Starting the new year off on the right foot!

Goals and resolutions are a part of the New Year rituals all over the world and the growing field of asset management is no exception to this.

If you have just discovered the Modern Asset Management Blog I hope you will recommend it to your colleagues as a source of independent facts and opinion.

So, as asset managers what are some of the ways that we can get a grip over our costs rapidly, without embarking on a full scale implementation project? As with most other things there are a bewildering array of options and opportunities; however this list comprises a few short and easy to implement techniques that I have picked up over the years.

I hope it is of some use to you.

1. Basic capacity scheduling: Capacity scheduling is probably one of the easiest and most effective things that you could implement within a short time frame. And while it requires a lot of discipline, it shouldn’t require a great deal of additional resource to get started.

The basic concept of capacity scheduling is easy enough. Work out what level of resources you have available to you, then make sure that your work schedule for a period uses all of the available time.
Doing it in reality does present a few challenges. For example, you will need to ensure that available hours are accurately calculated and do not represent the total hours. A fair way to begin this process would be to:

• Understand how many work hours you have available per person. (Subtracting breaks, meetings, vacations, training and other issues)

• Take off, say, 5% for time that will be used helping other teams

• Take of, say, 5% for time that will be required in dealing with reactive work.

Once the available time is accurately being forecast, then you can turn to the task of filling the schedule.

The first tasks to go into the schedule are the routine tasks. These are the standard routine maintenance tasks that will need to be done automatically. These are the highest priority and are not things that should be considered last. (There is a whole discussion on this that will be gone into at a later date on this blog)

Once the routine tasks are in, and the worker availability is calculated, we can then finish the capacity schedule. This is done by adding reactive work orders, from highest priority to lowest priority, until the capacity schedule has been filled.

There are a few things that you will need to do before you can really get this one into your day-to-day processes.

Namely;

• Ensure your hours worked and absence management systems are updated regularly and can be relied upon as an accurate forecast of worker attendance.

• Ensure your routine maintenance schedules are optimised. Without this they will continually be put back because there will be a lack of belief in them, and a lack of understanding of what they are designed to do.

• Ensure your estimates are close to representing reality. There is no doubt that they will change as time goes on and this will only be a beginning point.

Ensure your entire backlog management processes are up to scratch. This is going to be an exceptionally difficult area as it is one that will need to involve the entire workforce.

Implementing capacity scheduling will also challenge the connections you have between the planning and execution arms of your maintenance functions.

In all it is an area that can get you moving quickly, with a mild level of effort, but a lot of discipline to follow it through.

2. Precision alignment: A major source of unnecessary spending within the maintenance area is due to misaligned equipment. In particular early life bearing failures, increased wear of coupling components, excessive forces (radial and axial) on the bearings leading to shorter life also, and potentially premature seal and shaft failures.

Here are some quick tips that may help you:

• A quick check over a section of expensive or critical assets could indicate a need for a wider alignment audit. It is wise to do this on an annual basis as there are a lot of things that can contribute to misalignment.

• Always check on motors and pumps at least three to six months after they have been installed to allow for settling of the foundations

• Gain an understanding of how to use modern condition monitoring techniques (vibration analysis and frequency spectrum analysis) to distinguish between misalignment and other causes of vibration.

3. A few indicators: Some dramatic results can be gleaned from correctly implementing and using measurement programs. (See The Maintenance Scorecard) here are a few quick options for you:

• Implement an age versus priority metric. This is a vital metric for making sure that your backlog management, scheduling and execution are all doing their part to keep downtime low, uptime high, and risk levels under control. (This is a very good leading metric also)

• Establish the link between production and maintenance through use of unit cost indicators. (A good proxy for cost effectiveness)

• Start to measure schedule compliance as a means of determining risk of failure, not merely of determining how well we execute maintenance work.

There are many others that can be done quickly, however these are a few that I have successfully implemented many times; often with dramatic effects for a minimal level of effort.
Good luck!