It wasn’t always like that for Kilkenny. How have they created the processes and systems to allow them to regain – and then sustain – that performance over the long haul?

There must have been a change (or many many changes).

Spent some time with Peter de Jager this week – enjoyed his company. His simple definition of change is ” Change is when something moves from one situation to another” He then asks why is it that Change can possibly cause us all so much grief?

Neat answer from him – Inertia. Newtons First Law of Motion – An object at rest tends to stay at rest and an object in motion tends to stay in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force.

So, People will stay where they are unless they have a reason to change.

In your maintenance team, have any of the people there got a reason to change?

Some of the pitfalls to avoid around planning (and so how you won’t get the benefits!) include (according to B. Rivenbark of LCE):

Delays, e.g  your crafts persons having to spend time trying to gain details of what is involved in the work,  gather the materials and get them to the job. Typically all of this is happening after the production equipment has been taken out of service; downtime equals loss of production and loss of production equals loss of revenue.

Mismanagement:  The supervisor brings his team to the site and leaves them there while he goes to find someone in operations to get more information about the job: expectations, time available for repair, operator availability for support as needed, etc.

Ineffective Supervision:

1. The crafts stand around at the job site waiting for instructions about what to do and information on how to do it.
2. Most jobs get interrupted after work has begun, causing delays not only on this one but the new work as well.

Poor performance:

1. Crafts persons spend valuable time standing around waiting for equipment to be made ready so it can be serviced as required.
2. They are unable to complete one job before being pulled off to work on another one – they hop from job to job.
3. Crafts persons have to spend time figuring out what materials and/or special tools are needed to complete the job.
4. :

All of these situations contribute to machine downtime and production loss that proper planning and scheduling are designed to reduce. The core product of planning and scheduling is reduced delays – reduced delays in equipment downtime, in waiting for materials, in preparedness of starting jobs and in completing jobs. Reduce these delays and you increase equipment and machine uptime, resulting in improved availability of equipment and increased production “out the door.”

Had to make do with the English Newspapers while on the beach and one of the big debates raging in them is where will they get the money to pay for the replacement of Britains nuclear subs – Trident. (What with all the budget cutbacks, you see.)

Am I the only one who thinks it incredible that they’d run such capital intensive assets and only at their end of life begin to think about how to pay for replacing them? It’s really short term thinking (over years if that isn’t too paradoxical!!).

Such short termism – (what I call the “Quarter Thinking” – i.e. worry about this quarter only and forget about everything else) is one of the main reasons for the development of PAS55  - Asset Management. That forces you to think about how you are going to manage the asset over  four phases  - 1. Acquistion/Creation, 2,Utilisation, 3, Maintenance, 4, Renewal/Disposal.

It forces you to ask the questions and the answers clear away a lot of the fog!!

I’m reminded of fundamentals because of the amount of times that I see managers chasing the newest shiny thing (Lean is still new and shiny to many) and forgetting about the fundamentals.

So, if you know what work you do, to what equipment, for how long and what spares you use – those are basic building blocks. If you then analyse that information and use it for continuous improvement – that’s good practice and it’s fundamental. No point haring off unless you (and your people!) are doing that as a sustained behaviour. (This is what we are doing in the ESS Ltd. CMI service).

C’mon the Rebels this coming Sat – get the fundamentals right!!

And no, there won’t be a vuvuzela in sight .

The behaviours of these players on the pitch (and indeed off the pitch too – look at the French) reminded me  of something I read by D. Army.  He was talking about KPI’s  and said that  ” We have discovered that it is not enough to just manage the numbers.  What is of the most value is that along with developing the process is to develop a list of behaviors we want the organization to exhibit.  Then develop behavioral metrics that are aligned with the desired behaviors. ”

He’s certainly singing our tune (or playing our vuvuzela) when he says that it is extremely important that prior to commencing any installation or implementation activities that the new desired behaviors are identified.  Here are a few:

• People attend planning meetings and are prepared to make decisions
• A craftsperson knows what he or she will be working on during the next week or day
• A craftsperson is confident that he or she will be allowed to perform that identified work
• An operator knows what equipment will be taken out of service tomorrow
• A planner understands the importance of clear and concise work instructions
• Work is not permitted to begin until the parts are available
• Feedback is provided on Preventive Maintenance activities

In the ESS Ltd. CMI service, we have an implementation plan which puts in place the business processes and we carry out the training required. That’s the easiest bit. What we do after the implementation is put all our time and effort into changing behaviours because without these , starting at the very highest levels of the organization, firmly in place, it all just slips back to the way it was.  Ref: D.Army,Strategic Asset Management.

In maintenance, it has always been,” it’s the budget” and as a service provider, we have certainly had some very “challenging” requests (well,demands really) from some in our customer base due to “the budget”.

Would it be fair to say that for maintenance managers, a commonly used approach is to budget for 12 months and then re-forecast at shorter intervals of 1 month? S. Carlile of Assetitvy Pty Ltd. says that what we need to improve is how we perform the re-forecasting. Then how we manage the subsequent spending during that forecast period.

When gathering the information for the new forecast we must include information from the following sources:

• The original Budget
• The planned work in the CMMS
• Rectification/breakdown work and opportunities in the CMMS
• Expected parts deliveries in the purchasing system and any outstanding commitments not received in the previous period
• Information on possible work from production and maintenance supervisors, planners, Engineering and others

Stuart reckons that we have to monitor expenditure and compliance to plan on a regular basis (no disagreements there). He says “ At Best Practice level this would be on a daily basis but at a minimum should be performed on at least a weekly basis.”

Anyone out there who is reviewing their maintenance budget on a DAILY basis. ie.  Key stake holders (not just you on your own looking at figures on a screen) need to meet early, in the morning for a daily process or the beginning of the week for weekly reviews?

Then he goes on to say that “  The conventional wisdom is that maintenance best practices are planning, scheduling, preventative maintenance, optimized procurement, and predictive maintenance. ”

I’d say that some form of continuous improvement process has to be a given too. Otherwise, the best that we can hope for is that the performance will stay the same – and who would be happy with that?

A Canadian firm called Western Management Consultants have put together the Ten Pitfalls to Avoid When
Selecting a CMMS/EAM

In Mistake no. 2 they comment…………”

Look for a vendor partner whose resources best fit your specific needs, now and over the long run. Some of the supporting services that vendors offer are as follows:
• assessment of organizational readiness and gap analysis to understand what changes will be necessary for a successful implementation, (That is the ESS Ltd. Maintenance Evaluation) • process design expertise to map your software configuration to optimized business processes, (That is part of the ESS Ltd. CMI service.) • guidance about industry best practices, (Done as part of the evaluation initially and then as part of CMI) •assistance in setting up key performance indicators (KPIs) to ensure users are focused on the right things, and (Done as part of implementation of CMI) • facilitation of data analysis and decision-making to ensure expected savings and benefits are achieved. (This is the whole key to CMI)

Your relationship with the CMMS/EAM vendor should not end once the system has been implemented.

The vendor can be extremely helpful in establishing a framework for continuous improvement by assisting with performance assessment and benchmarking, as well as fine-tuning asset management processes and the underlying CMMS/ EAM system. I.e. the ESS Ltd. CMI Service.

Or Mistake No. 9…………
When purchasing a CMMS/EAM system, do not make the mistake of assuming the most economical approach is to buy the software outright and run it on your own premises. One of the latest alternatives that might be more cost-effective and/or preferable from a cash-flow perspective is called “SaaS” or “Software as a Service.” Although there are many variations on the theme, (The ESS Ltd. CMI service is a variation on the theme) SaaS provides you with the flexibility to pay a monthly subscription rate, per named user, that covers hosting, training, consulting and other start-up costs.

Last one: Mistake No. 10
When would you consider the CMMS/EAM system successfully implemented? Most companies would argue that the system is implemented after a successful go-live, when it is up and running with minimal interruptions, and the system has stabilized. However, this is flawed in that the basis for selecting and implementing a CMMS/EAM system was presumably to realize benefits, not simply install a system.

That is the reason for the existence of the award winning ESS Ltd. CMI service – to realise benefits.

He says that what should be measured is different for every company. Select and use measures to influence behavior. For example, measuring profitability will positively influence behavior he says. Really? I know of a firm that measured and displayed profitability and it lead to completely negative behaviour.

This was because the employees deemed the shareholders greedy and demanded a greater share of the profits.  So, I’d agree with Thomas on his next statement – It is important to identify what you want to change in the work process, then carefully put measures into place that will affect the selected behavior in the right direction. The key word in this last statement is carefully. You can easily introduce problems if you use the wrong measures!!

He clearly understood the difficulties associated with change when he made this statement in “The Prince” almost 500 years ago. I’d say there is general agreement that change is probably the most difficult thing for us to accomplish as part of our jobs.  

Steven J Thomas outlines that there are Three Characteristics of a Successful Change Initiative saying if any one of these elements are missing from the equation, problems will occur. These are:

 1. Dissatisfaction with the current state of things
 2.  A vision of the future
•   3.  A set of next steps showing how to get where you want to go

Dissatisfaction with the Current State

Easy to get people to recognize their dissatisfaction and want to make the necessary change for the better when the wolf is at the door!  

Not so easy for companies that are  marginally profitable or even successful .  Example:

We worked with a plant that was not operating at full capacity.  When there was a breakdown, they just changed over to another line. Also the maintenance people were focussed on making rapid repairs to restore the equipment to service.  We all knew that a process needed to be put into place that addressed equipment failure before it happens – a preventive and predictive maintenance effort as part of an overall maintenance strategy. However this is a major change and will make those who are the great “rapid repairers” very uncomfortable. The praise that they got from Production for quick repair and return to service will no longer exist because in the new order of things, you can’t let that equipment fail!

 Thomas says that the problem is how to create dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs so that people will want to move to the new state of equipment reliability.  He says there are eight key elements to successfully making this transition. They are:

• Leadership – management at all levels leading the change.
• Work Process – a work process in place that supports the new way of working.
• Structure – an organizational structure that supports the new process.
• Group Learning – processes in place that allow the organization to make changes, evaluate the results, learn from what they accomplished.
• Technology – computer support tools to make the process easier.
• Communication – continuously explaining why the change is needed and where the organization stands in the effort.
• Interrelationships – high quality collaborative efforts between people and work groups.
• Rewards – positive reinforcement for making the change.

These elements are key, but there is one overriding component that needs to be addressed in more detail. This is the vision of what the change will look like.

This is the clear picture of the future that will inspire those who have done well under the old conditions and energize those who are luke-warm to the new.

Anybody want to come back with how they drew this “clear picture” in their change management?

Portions of this blog were extracted from “Successfully Managing Change in Organizations: A Users Guide” by Stephen J Thomas.