Stated simply, a preventive maintenance plan is a collection of various processes, tools, and guidelines, which help achieve preventive maintenance targets with limited use of resources. The right blueprint helps to achieve the intended targets of preventative maintenance without any hassle.
With a preventive maintenance plan, organizations can run on a seemingly well laid out path free of obstacles. A plan such as this one makes it easier to define goals and timelines and allocate resources.
However, the difference in structure, goals, and availability of resources makes every organization different. This is the reason why one single type of preventive maintenance plan may not fit each one of them. Thus, there is a need to build a custom preventative maintenance plan, which comprises of several elements.
Building a custom plan can help an organization achieve sustainability and efficiency in the long run. So, what are these elements? Let us find out.
How To Implement And Use An Effective Preventive Maintenance Plan?
Setting Goals
This is the first step that needs to be undertaken when building an effective preventive maintenance plan. Due to the difference in goals, future decisions’ impact tends to be varied for all organizations. They could be focused on anything, right from reducing downtime, increasing reliability, cutting costs, and more.
At this stage, goals are determined in the order of their priority for the organization. This helps in deciding which goals require allocation of resources and attention above other pursuits. This, in turn, helps to refine the process of forming and using a plan for preventive maintenance.
Create Key Performance Indicators
Simply laying down goals in words may not be enough actually to make them of any value. It is crucial to measure them, for which attaching numbers to them is a good idea. Maintenance metrics can make preventive maintenance plans more usable by allowing measurement of performance.
Right from measuring effectiveness to failure, some essential key performance indicators can reliably help your organization measure performance. A dedicated framework that allows measuring such metrics consistently may be optimum to improve the preventive maintenance plan’s design.
Involve Stakeholders
Taking your team on board to implement the preventive maintenance plan is an effective way to ensure that every small detail is taken care of! From a simple technician to an engineer and the people who ought to perform their respective jobs, discussion about goals, skills, and resources is crucial with the involved team.
The impact of maintenance is likely to reach every person and team involved in an organization. Thus, their appraisal and cooperation will help to implement changes and execution of strategy without hurdles.
Using The Right Technology
Any preventive maintenance plan cannot be put in place without the right technology. Necessary tasks such as inventory management, scheduling, organizing work orders, and more can be embraced seamlessly with the right technology’s help. Transition to a digital solution from a typical pen and paper approach may be the answer to your questions about using the right system for preventive maintenance.
To consider the right technology for this purpose, essential elements such as budgets, available assets, preferences of the team, data security, and more must be recognized. The use of preventive maintenance technology, like CMMS, can be considered for this purpose. As a system, it is easy to understand and use effectively.
Training And Implementation
While it is easier for the superiors to know and understand what needs to be done and how it is to be done, the team members need to be introduced to the prospect of a preventive maintenance plan. An effective training strategy is a key to equipping them with the knowledge and information they require to overcome this barrier.
Preventive maintenance may require several shifts and changes, which need to be translated according to practical goals. A pilot program may be one way to help them understand the basics of the preventive maintenance program.
Checklist And Analysis
Once a plan is set in motion, it is necessary to analyze it and understand the results that it is helping you reap. A specific preventive maintenance checklist will be of help to track and analyze the results of the plan.
When these numbers are analyzed and compared to several other pre-defined numbers, a more precise image will emerge, showing exactly how well the organization’s maintenance operation works.
Simultaneously, it is also essential to assess these metrics against set benchmarks, which will further assist in refining the process of preventive maintenance. So, if any errors are being made during the implementation process, they will be identified swiftly and corrected before the purpose of the maintenance program is defeated.
Refinement Of Plan
Refinement of preventive maintenance plan may never be complete in whole. It is a type of plan which always remains under construction and undergoes modification as per the changing requirements. As new systems or equipment is added, preventive maintenance has to transform to fit the new needs.
Filling gaps and fine-tuning planning procedures is an absolute necessity to check where the organization is lagging and seek improvement opportunities. Doing so also helps identify spots where an organization can put more effort and achieve more remarkable results.
Conclusion
The benefits of preventive maintenance plan make it an indispensable element of every organization. It is vital to build and create a successful, effective, and sustainable program for sustainable maintenance. Inadvertently, it requires intensive planning and thought to make one.
A strategy to build a sturdy and full-proof plan by identifying the right key performance indicators and involving all stakeholders in the program helps leverage technology solutions in favor of the plan. To ensure that all your effort does not go to waste, it is essential to pay heed to every step of the process with intricate care.
Achieving a well-established and definitive preventive maintenance plan is not difficult but requires intensive planning to layout and implement. A preventative maintenance plan can be a viable option for most organizations that dream of attaining cost savings and scaling their operations in the long run.