Discrete Solutions, Maintenance Management

In our experience, almost every time a company has had a maintenance management system that failed, it has failed for one of two reasons:

1. The level of the system didn't match the level of the company's needs. If a manufacturer only needs a maintenance system that functions at the Reactive level, their money will be wasted on anything more sophisticated. If the manufacturer has a plant that needs a Mature level system, their money spent will prove quite valuable. The ROI is there.
2. Failure can come from the lack of sound operating practices within the organization, regardless of the computer software being used. If work practices are sloppy and ineffective, or if scheduling and planning are incomplete and haphazard, equipment will not be well maintained. Unfortunately, adversarial relationships often develop between Operations and Maintenance, which creates a lack of coordination in the plant and will, in turn, undermine any efforts to build an effective maintenance program.

The ultimate goal of Maintenance is to support Operations, and thereby make the plant run more efficiently. While ERP systems, which are ledger driven, can help companies reduce monies tied up in a maintenance inventory and consolidate the purchasing of maintenance supplies and spare parts, they aren't much help in structuring Maintenance to minimize downtime. So, most companies do benefit from using a Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS). The fundamental issue, apart from ensuring that your organization has sound maintenance management practices in place, is making a good match between the maintenance philosophy being pursued by the company and the maintenance management information systems that are employed. Maintenance management systems that don't fit the needs of the company are destined to fail. A company's ability to choose the right CMMS is contingent on their ability to define the company's IT needs clearly and thoroughly.