Disrupted production schedules, poor quality, and excessive costs. Do you need any more reasons to make preventive maintenance management a higher priority?

Before beginning to work on improving plant performance, we frequently have to help clients address equipment reliability issues, which slows down transformation efforts. Baseline stability is required to effectively reduce waste, provide stability to production output, and continuously improve production processes. Machines and equipment must be well-maintained for processes to be capable and in control.

Here are six signs that a facility’s preventive maintenance activities are being neglected and need your immediate attention:

  1. A high level of frustration in the plant – Poorly maintained equipment makes it difficult for production to consistently meet schedules, for operators to learn their craft, and for improvements to be defined and implemented.
  2. A rise in unplanned downtime and decreased machine availability. Insufficient preventive maintenance is not the sole contributor to unplanned downtime and machine availability, but it is a major factor.
  3. Poor quality and excessive scrap – Poorly maintained equipment contributes to reduced yields and higher scrap levels. This is a critical concern for manufacturers using expensive raw materials or where materials are a large percentage of direct costs.
  4. Maintenance budget overruns. When maintenance costs start running over budget it’s often caused by excessive overtime. Reactive maintenance is always more expensive than preventive maintenance work. Of course, costs will rise in the short term when deferred maintenance work is undertaken to make up for past neglect.
  5. Lack of maintenance KPIs and performance targets. Disciplined performance measurement, analysis and reviews are key practices of any well-run business or function. Establishing KPIs and a tracking system to monitor equipment capability and performance is one of the first steps that we take when improving maintenance management.
  6. MRO spending growth and out-of-stock spare parts. MRO (maintenance, repair and overhaul) inventory is everything consumed in the production process that does not become part of the end product. Out-of-stock spare parts or consumables can bring production to a screeching halt, leading to extended downtime and expedited shipments from suppliers.

There are many potential contributors to these maintenance issues. All of them are management related.

For example, a company might be readying itself for sale, with management limiting anything that seems like discretionary spending to boost earnings. Or, as often happens, a great mechanic was promoted to maintenance manager, but he didn’t receive the training or support to effectively manage the department.

Doing more with less is an unrealistic and ineffective maintenance strategy. No operation is immune to the short-term focus and excessive emphasis on maximizing profits that underlie decisions to shortchange maintenance. Benefits of improving your preventive maintenance practices include reduced injury rates, reduced defects, higher first-pass yield, and increased asset utilization, which is only the beginning.

Manufacturing leaders must recognize that the costs of an effective maintenance program, and preventive maintenance specifically, are small when compared to the cost of major breakdowns, material losses, and poor quality.

Eliminating such costs starts with an assessment of a plant’s current maintenance program, which we will explore in detail in a future post. The maintenance diagnostic guides the development of a thought-out, structured improvement plan to make the transition from reactive to preventative maintenance work and, ultimately, to predictive practices.