Critical changes affecting Maintenance and Production people

Production as well as service organisations have traditionally discharged their duty towards their owners / founders /stakeholders by operating and maintaining production/service assets. For this purpose there existed a production/service department and a maintenance department in most firms.

Since the sixties of the previous century there was a progressive realisation that production assets need to be managed comprehensively by production organisations. Maintaining them is not the total answer. The idea of Physical Asset Management (mostly simply called Asset Management) was conceived.

Asset Management includes Maintenance, but much more than that. It broadly includes the following four main stages:

1. Asset conceptualisation, design, development, and production.
2. Asset (and support infrastructure) selection, procurement, and installation.
3. Asset operation and maintenance
4. Asset disposal

This led to the British PAS 55 Standard (2003, updated in 2008), followed by an International set of standards, called ISO 55000. These address the need for developing the typical organisation’s Maintenance function to a full blown Asset Management Function.

The questions now asked by most Maintenance (as well as Production) people are:

1. What is the difference between what I have been doing and what I am supposed to be doing in future?
2. Will these standards really contribute to a better future for our businesses?
3. What is the real difference between Maintenance and Asset Management?
4. What do I have to do?

The present course intends answering these questions, so that business managers (production and maintenance) can start planning for the new future specified by these standards.

Can Maintenance and Production people disregard these changes?

These changes will have at least as great an effect as that of the various safety, quality, and environmental standards. It is critical to build an understanding of these changes now and start planning for the future.