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The maintenance organization of today, like many departments, is
under continued pressure to cut costs, show results, and support
the mission of the organization. After all, it is a logical
expectation from the business standpoint.
The evolving maintenance operation has been charged with
supporting the broader efforts of World Class Manufacturing such
as Six Sigma, Lean Manufacturing and major quality initiatives.
The ability to be successful in that charter lies within the
practices and systems that make up the maintenance function. It
is not just what we do…it is how well we do it.
In fact, regardless of who does maintenance, whether it is a
specialized skilled or multiskilled tradesperson or a highly
trained operator/mechanic, solid maintenance practices are the
keystone to World Class Maintenance, which leads to World Class
operations.
According to Paul Thomlingson, in "Effectiveness Maintenance",
the objectives of a good maintenance function are to:
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Support operations by keeping production equipment in good
condition so that production targets can be met
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Maintain the plant facilities by keeping the plant site and
its buildings, utilities, and grounds in a functional,
attractive state
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Conduct engineering projects like equipment modifications,
construction, installation, and relocation
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Develop a program to carry out its services
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Organize itself to support the equipment maintenance needs of
production while conducting essential engineering projects
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Execute its programs while utilizing its resources
productively
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Perform quality work
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Anticipate and prepare for future work
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Achieve continued improvement by evaluating performance,
taking corrective actions, and measuring progress
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Prepare for future changes by anticipating needs and
organizing flexibly
This would be in addition to conducting those proactive
activities to prevent failures from occurring.
Best Maintenance has its foundation in Best Maintenance
Practices. Those practices include the following twelve areas:
Leadership and Policy Deployment
Let’s look at the first of these, Leadership and Policy
Deployment. World Class Maintenance relies on leadership
providing direction, focus and support. This involves management
establishing a clear mission and vision supportive of the
organization’s direction and goals.
Leadership is also responsible for establishing the policies and
expectations that serve to guide maintenance and the total
organization in supporting maintenance activities. Once policies
are developed, they must be deployed, communicated and
monitored.
Part of the responsibility of leadership is to set the framework
for maintenance to improve its effectiveness and efficiency.
This may often be in the form of a formal improvement effort or
program.
Leadership should help to identify and address resource issues
that could prevent improvements from taking place. This may
often be accomplished through auditing or other forms of
monitoring to ensure successful implementation.
Organizational Structure
Maintenance organizational efficiency depends upon many
interdependent variables. Some of these include: organizational
structure, goals and objectives, communications processes,
policies and procedures, work processes (methodologies) and
employee systems. Maintenance organizations function at three
major levels: organizational level (functional and structural
relationships), process level (work activities) and job
performer level (individual worker.
The ineffectiveness of one level could negatively impact another
level. For example, poorly defined work activities, such as the
lack of planning and scheduling, can hinder an individual’s
performance and attitude.
One element is to develop a process to conceive and communicate
the maintenance philosophy including the refined mission, goals,
direction, focus, purpose, etc.
An often-used strategy may involve allocating maintenance
resources closer to the actual work area such as "zone" or
"area" coverage. This maximizes familiarity with the equipment,
the operations personnel in that area, and encourages
"ownership."
It may or may not include the decentralization of maintenance to
partial or full control by operations personnel. Regardless,
maximizing productivity and labor utilization is key.
Inventory Control
The purpose of this practice area is to refine the maintenance
stores and acquisition process to streamline parts
appropriation. It is focused on the right parts in the right
place at the right time.
This may involve studying the existing flow of requested parts
and improving the process to reduce wasted effort and
inactivity. This would involve standardized stores and inventory
practices.
Minimizing poor use of the company’s assets can be accomplished
through many ways. These may include improved turnover, cost
control, efficient purchasing practices, judicious inventory
counts, vendor stocking, recorded issuances, secured access,
staffed coverage, close monitoring of min-max levels and reorder
points, as well as minimizing unofficial stocking or
"squirreling" of parts can go a long way to ensure best use of
spares and materials.
Computerized Maintenance Management Systems
Successful maintenance practices depend a great deal on a robust
information system. This involves having a CMMS program that is
capable, well supported, and fairly easy to use.
Modules should be consistent with industry standards. These
areas included: equipment data management, work-order control,
preventive maintenance, inventory control, documentation
control, system security, ease of use, reports, user
configuration and metrics.
This also includes maximizing the usage of the CMMS
capabilities. Although most companies have a CMMS, poor
utilization is quite common.
Preventive Maintenance
PM is often defined as "those timed or meter-based service
activities used to extend the life of equipment and identify
potential problems through inspection and early detection."
PM may include work performed on selected equipment through
service contracts, inspections, cleaning activities, testing,
lubrication efforts, and scheduled shutdown service. The most
significant activity to occur in PM is inspection, which should
lead to early detection and correction.
PM is a major component in moving from reactive to proactive
through early detection and early correction.
Predictive Maintenance
A sound description of PDM is "the application of technologies
and early detection processes to monitor and detect changes in
condition to allow more precise intervention."
PDM may include vibration analysis, shock pulse methods,
ultrasonics, thermographic analysis, oil analysis, electrical
surge comparisons, coolant analysis, wear particle analysis, and
performance trending.
Planning and Scheduling
Planning is devising a process for doing, making or arranging
maintenance work. It involves preparing job plans and other
resources to enable the craftsperson to perform the work quicker
and more efficiently. It often deals with the "what" and "how".
Scheduling is creating a schedule for when the work is to be
performed. Where planning dealt with the "what" and "how",
scheduling deals with the "when" and "who."
The lack of organized processes and standardized procedures can
significantly restrict a maintenance operation from meeting its
objectives of servicing the needs of the organization.
The majority of maintenance work can be planned and, for the
most part, should be. Increasing productivity or value-added
work of maintenance personnel depends a great deal on properly
planned activities.
Work Flow
The work order is an integral part of an effective maintenance
operation. It serves to:
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Identify work
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Request work
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Prioritize work
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Schedule work
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Activate work
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Track work
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Analyze work
The importance of this paper or electronic document is to allow
us to control and monitor work activities. One of the most
significant purposes is to analyze work that has been performed
to identify costs, losses, and trending of problems.
Financial Control
This practice area deals with the fiscal control procedures of
the maintenance organization. It may include budget control,
contractor cost monitoring, and overall labor and material cost
control.
It may also include monitoring and affecting decisions on asset
repair/replacement.
Operational Involvement
It is becoming rarer to find organizations that have not
broadened their level of operator involvement in basic care type
activities. The logic includes having operators assume some
basic responsibilities such as routine cleaning, lubrication
tasks, adjusting/tightening, inspections, and minor
repair/replacement.
This may be in the form of Total Productive Maintenance or some
other structured process to encourage ownership, involvement and
improve equipment reliability.
Staffing and Development
To support the "new" maintenance organization, jobs will have to
be redefined to improve efficiency and effectiveness.
Traditional views of restrictive job requirements and duties
will have to be replaced with more flexibility and higher levels
of skills.
People will perform successfully if they are capable, have well
defined job roles, know what is expected of them, have the
skills and knowledge as well as the tools and resources to
perform, and receive feedback and rewards for good performance.
Training and skill development is a key component as it enables
people to meet the expectations that face in their changing
jobs.
Continuous Improvement
Continuous improvement is best described as constantly striving
for better ways to do things. It is creating discomfort with the
status quo and striving toward excellence through small,
incremental change.
This often involves comparing one’s operation to others to find
those better ways. This is referred to as benchmarking.
It also involves auditing and monitoring one’s activities to
reduce the possibility of slippage and not following standards.
Reliability’s greatest enemy is variation. Finding a consistent
process to follow but continuing to look for ways to improve the
process is one of the ways good companies become great
companies.
Summary
Poor planning, improperly trained staff, unclear goals and
objectives, lack of leadership, poor historical records, and
inefficient manning can cause work to take longer, cost more,
and produce poor results. This outcome is an organization that
is inadequately postured to compete effectively.
Solid maintenance practices supports a strong maintenance system
geared toward proactive activities involving the total
organization. Improving those practices requires patience,
management commitment and dedication, as well as the willingness
to make it happen through well-conceived plans and actions.
Measuring these practices is important to see how well they
perform. However, the ultimate indicator is how well maintenance
enables the rest of the organization to meet its goals and
objectives |
