Ashcom Advisor

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-11-23T09:11:00.000-05:00

It's the time to sit back and think about what you're thankful for. The time to be giving to those you love and to complete strangers. While the sentiments of gratitude and generosity are beautiful, the sad reality is that most Americans have high anxiety around the holidays and miss the meaning of the season. This year, remember to take a moment and breathe! If we all came to our Thanksgiving dinners with positive attitudes, this years Thanksgiving could be the best one yet! Arrive on time, lend a hand, be on your best behavior, and set aside your differences. Make an effort to be kind and to change the dynamics of your "dysfunctional" family dinner, who knows you may even see a change for the better! Thanksgiving is a time to reconnect with family and friends, it is not a chore.

From our family to yours, Happy Thanksgiving!

It's Here: The Continuous Improvement Webcast!

2011-11-07T09:02:00.000-05:00

Now through Sunday, November 13, 2011 you can watch our webcast presentation featuring our Continuous Improvement Curriculum.

The Continuous Improvement Curriculum program was developed by and for MaintiMizer™ users. The courses are designed to help utilize MaintiMizer™ to its fullest extent. Sit back for 10 minutes and let us show you what CIC can do!

Click Here to Watch the Webcast!

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Success

2011-10-12T11:12:00.000-04:00

Here is this week's installment of ReliabilityWeb.com's e-book, Things to Think About and Do in 2011. Can't wait for next week's topic? Thumb through the entire e-book for free at ReliabilityWeb.com, Happy Reading!

Success

Success is something we all strive for but seldom take the time to fully understand. Few think about why things go right because they are so busy dealing with all of the equipment, policy and processes that are going wrong.

Many of the solutions to our failures lie in our successes. The study of success, or positive deviance, as it is called, has been used to solve malnutrition and famine in foreign countries, political turmoil during wars, and even pump failures in manufacturing plants.

The Root Cause of Success (RCS) is simply a process that includes using your existing root cause tools to better understand why your processes and equipment work reliably.

For example, if you have a bank of seven pumps within your facility and five of the seven have never dialed, then ask yourself why. What is different about these successful pumps? When you look into the success factors for the five reliable pumps, you may discover any or all of the following: proper alignment, correct initial assembly, proper mounting, correct up and downstream piping, etc.

These findings can then be leveraged across the remaining, less reliable pumps, increasing their productivity and your plant up-time.

If your plant has created a culture where is where it is OK to use failure investigations to blame or punish folks within the facility, then applying RCS may help get your program back on track. Using this method, you can focus on the positive, solve problems, reward good behavior, and change the culture.

For 2011, consider your success. Take the time to use your root cause tools to analyze your good fortune. What have been your enablers? Leverage them and enjoy your 2011.

—Shon Isenhour

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Excellence

2011-10-06T09:32:00.000-04:00

Excellence

What is excellence? To many maintenance reliability professionals, excellence is completing more than 85 percent of work planned, compliance with over 90 percent of the schedule and completing at least 95 percent of the PM. But ask yourself if that definition is shared in the ivory towers of your organization? If not, what is the boss’s definition of excellence? If you want to be considered a valued contributor with job security, shouldn’t you know?

We can argue about the definition of value. However, in the corner offices of corporate management, value has only one meaning: dollars! If it can’t be monetized or show up on a profit and loss statement, it doesn’t have value. Returning to the original question, do planned work, schedule compliance and PM completion have monetary value? They probably do, but try to convince a financial executive, who is under extreme profit pressure from a board of directors and shareholders. The vision isn’t there.

In order to thrive, we must reorient out thinking to conform to that of corporate chieftains. They certainly aren’t going to reorient their thinking to us. What does that mean? First, we must be recognized as fulfilling a vital role by producing demonstrable business values within operational excellence. If you don’t know what operational excellence is, you’d better find out, because your masters of industry are probably thinking about implementation! Second, we must shift our sights to results that can be shown to have real monetary value instead of measures that may generate all the excitement of the flu in the stratosphere of your company:

Focusing on declining lifetime cost and failure rates—rather than on PdM, PM and work effectiveness
Achieving optimal system availability—rather than equipment MTBF
Showing the percentage of RCA recommendations that succeeded in preventing subsequent events—rather than analyses completed

Let’s measure and publicize the results of objectives that create business value, not activities that got you there!

—John Mitchell

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Leakage

2011-09-28T10:16:00.001-04:00

Leakage

As a football fan, I have found it interesting to note that some defense-minded coaches have used the term “leakage” to describe situations where a team’s opposition had been able to gain more yard than expected based on the team’s less-than-perfect defensive scheme. In other words, Leakage describes an instance where, although a total breakdown did not occur, the system did not function as “tightly” as planned. There are many analogous situations in work and personal life where leakage occurs.

For instance, We intend for a repair to be completed today, but it slips into tomorrow. Is the leakage a catastrophe? No. It is, however, a sign that your systems are not as well controlled as you had hoped.

Another example is repeat failures. The repeat failure would not have occurred if the failure-causing defect had been removed, or if another failure-causing defect had not been introduced during the repair. Again, this may not be a catastrophe, but it is a leak in your system.

Still another example is when you find that although a repair restores functionality, it does not restore the reliability of a device. All too often, when technicians focus on getting things back into operation as quickly as possible without paying enough attention to restoring the inherent reliability. This practice allows defects to leak from the past into the future. This causes the future failure rate to increase.

Returning to the football analogy, when a defensive coach recognizes that his team has a porous defense, he knows the problem is one of two things: either the defensive scheme is not putting the players in the right place at the right time, or the players are not performing. The first is a systemic problem and the second is an individual performance problem.

Good managers recognize leakage when it occurs and take decisive action. They are not afraid to blame their own systemic problems or to deal with poor performers. Individuals who manage leakage seldom have to worry about managing catastrophes.

—Daniel T. Daley

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Priceless

2011-09-21T09:14:00.001-04:00

Priceless

Qualified vibration analysts are priceless. Determining that a bearing has a defect on the inner race takes skill and experience. A timely warning about the defect so that action can be taken to avoid a catastrophic failure reduces downtime, eliminates the secondary damage and mitigates the safety risk. But that is not the end of the job; it is just the beginning. Performing acceptance testing so that only healthy machines are installed in your plant is essential. Detecting and correcting unbalance, misalignment, and resonance extends the life of the machine; you’ll see fewer bearing defects. And when you do detect a fault, determining why the fault occurred, and working to ensure that “root cause” is not repeated in the future; that’s where the real pay-off comes. Detecting bearing faults is important, but there is so much more you can contribute to plant reliability, safety, and profitability.

—Jason Tranter

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Sustained

2011-09-14T08:41:00.001-04:00

Sustained

One of the objectives of setting goals is to improve performance for a given process, area or event. Each time I perform an RCM [Reliability Centered Maintenance] Blitz™ analysis, I set a goal with the RCM team before moving on to the next analysis. Having facilitated hundreds of RCM analyses, I have a good idea of what it takes to implement the tasks and I also understand the implications of not achieving this first goal.

After achieving this first goal of implementing the RCM tasks, while we might take a moment to celebrate, we must realize that our work is not complete. Analyzing the failure modes and implementing the mitigating tasks is only two-thirds of the equation when it comes to having a successful RCM effort. A successful effort can only be achieved by now completing the implemented PL and PdM tasks as scheduled on a routine basis. The results of your effort can only be recognized by having the leadership, structure and discipline required to plan, schedule and complete this new strategy.

The objective of performing Reliability Centered Maintenance is to improve the reliability of your assets, and while achieving the goal of implementing you RCM analysis is a good start, it doesn’t make your equiptment or your company reliable.

Reliability, afterall, can only be achieved by demonstrating a sustained level of performance over a scheduled period of time.

An RCM effort, therefore, can only be deemed successful when the implemented strategy delivers an improved and sustained level of reliability.

—Doug Plucknette

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Influence

2011-09-08T10:54:00.002-04:00

Influence

I’ve noticed lately how much I impact my own day. I’ve recently moved and with that came much packing, unpacking, home improvements and decoration. Fabulous, darling! However, if I don’t look at what I’m doing or think one step ahead, then something falls off the table, I buy the wrong size, forget something at the store, something doesn’t fit however hard I try to squish it, and the cupboard needs un- and re-packing (if it hasn’t been squished for good). Far from fabulous, darling! If simply having a trouble-free, ‘no rework’ day requires constant concentration and discipline, what does excellence require? Constant concentration and discipline, plus the belief that you can make improvements.

I’ve come to believe that excellence is not a state, but a journey. The picture of excellence changes over time, but the journey to get there remains the same and it always energizes. It’s continual improvement.

A company that survives must to things well and strive to do it better tomorrow. It takes continual improvements from people in every department and all levels to achieve this. In 2011, I’ll be thinking about how to notice and congratulate others when they have done something that energizes them, however small, for “continual” tends to happen in small steps and people are better at improving things when they feel positive. I’ll be working at a level that’s tangible to me (small and basic!), but hopefully this will help those with whom I come into contact today improve something else tomorrow, and maybe I can positively impact someone else’s day as much as I influence my own.

—Claudia Faye

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: People

2011-08-30T09:30:00.000-04:00

People

People, people who need people…are likely to call on maintenance! In the year ahead, I think we all need to take a step back and realize that behind those pesky work orders, complaints and all the other demands on out time, there are people. Just like you and I, they walk, they talk, they breathe, they think and, as we often find out, they have needs. I think if we resolve to try and understand what they mean, which is not necessarily the same as what they day, we can help them better. The desire to help them better doesn’t come from some altruistic motivation— it’s simply self-preservation! When I’m asked by tradespeople what exactly my job is, I quickly answer, “to make your life easier.” My reasoning is that if I can make their lives easier, then they’ll be more successful. If they’re more successful, then I'm less troubled.

One of the things that I’ve noticed about maintenance people is that they don’t always say what’s really troubling them. They may complain about a dirty job site, for example, when what they’re really ticked off about is a change in the work schedule. The only way to find out what is actually bothering them is to listen, then ask questions, the listen to the answers and ask more questions.

The other thing to remember is that we’re all different. What works as motivation for one may be a complete turn-off for another. Get to know the people you work with. Find out what they are interested in and what makes them tick, then let them know that you know with an appropriate question of comment.

Until they invent machines that PM and repair themselves, the most important part of maintenance will be people. In the words of Stephen Stills, “love the one you’re with”.

—Cliff Williams

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Train

2011-08-23T08:47:00.000-04:00

Train

Train yourselves up! There are wonderful resources available for proactive learning, knowledge, inspiration and direction for the reliability and maintenance-minded. Let us discipline ourselves and our groups by focusing on continuous improvement for 2011.

Speaking of discipline, our great nation’s military training is a hallmark and would class activity. In preparation to defend our country from any attack, by any means, from anywhere, they train, educate and train some more. The same is true in our businesses; we have to stay educated, aggressive, vigilant and ready to adjust. Continuous improvement provides this protection and shareholder value.

Train, Baby, Train!

—Joe Swan

On a side note, enrollment for fall MaintiMizer™ training courses is going on now! MaintiMizer™ Client Server Training runs September 12-15. MaintiMizer™ Web Edition Training runs September 19-22. Register Today at www.ashcomtech.com/services/education. We hope to see you in class!

Things to Think About and Do in 2011: Data

2011-08-12T08:11:00.001-04:00

Data

How much valuable information are you losing because of inconsistencies in the information that was entered into your data management system? We have all heard the saying, “garbage in, garbage out,” but what does it actually mean?

FALK 1040-EZ

FALK 1040EZ

To the human eye, the above examples shows three gearboxes that are the same make and model, but to a computer that is processing data for the generation of failure models, maintenance expenses tracking, and spare parts stock lists, there are three different make and models of gearboxes.

The differences in the descriptions are subtle—an extra space or a dash—but these extra characters create different gearbox units. The same applies to a mere typographical error.

Now, imagine that you have 500 gearboxes in your plant. All of them are a Falk 1040EZ. And ALL of them have slightly different entry for their make, model or description. How much time is wasted scrubbing the data before a failure model can be created? Running a simple failure model might take an hour or two, but the data preparation can add weeks to that time line. Are you tracking maintenance costs collectively by make and model? You could be seeing costs spread over multiple categories that should be grouped into one, and this gives an artificially low result for problem component types. This can increase the space required for parts storage through unnecessary duplication of parts, based on the components categories.

Data entry is often overlooked as a menial task. However, good data entry is the backbone of a reliable maintenance program. To increase the consistency of data entry, knowledge and understanding of the information being entered is needed, as well as the know-how to research and make corrections when discrepancies are found.

—Stacy Heston