Leadership and the SAP Plant Maintenance Tool

Using a software package to administer maintenance activities is nothing new to most of us. As a matter of fact, the vast majority are experiencing our second implementation of the latest and greatest CMMS (Computer Maintenance Management System).

We struggled with the first one just getting used to the complexity of using a computer and its awkward commands to do the things that we handled so quickly with the paper system of the good old days. In those days, the world was much different. There was no real pressure from Wall Street at the operating floor level, and we all seemed to remember the failures and what happened and why, and took the time to make sure it did not ever happen again. Well, I may be stretching the truth a little, I remember taking pride in how quickly we could fix a problem, and to this day, getting that mentality off of the operating floor is difficult. But to be fair, we all respond to what our bosses reward us for, and it is the rare leader that routinely publicly recognizes effective preventive maintenance and therefore minimal downtime. It is always the excitement of working under pressure and doing well that feed our maintenance egos. And in some people's opinion, ego and maintenance go hand in hand. This maintenance ego is what is at risk in today's world of computer based maintenance. The very act of teaching the computer the tasks that we reserved for measuring our own worth seems to be self defeating. "If I put all the information in there to do the job, what do they need me for? If I do not measure my worth by how fast I can fix something that is broken, how do I measure it? Why do I take the enormous amount of time it takes to document the equipment specs and failures, when there seems to be no real reward for doing that?" In response to this challenge, we must strive to understand what it takes to make the CMMS work for us, instead of it creating non-value adding work. And as a leader, the task is to measure and reward the organization accordingly.

The Goal

Now it is a given that the financial bottom line is where the rubber will hit the road. It will always be a matter of equipment uptime and the cost to support that uptime. The strategy will be to work toward 100% uptime and have it cost as little as it can to sustain that reliability. We will always be benchmarked and compared against our competition. The difficult part is what tactics are used to execute that strategy. As maintenance professionals we are not the main event, we are a support to the main event, keeping the equipment running that actually allows our organization to make a profit. It is about making money, safely and within the law, period. Which brings us to the role of the computer based maintenance system in that strategy and more particularly, the tactics. On the debit side, there is a significant cost associated with the software and hardware just to run the system. On top of that, and even more painful, is the human cost associated with learning the system and trying to achieve the potential. The basic question that runs through a plant manager's mind is "How is this system going to make my plant money? Is there a competitive advantage in there somewhere?" The answer is "Yes , if you are willing to lead the effort".

The Strategy

The system we are using as an example is the SAP Plant Maintenance Module, but the concepts are applicable to any business enterprise software system. As with most enterprise systems, there are two large drivers to implementation. Leveraging the size of the company by sharing data streams and being able to know at any point in time where the company is financially. These systems are usually designed by financial people who see the need to integrate maintenance costs within their financial reporting structure, so software is developed to execute those actionable costs. So given this fact the first basic question for plant leadership is "Is maintenance cost important for me to track and to what degree?" This is the fundamental question that will drive the rest of this discussion, for there is a business fundamental that will drive how deep we delve into the CMMS. If we are at reliability targets and within budget, spending summaries are sufficient. If we are not, we now have the tool to quickly get to root issues and get a real time picture of what is going on day to day in our maintenance operations. Now we have the capability of to monitor every action within the system, and with the enterprise approach of merging maintenance, stores, accounting, purchasing, and human resources all invariably linked, you are not allowed to attempt any task without a keystroke. If gaining accountability is your focus, this is a tool. If you have a self driven organization to be excellent, it is also a tool. If you have neither, much of the time invested in this CMMS will not create a dividend. More likely than not, it will become an added operating cost.

The Structure

Just as an overview, let's take a layman's view of the SAP Plant Maintenance Module and what is consists of.

1) Technical Objects

a) The Equipment
b) The Equipment (Functional) Locations designated normally by General Ledger
c) The Materials associated with the Equipment or Locations (This is normally referred to as the Bill Of Materials)
d) Maintenance Work Centers or people resource to do the work.

2) Maintenance Processing

a) The Notification - The Heart of the Equipment or Location History
b) The Order - The Cost Tracking Vehicle to get Maintenance Work Done

3) Preventive Maintenance

a) The Repeatable Maintenance Task Strategies that are used to inspect and perform work that anticipate problems before they happen
b) The Task Lists that provide the template for work that happens more than once.

4) Information System