Disconnected from the physical asset base

One of the phenomena of modern asset management that I have noted recently is that there are a lot of organizations who are becoming increasingly separated and disconnected from their physical asset base.

There seem to be a couple of really strong reasons for this. First, many companies have lost a lot of experience over the past ten years. Numbers are being lowered all the time, and the young engineering staff who are coming into the companies lack the depth of knowledge about the asset base that their predecessors had.

Second, and more importantly, many asset-intensive companies have had to become a lot more focused on economic performance. This has happened often at the expense of a balanced focus on the performance of the assets.

This pattern has repeated itself many times, through some of the privatized utilities sectors of the United Kingdom, through the lean times in the mining and manufacturing industries, the various changes in the rail sector, some utilities in the USA, and there are no doubt many other similar cases throughout the world.

The result is a company that has drifted away from its asset base. Decisions being made for increasingly economic-only criteria, without a detailed understanding of the inpact on the physical asset base. Often resulting in short term gains at best.

Basic knowledge regarding short term planning and scheduling, developing effective maintenance programs and routine administration of the maintenance function, become skills and abilities that the company doesn't even realize that it has lost!


Cheers,

Daryl...