I’d go in, do a discovery session, help them build out training, and document processes that actually fit their business,” she explains. “A lot of companies underuse the system — they just need a bit of help to make it work harder for them.”

Her hands-on understanding of Simpro and its data ecosystem gives Ignite clients a distinct advantage. Whether she’s configuring BI dashboards that turn operational data into actionable insights or linking third-party platforms for automated compliance reporting, Dawn is redefining what digital transformation can look like for field-service companies.

Now, one of Ignite’s most ambitious projects yet is coming to fruition — a new SFG20 Facilities IQ integration, designed to connect Simpro users with the latest and greatest in British maintenance standards. The tool synchronizes regimes between SFG20’s new platform and Simpro, ensuring clients can maintain assets with up-to-date specifications and full visibility across systems.

“There were about 20 customers waiting on this integration,” Dawn says. “SFG20 had completely changed their API, and we built the bridge. It links both platforms, keeps everything compliant, and makes the process seamless for anyone maintaining to that standard.”

The project isn’t just a technical achievement; it’s a testament to how far Virtual FM’s approach to innovation has evolved — from internal efficiency to industry-wide impact.

“For me, it’s about collaboration, not competition. The more we share what’s working, the stronger the industry gets.”

And through it all, Simpro remains the constant: the platform that powers the operations, the data that fuels the insights, and the community that connects it all.

“I’ve been targeted by other systems,” she says with a smile. “They try to demo me all the time, but I always compare it back to what we’ve got in Simpro. I’ve never found anything else that offers the full package.”

At the end of the day, true innovation moves beyond improving systems and processes and into helping an entire industry raise its standards.

Looking Ahead: The Future of Innovation in the Trades

Winning two major awards in a single year for innovation — Simpro’s Innovation in Operations Award and the UK’s Facilities Management Award for Innovation and Technology End Users — is no small feat.

For the team at Virtual FM, it’s a massive accomplishment that carries weight and meaning well beyond professional recognition and success. It’s proof that a long-term strategy for investing in people, systems, and processes through years of calculated experimentation, process-building, and persistence really does pay off and create measurable impact.

“I was over the moon,” she admits. “There are so many incredible partners and customers out there, so just being recognized was a real honor. For me, it validated everything we’ve done — that constant drive to make things better, faster, and smarter.”

So what’s next for a trades business that’s already winning awards for innovation? Virtual FM isn’t slowing down any time soon. This hard-earned recognition is only fueling their motivation to keep moving forward while bringing other trades businesses along in their success.

“For me, it’s about offering the best possible service — not just completing the job, but making the experience better for the client. If we don’t provide them with the best information, the best portal, and the best visuals, then they don’t stay — they go find someone else.”

Dawn shares this philosophy with every business she consults through Ignite — and this same passion keeps Virtual FM, part of the broader Virtual Services Group, at the forefront of digital progress in the trades.

“If there’s one thing I’d tell other businesses,” she says, “it’s to always keep your eyes open. Watch what’s out there. Don’t be afraid to test new ideas, or talk to other companies about what’s working for them. There’s so much technology available now that can make life easier — you just have to go and find it.”

Her advice to other trades owners and businesses is pragmatic but powerful: stay curious, get connected, and never assume your systems are finished.

And at the heart of it all remains the platform that helped make it possible.

“Simpro’s been part of our journey since the start,” Dawn says. “It’s flexible enough to grow with us, but solid enough to keep us grounded. It gives us the visibility we need to keep improving.”

One thing couldn’t be more clear: innovation isn’t a one-time milestone for Virtual FM — it’s a continuous loop of learning, sharing, and refining. When technology, teamwork, and curiosity align, the result isn’t just better business performance, it’s progress that lifts the entire industry.