In my Nov. 24, 2019 article for The RAM Review, I focused on the “relationship” factor with regard to what a maintenance department actually controls and what it merely manages. That’s an important distinction when it comes to understanding the “who” and “what” of equipment and process failures. Here, the focus is on the “tracking” factor.
To understand the difference between what we (as maintenance) control versus what we manage requires the maintenance department to keep two sets of books.
DIFFERENT CODES, SEPARATE REPORTING
When all labor and parts are accounted for in the CMMS, the system automatically tracks the total cost of maintenance, or the sum of what the maintenance department controls and manages. Breaking this down into two sets of books requires each completed work order to be simply classified as a as either a non-maintenance-related event/failure (what we manage); or a maintenance-related event/failure (what we control). These two simple codes allow the data to be filtered and reported on separately
Maintenance is mandated to perform work regardless of how that work comes about. For example, whenever maintenance personnel perform work caused by elements not within the department’s control, e.g., work resulting from vandalism (graffiti), operator abuse, production using poor quality or out-of-specification raw materials, or work caused by operations refusing maintenance access to equipment to perform basic preventive maintenance that result in premature equipment failure, the work can be classified as a Non-Maintenance related event or failure. Identifying these events as such is as simple as coding the work order upon completion of the job.
Alternatively, when maintenance could have (and should have) prevented a failure resulting from over/under lubrication of a bearing, use of inferior parts, or maintenance personnel neglecting to repair something before it failed (despite knowing it would fail), the work can be classified as a Maintenance-related event or failure.
Classifying completed work in this manner allows maintenance to be more in tune with failure and better able to identify root causes. This information can then be used to either build an improved preventive strategy, or put together a report for stakeholder/client discussions on how to improve and better utilize and manage the asset together as a team.
The same strategy and reporting also applies to managing contractor maintenance, especially when a contractor turns up late and stalls the production process longer than necessary. This work can be identified using a standing work order for a specified contractor. In this type of arrangement, all wait time from the proposed start time to the actual start time is captured against the standing work order to identify the total hours the contractor held up production through tardiness. The resulting report can be used in service-level discussions with the contractor and discussions with the production department, all of which would reflect non-maintenance-control issues.
Filtering out all non-maintenance events/failures provides a second set of figures identifying problems directly under the maintenance department’s control. These figures truly depict the efficiency and effectiveness of the maintenance efforts.
THE PAYBACK
Armed with this new, more relevant information, maintenance is equipped to manage its department in a more positive manner. That includes having full, open disclosure, recognizing not only opportunities to develop improved methods and tactics to increase its own effectiveness, but also opportunities to develop more reasonable service-level agreements with stakeholders and clients.
Accordingly, those types of service-level agreements, now based on relationship deliverables on the input side, can be calculated in tangible terms, thus helping drive a higher level of cooperation in areas that maintenance does not control.TRR
CLICK HERE to read “Controlling or Managing: The ‘Relationship’ Factor” (Nov. 24, 2019)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ken Bannister has 40+ years of experience in the RAM industry. For the past 30, he’s been a Managing Partner and Principal Asset Management Consultant with Engtech industries Inc., where he specializes in helping clients implement best-practice asset-management programs worldwide. A founding member and past director of the Plant Engineering and Maintenance Association of Canada, he is the author of several books, including three on lubrication, one on predictive maintenance, and one on energy reduction strategies, and is currently writing one on planning and scheduling. Contact him directly at 519-469-9173 or [email protected].
