Asset Managers are expected to provide an annual budget and periodic cost reporting against that budget. Traditionally creating a budget has been mostly guesswork and is justified by previous year’s budgets with an inflation adjustment. There is no opportunity for improvement, and often senior management will request cost cutting due to economic conditions, making it difficult for the maintenance manager to argue a case for maintaining their budget. A better approach that supports continuous improvement and enables the maintenance manager to control and justify costs is to use zero-based budgeting in SAP.

The way your asset management system is set up and used, particularly the asset register, will play a major role in determining the ability of your maintenance organization to effectively operate. Data must be gathered at the appropriate level to allow it to be used, then summarized and reported on if necessary.

We have all seen it or done it before. Very busy people trying to do their jobs yet having to fuss with a grumpy piece of equipment. Banging and flailing about to bring the expensive tool back to an operational state. Our exceptional people are usually successful. Equipment is back in service for the moment then we all move on to the next task. Often “downtime,” is looked upon as a big negative and source of cost to the business. But allow us to posit that it’s the time fussing around with cantankerous… aka non-healthy… equipment that is the real source of business inefficiency and staff frustration.

The following is a brief description of this short video on modulation, demodulation and enveloping in vibration. I’d recommend pausing the video at various times to take a closer look at what is happening to make sure you understand the concepts.

Let me get right to it. I don’t think the P-F curve is really a curve anymore. Rather it is more like a cliff. We march right up to the edge with all our preventive maintenance activities and the equipment fails anyway. No gentle path downwards to follow, giving us lots of time to head off trouble. No, things simply go bad very quickly. The idea is to avoid the cliff. Stay back a safe distance and enjoy the view vs. extending your toes over the edge for a thrill.

It is imperative that equipment and staff at your organization have the ability to do what is asked of them when called on. This enables effective execution of operations and the business plan on a daily basis, ensuring the success of your business. People are arguably the most important asset driving the success of an organization next to physical assets. Employee reliability at your organization must be established, just like the equipment that the people in maintenance were hired to manage and maintain.