THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO

MAINTENANCE
STRATEGY
OPTIMIZATION
 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

CHAPTER 1 Regardless of industry or discipline, we can

probably all agree that knowing the rhyme and
reason behind your routine maintenance tasks -
10 COMMON ROUTINE sometimes referred to as preventative, predictive,
MAINTENANCE ISSUES (AND or even scheduled maintenance - is a good thing.
Unfortunately, most companies don't have the
WHY THEY’RE A REAL PROBLEM)
robust (and justified) strategies they need.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 2

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

Typical issues and the kinds of trouble they can create:

1. Lack of structure and schedule 4. Reactive Routines

In many cases, routine tasks are just entries on a to-do Sometimes, when an organization has been burned in
list of work that needs to be performed — with nothing the past by a preventable failure, they overcompensate
within the work pack to drive compliance. In particular, by performing maintenance tasks more often than
a list of tasks beginning with “Check” which have necessary. The problem is, the team might be wasting
no guidance of an acceptable limit can have limited time doing unnecessary work — worse still, it might
value. The result can be a “tick and flick” style routine even increase the likelihood of future problems simply
maintenance program that fails to identify impending because unnecessary intrusive maintenance can
failure warning conditions. increase the risk of failure.

2. Similar Assets, Similar Duty, Different 5. Over-reliance on past experience

Strategies There’s no substitute for direct experience and
Oftentimes, maintenance views each piece of expertise. But when tasks and frequencies are solely
equipment as a standalone object, with its own unique based on opinions and “what we’ve always done”
maintenance strategy. As a result, one organization — rather than sound assumptions — maintenance
could have dozens of maintenance strategies to teams can run into trouble through either over or
manage, eating up time and resources. In extreme under maintaining. Without documented assumptions,
cases this can lead to similar assets having completely business decisions are based on little more than a
different recorded failure mechanisms and routine hunch. “Doing what we’ve always done” might not be
tasks, worded differently, grouped differently and the right approach for the current equipment, with the
structured differently within the CMMS. current duty, in the current business environment (and it
certainly makes future review difficult).
3. Operational Focus
Operations might be reluctant to take equipment out of
service for maintenance, so they delay or even cancel
the appropriate scheduled maintenance. At times
this decision is driven by the thought that the repair
activity is the same in a planned or reactive manner. But
experience tells us that without maintenance, the risk
is even longer downtime and more expensive repairs
when something fails.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 3

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

6. Failure to address infrequent but high 8. Assuming new equipment will operate
consequence failures without failure for a period of time
Naturally, routine tasks account for the most common There’s a unique situation that often occurs when
failure modes. They should however also address new equipment is brought online. Maintenance teams
failures that happen less frequently, but may have assume they have to operate the new equipment
a significant impact on the business. Developing a first to see how it fails before they can identify and
maintenance plan which addresses both types prevents create the appropriate maintenance tasks. It’s easy to
unnecessary risk. For example, a bearing may be set overlook the fact that they likely have similar equipment
up on a lubrication schedule, but if there’s no plan to with similar points of failure. Their data from related
detect performance degradations due to a lubrication equipment provides a basic foundation for constructing
deficiency, misalignment, material defect, etc then effective routine maintenance.
undetected high consequence failures can occur.
9. Missing the opportunity to improve
7. Inadequate task instructions If completed tasks aren’t reviewed regularly to gather
Developing maintenance guidelines and best feedback on instructions, tools needed, spare parts
practices takes time and effort. Yet, all too often, the needed, and frequency; the maintenance process
maintenance organization fails to capture all that hard- never gets better. The quality or effectiveness of the
won knowledge by creating clear, detailed instructions. task then degrade over time and, with it, so does the
Instead, they fall back on the maintenance person’s equipment.
knowledge — only to lose it when a person leaves the
team. Over time, incomplete instructions can lead to 10. Doing what we can, not what we
poorly executed, “bandaid-style” tasks that get worse should
as the months go by. Too often, maintenance teams decide which tasks to
perform based on their present skill sets — rather than
equipment requirements. Technical competency gaps
can be addressed with a training plan and/or new hires,
as necessary, but the tasks should be driven by what
the equipment needs.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 4

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

Without a robust routine maintenance Here’s the good news: An optimized

plan, you’re nearly always in reactive maintenance strategy, constructed with
mode — conducting ad-hoc maintenance the right structure is simpler and easier to
that takes more time, uses more sustain. By fine-tuning your approach, you
resources, and could incur more downtime make sure your team is executing the right
than simply taking care of things more number and type of maintenance tasks,
proactively. What’s worse, it’s a vicious at the right intervals, in the right way,
cycle. The more time maintenance using an appropriate amount of resources
personnel spend fighting fires, the more and spare parts. And with a framework
their morale, productivity, and budget for continuous improvement, you can
erodes. The less effective routine work ultimately drive towards higher reliability,
that is performed, the more equipment availability and more efficient use of your
uptime and business profitability suffer. production equipment.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 5

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

Maintenance optimization doesn’t have to be time-

consuming or difficult. Yet many organizations simply

CHAPTER 2
can’t get their maintenance teams out of a reactive
“firefighting mode” so they can focus on improving
their overall maintenance strategy.
PLANS CAN ALWAYS BE
Other organizations never make a start because they
IMPROVED: TOP 5 REASONS TO lack the data and/or the framework to demonstrate the
OPTIMIZE YOUR MAINTENANCE real, concrete business value that can be gained.

STRATEGY And even when organizations do start to work on

optimization, sometimes their efforts stall when
priorities shift, results are not immediate and the
overall objectives fade from sight.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 6

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

If any of these challenges sound familiar, there are some very convincing reasons
to forge ahead with maintenance optimization:

1. You can make sure every maintenance 3. You’ll have a solid framework for a
task adds value to the business realistic maintenance budget
Through the optimization process, you eliminate The plans you establish through the optimization

SMALL CHANGES redundant and unnecessary maintenance activities,

and make sure your team is focused on what’s really
process give you a real-world outline of what’s needed
in your maintenance department, why it’s needed, and

CAN MAKE A important. You’ll outline the proper maintenance how it will impact your organization. You can use this

HUGE
tasks, schedules and personnel assignments; then framework to establish a realistic budget with strong
incorporate everything into the overall equipment- supporting rationales to help you get it approved.
utilization schedule and departmental plans to help Any challenges to the budget can be assessed
drive compliance. Over time, an optimized maintenance and a response prepared indicating the impact on
strategy will save time and resources — including performance that any changes might make.
reducing the hidden costs of insufficient maintenance

DIFFERENCE
(production downtime, scrap product, risks to personnel 4. You’ll just keep improving
or equipment and expediting and warehousing of spare Optimization is a project that turns into an ongoing
parts, etc.). cycle of performing tasks, collecting feedback and data,
reviewing performance, and tweaking maintenance
2. You’ll be able to plan better strategies based on current performance and business
Through the optimization process, you’ll be allocating drivers.
resources to various tasks and scheduling them
throughout the year. This gives you the ability to 5. You’ll help the whole business be more
forecast resource needs, by trade, along with spare productive and profitable
parts and outside services. It also helps you create Better maintenance strategies keep your production
plans for training and personnel development based on equipment aligned to performance requirements, with
concrete needs. fewer interruptions. That means people can get more
done, more of the time.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 7

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

CHAPTER 3 Optimizing your maintenance strategy doesn’t have

to be a huge undertaking. The key is to follow core
steps and best practices using a structured approach.
HOW TO OPTIMIZE YOUR
If you’re struggling to improve your maintenance
MAINTENANCE STRATEGY: strategy — or just want to make sure you’ve checked
A 1000-FOOT VIEW all the boxes — here’s a 1000-foot view of the process.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 8

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

1 SYNC UP 2 ORGANIZE 3 PRIORITIZE

Identify key stakeholders from Review/revise the site’s asset hierarchy A
 ssign a criticality level for each piece of
maintenance, engineering, production for accuracy and completeness. equipment; align this to any existing risk
and operations — plus the actual hands- Standardize the structure if possible. management framework
on members of your optimization team.
Gather all relevant information for each C
 onsider performing a Pareto analysis
 et everybody on board with the
G piece of equipment. to identify equipment causing the
process and trained in the steps most production downtime, highest
you’re planning to take. A mix of short - Empirical data sources: CMMS,
maintenance costs, etc.
awareness sessions and detailed FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects
education sessions to the right people Analysis) studies, industry D
 etermine the level of analysis to
are vital for success. standards, OEM recommended perform on each resulting criticality level
maintenance
 ake sure you fully understand how
M
your optimized maintenance strategies - Qualitative data sources: Team
will be loaded and executed from knowledge and past records
your Computerized Maintenance
Not sure you have enough detail?
Management System (CMMS)
The truth is, you can still do a lot with
limited or poor quality data, supported
by additional sources of knowledge.
Extract any and all information you
have available, not just what is in the
CMMS. Check out our blog, "Making
Maintenance Decisions Without
Complete Failure Data" to learn more.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 9

 CONGRATULATIONS YOU'RE NOW A RELIABILITY ENGINEER
The What, Why, and How of Maintenance Strategy Optimization

4 STRATEGIZE 5 RE-SYNC 7 KEEP GETTING

 sing the information you’ve gathered,
U Review the proposed maintenance BETTER
define the failure modes, or apply an strategy with the stakeholders you C
 ontinue to collect information from
existing library template — determine identified above, then get their buy-in work orders and other empirical and
existing and potential modes — for each and/or feedback (and adjust as needed) qualitative data sources.
piece of equipment
P
 eriodically review maintenance
 ssign tasks to mitigate the failure
A tasks so you can make continual
modes. improvements.

 ssign resources to each task (e.g, the

A
time, number of mechanics, tools, spare
6 GO! M
 onitor equipment maintenance
activity for unanticipated defects,
parts needed, etc.) new equipment and changing plant
Implement the approved maintenance
conditions. Update your maintenance
 ompare various options to determine
C strategy by loading all of the associated
strategy accordingly.
the most cost-effective strategy tasks into your CMMS — ideally through
direct integration from your RCM B
 uild a library of maintenance strategies
- N
 OTE: Reliability-centred simulation software, manually, or via an for your equipment.
maintenance (RCM) simulation Excel sheet loader.
T
 ake what you’ve learned and the
software can be a great help in
strategies and best practices you’ve
deciding between run-to-failure,
developed and share them across the
time driven repair/replace and
entire organization, wherever they are
inspection tasks.
relevant.
 undle selected activities to develop
B
an ideal maintenance task schedule
(considering shutdown opportunities).
Use standard grouping rules if available.

THE RELIABILITY LEADER'S GUIDE TO MAINTENANCE STRATEGY OPTIMIZATION 10

 ARMS Reliability provides solutions to help companies achieve optimal asset performance.

This eBook has outlined at a high level why and how you should optimize your maintenance
strategies. To ensure you are using the best approach to maintain your assets, ARMS Reliability can
provide software, consulting, and training, either individually or in combination, to help you with:

• Criticality Ranking • Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM)

• Maintenance Strategy Assessment • Task Based Maintenance (TBM)
• Maintenance Master Data • Enterprise Data Migration
• Maintenance Strategy Development • Integration with your Computerized
• Maintenance Strategy Optimization Maintenance Management System (CMMS)

Learn more about ARMS Reliability’s approach to Maintenance Strategy

Development and Optimization or contact us to discuss your current challenges.

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