A lesson in determining reliability resources

Publicado el Publicado el 3 de enero de 2018

John Yolton

“We’re learning, slowly, but surely, how to better manage our assets to create more
uptime.” Sam was talking with Chris, an up and coming maintenance supervisor assign to
manage work in one of the sites business units.

“But if we are going to make an impact on both asset availability and resource costs we
have to speed up this process of improvement. Simple as that.

“So, what do you have in mind?” Chris asked, sensing that Sam was primed and fully
prepared to launch into a lengthy dialogue elaborating on his thoughts.

“Don’t get me wrong Chris, we are doing quite well in our goals, in fact the envy of our
peers within the company, but as you also know we can reduce the number of everyday
maintenance resources in this complex by simply understanding what needs to be done
and then doing those tasks more effectively.

“Imagine that you have responsibility for maintenance for a brand-new facility.

“What would be your first task, based upon the goals of the site, you know, things like
good production, low costs, a safe workplace, no environmental incidents, the usual.”

“Identifying the work that needs to be done on the assets?” Chris ventured.
“All assets?”

“Well not all, but the important assets for sure.”

“And which are those?” Sam asked rhetorically.

“Perhaps”, Sam continued, “the most critical to accomplishing the goals of this site?”

“Aren’t all the assets critical?” Chris queries.

“Well, yes, but some are more critical than others. Fact is there are probably less than 50
percent of the assets we operate and maintain that are actually very important to the
goals of production, cost, safety and environment.

“But we don’t know and won’t know until we perform some analysis.

“First, we need to establish the criticality rating chart.”

Sam went on to explain, with the whiteboard prevalent as his teaching aid, how a chart
can be developed, and modified until all the parties effected by criticality and site and
business unit goals are satisfied.

“Now, again remembering that we are a brand-new plant with new equipment and no
operating history, we need to determine which of this equipment is most critical, less
critical and not critical, using the chart we put together.

Sam pulled out a set of rolled up P&ID drawings he had laying on his desk. “I pulled these
out today. They are old but will be good to use for practice.

“Of course, today we would access this information and more via our document database
and our CMMS, but I wanted to be more hands on.

“Starting at the front end of the process flow, draw a line,” Sam handed Chris a red pencil,
“to the first group of assets and ask yourself, ‘is this equipment critical to the process’
based upon our criticality chart?

“If it is, draw a red circle around the cluster of equipment and move on to the next and
the next until you have covered the plant and all its processes. Obviously, some of the
equipment, including whole sub-processes, are not critical, so make a note of these.”

Chris, head down, went on with this task, asking a few questions here and there, mostly
seeking clarification when he didn’t know the process well enough to make a judgement.
“In a real exercise, Chris, we would have all the primary participants here representing
their various business units to make sure we have made the most accurate assumptions.

“Many of those ‘operators’ will emphatically state that all their equipment is critical, but
we will keep asking questions about the specific equipment and process and eventually
will filter ‘all’ to ‘likely’.” Sam smiled.

“What is the outcome of this, uh, exercise?” Chris asked, pointing back to the drawing
and the red circles and red lines he had drawn so far.

“Once we have determined the most critical assets, then we will decide which operating
and maintenance strategies and then, procedures and tasks will provide the best
outcome for that asset to meet our BU and site goals.

“For example, today, here, we replace the valve stem packing in every valve, hand valves
included, on each of the boilers once per year, every year, during the annual outage. That
has been practiced for years, decades even.

“Is it the right thing to do?

“I have no doubt it is done efficiently, after all these years of doing and doing, but is it the
most effective strategy for those assets?

“Is some of time used to replace good, undamaged packing more effectively used
elsewhere for more critical assets, or not done at all?

“Even Bill, who has performed this task for the last umpteen years, knows that most of
the valves do not require repacking and he has given up trying to tell anyone.

“In the end, Chris, after this red line exercise is performed across the entire plant and all
the tasks identified, we will have an evidence-based consensus of the base workload for
effectively and efficiently maintaining this site to meet our goals, both for maintenance
mechanics and operators.

“We will know number of workers, their skills, hours required, whether shutdown is
required, or not, so pretty much a complete summary of required preventive work.

“Will it be 100% correct and accurate? No, but it is a start and over time the task lists,
and workload will be refined and corrected accordingly. Some tasks will be eliminated,
others will be changed, and some will be added.

We will no longer be doing everything to everything like we are trying today

“We will no longer be doing everything to everything like we are trying today. Instead we
will be doing the right things the right way and that will produce more product at less
cost, safely without damaging the environment.

“Imagine knowing a year ahead, what your next year’s workload, and resource
requirements, will be? Aside from corrective work, which we will deal with separately.”

“I can’t imagine.” Chris stared, glassy-eyed into the future. “What about using that same
process here for this plant?”

“Yeah, what about it?” Sam smiled

Sam repeated this ‘learning’ process with different people, generally one-on-one, over
the next few months.

He only had a few months to make an impact and there is plenty of resistance to change
to overcome so haste was essential for success. Identifying and educating the most
receptive ‘learners’ is part of the process.

‘Another convert, now to build critical mass.’ Sam thought, smiling. ‘Every journey starts
with the first step.’