The maintenance management framework : A practical view to maintenance management

The objective of this paper is to define a process for maintenance management and to classify maintenance engineering techniques within that process. Regarding the maintenance management process, we present a generic model proposed for maintenance management which integrates other models found in the literature for built and in-use assets, and consists of eight sequential management building blocks. The different maintenance engineering techniques are playing a crucial role within each one of those eight management building blocks. Following this path we characterize the ‘‘maintenance management framework’’, i.e. the supporting structure of the management process. We offer a practical vision of the set of activities composing each management block, and the result of the paper is a classification of the different maintenance engineering tools. The discussion of the different tools can also classify them as qualitative or quantitative. At the same time, some tools will be very analytical tools while others will be highly empirical. The paper also discusses the proper use of each tool or technique according to the volume of data/information available. 1 THE MAINTENANCE MANAGEMENT PROCESS The maintenance management process can be divided into two parts: the definition of the strategy, and the strategy implementation. The first part, definition of the maintenance strategy, requires the definition of the maintenance objectives as an input, which will be derived directly from the business plan. This initial part of the maintenance management process conditions the success of maintenance in an organization, and determines the effectiveness of the subsequent implementation of the maintenance plans, schedules, controls and improvements. Effectiveness shows how well a department or function meets its goals or company needs, and is often discussed in terms of the quality of the service provided, viewed from the customer’s perspective. This will allow us to arrive at a position where we will be able to minimize the maintenance indirect costs [3], those costs associated with production losses, and ultimately, with customer dissatisfaction. In the case of maintenance, effectiveness can represent the overall company satisfaction with the capacity and condition of its assets [4], or the reduction of the overall company cost obtained because production capacity is available when needed [5]. Effectiveness concentrates then on the correctness of the process and whether the process produces the required result. The second part of the process, the implementation of the selected strategy has a different significance level. Our ability to deal with the maintenance management implementation problem (for instance, our ability to ensure proper skill levels, proper work preparation, suitable tools and schedule fulfilment), will allow us to minimize the maintenance direct cost (labour and other maintenance required resources). In this part of the process we deal with the efficiency of our management, which should be less important. Efficiency is acting or producing with minimum waste, expense, or unnecessary effort. Efficiency is then understood as providing the same or better maintenance for the same cost. In this paper we present a generic model proposed for maintenance management integrates other models found in the literature (see for instance [6,7]) for built and in-use assets, and consists of eight sequential management building blocks, as presented in Figure 1. The first three building blocks condition maintenance effectiveness, the fourth an fifth ensure maintenance efficiency, blocks six and seven are devoted to maintenance and assets life cycle cost assessment, finally block number eight ensures continuous maintenance management improvement.