Performance inhibitors (PIs) are problems that drag performance down instead of contribute to boosting it up. These are often unseen, though keenly felt. Any or all of the following six PIs may be lurking in your maintenance organization.
1) Cumbersome procedures
Having written procedures is a good thing. Having written procedures that are so dense that nobody wants to use them is not such a good thing. Three tips:
- Follow the noun/verb structure in an enumerated format, instead of paragraphs of elaborate sentences.
- Assume the user is trained (a fair assumption, since only a qualified person should do the work). A written procedure should tell the reader what to do, not how to do it.
- Let procedure users make notes on procedures, suggesting what needs to stay, be added, or be changed. Take those notes seriously.
2) Outdated test equipment
Are you running a museum or a maintenance operation? While it isn’t necessary to have the latest thing, it is necessary to have modern test equipment. The definition of modern varies by the type of equipment, so it’s not as simple as saying if something is three years old it must be upgraded. Look at what is out there, and see where your existing equipment falls short by comparison. New offerings come to the marketplace to solve specific problems that users have encountered. You may find “just what the doctor ordered” and be able to say goodbye to a problem that has been a royal pain for a long time.
3) Outdated tools
Hand tools have come a long way in recent years. Advances in ergonomics and multi-function abilities are often obvious from looking at a tool. But advances in materials and machining may produce even more benefit. Then we have power tools, a category of product that somehow just keeps getting better. Related to tools are work equipment such as tool caddies and folding work benches. As with test equipment, look at what is new, and see where your existing tools fall short by comparison.
4) Poor priorities
Does maintenance respond to every downtime call equally? It is, in fact, a common practice to let high revenue equipment sit while everyone is tied up with low revenue equipment. A justification for this is it’s not good to pull people off jobs and bounce them around.
If you look at maintenance as an investment, then you need to prioritize it for the highest return. This means you will often have to pull somebody off a lower ROI job and put them on a higher ROI job. In doing that, however, you must consider mobilization times and required availability times. If Fred is 10 minutes away from completing a PM, should you pull him off it to do a repair on something that needs to be available 70% of the time? Probably not.
And some priorities do not fall under this calculus.
- Human safety always comes before anything.
- Environmental issues come before production.
- Critical infrastructure comes before critical (load) equipment (rare exceptions exist).
5) Managerial apathy to applicable codes and standards
Conforming to or exceeding applicable codes and standards should drive managerial decisions. Treating these as optional is managerial malfeasance. These documents embody the collective wisdom of the industry. Generally, meeting the minimums proscribed by this collective brain trust is a starting point not a goal in itself. To not even meet these requirements is a performance failure that will inhibit performance in other areas.
6) Toxic attitudes
Maintenance isn’t an easy path. Some days are going to be hard and some downright frustrating. This comes with the territory. The best maintenance people handle it with humor, treat adversity as a learning experience, encourage others, and use positive behaviors to respond to negative situations.
The worst maintenance people use negative behaviors as a basic work strategy. They may mask their own poor performance (real or perceived) by fibbing, seek validation by putting down others or badmouthing the company, manipulate supervisors and coworkers through deceit (lying, gaslighting, withholding helpful information, etc.), or in other ways just drain the energy out of the organization.
Supervisors and managers may contribute negativity by using unnecessarily harsh words, failing to recognize exceptional effort, and “managing by exception” which is often in practice just means looking for fault and criticizing other people .
Toxic attitudes start with individuals and metastasize to the organization. One problem is they do this insidiously. The only way to stop these attitudes is to call them out at the first sign. Don’t let them take root. Try a simple defusing question like, “Are we having a bad day?” or a comment like, “Let’s see if we can do better tomorrow.” People need to understand that frustrations happen and it’s okay to be annoyed. They also need to understand that we can’t let frustrations dictate who we are or how we act. Let them pass, and let them stay in the past.
