At a minimum, your computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) should do the following:
Record and track material usage and labor costs.
Capture information on inventories.
Control the work-order system.
Provide equipment data and history.
Schedule and track preventive/predictive maintenance.
Link all critical information in a relational database.
Provide some analysis functions.
Export data to spreadsheet and database applications for analysis.
Very likely, it does all of these things and more. But are you making use of these features? More importantly, what are you doing with the information once you have it? We'll explore these areas more in depth in future issues.
