PCA Blog
How One Paper Mill Transformed Through Change Management
Discover how disciplined work management, leadership alignment and cultural change revitalized a struggling paper mill.
What Life at Sea Teaches About Reliability
IDCON’s Owe Forsberg shares how years aboard merchant ships shaped his reliability mindset and how these insights power his approach to maintenance excellence.
Don’t Let “Dirty Data” Derail Your CMMS Success
When rolling out or upgrading a CMMS, clients often budget for software and implementation, but not data enrichment. Learn why data enrichment is essential.
The Three Pillars of a Reliability Playbook: Standards, Expectations and Training
Discover PCA’s playbook framework built on standards, expectations and training, which aligns teams and enables execution.
Embedding CEO Vision Through the Reliability Playbook
Learn how CEO vision and leadership buy-in drive cultural change through a strategic reliability playbook built on proven standards, training and expectations.
Why Training and Vision Are Critical to Asset Management Success
Learn why education, training and leadership vision are key to sustainable asset management and discover how standards and strategy drive success.
Navigating Supply Chain Disruptions: Keep Your Storeroom Ready
Facing supply chain disruptions? Learn how PCA’s expertise can optimize your maintenance storeroom and ensure the availability of spare parts.
From Massive Compressors to Smart Tech: A Vibration Analysis Journey
Finance and insurance leaders often overlook ISO standards, but aligning with these best practices can impact profits and shareholder value.
How Finance and Insurance Leaders Overlook ISO Standards (but Shouldn’t)
Finance and insurance leaders often overlook ISO standards, but aligning with these best practices can impact profits and shareholder value.
Maintaining Master Data: A Critical Task for Operational Success
The quality of your master data management protocols will have resounding effects on the entire organization. Learn how to maintain it effectively.
The Importance of Master Data Management in the Operational Life Cycle
Master data management has a direct impact on the operational life cycle of mission-critical equipment. Learn why this impact matters.
Reduce Your Labor Costs with Effective Master Data Management
Did you know that effective MDM can help you slash labor expenses? Learn more about how you can use data management to be more efficient.
Don’t Let Dirty Data Derail Your Greenfield Projects
A greenfield project should provide a fresh start. You won’t be encumbered by past mistakes or the habits of previous operations.
Get Your House in Order
Learn strategies for cleaning messy data and discover how effective data management can extend the mean time between failures from months to years.
Ensuring Successful CMMS Adoption — Critical Factors
In 2008, an Atlanta-based company with a network of North American paper mills began searching for an enterprise-wide computerized maintenance management system (CMMS).
Eliminating Failures and Paving the Way for Proactive Maintenance Support
During his 40+ year career with two paper companies and an energy company, Bob Anderson, now a PCA Consulting professional, implemented system-wide changes that eliminated equipment failures
Seven Words You Shouldn’t Say in Maintenance
When I was a teenager, my neighbor had a recording of George Carlin’s “Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television.” We listened to it
Change Management Best Practices — Avoiding Friction and Realizing a Strong ROI
Before embarking on a major transformation initiative, business leaders must lay the foundation for a successful transition through proper change management.
Getting your Storeroom “Back to Basics”
If your storeroom is not up to where it should be, the efficiency and effectiveness of your maintenance teams will suffer.
Detailed Maintenance Planning, Clean Master Data Help Combat the Brain Drain and Assure Uptime
Clean Master Data and planned maintenance avoids expediting and saves frustration, time and money.
Practical AI: The Path to Top Quartile Reliability
According to some predictions, AI will permeate all facets of life, making it easier to do everything, including maintenance.
Despite all of the Technology, the Basics are Still Important
As I look back across my career in maintenance and MRO materials, it seems that the things people hire us for really have not changed.
The Human Side of Reliability
While there is a growing body of proofs regarding the right technical approach to boosting reliability, the best technical solutions are nothing if they leave the people behind.
A Journey to Reliability Excellence: Summary and Conclusions
The journey would not have been complete or the objectives of our mission fulfilled if one of them had been left out.
A Journey to Reliability Excellence: The Contributions of MRO and Procurement
MRO materials management and procurement was a critical part of our reliability improvement journey, and it should be considered part of every reliability program.
A Journey to Reliability Excellence: The Effects of Making Work Go Away
My plant reduced maintenance spend by $22 million per year just by making work go away.
A Journey to Reliability Excellence: The Critical Importance of Work Management
One of the key learnings we had is that it is impossible to implement advanced reliability solutions until the foundation is solid.
A Journey to Reliability Excellence: The Business Case and Executive Support
Implementing a reliability-based maintenance program has tremendous business benefits – the kind of impact that executives get excited about.
CMMS Offers Asset Predictability in Industry 4.0
With Industry 4.0 comes the first opportunity industrial organizations have had to implement a comprehensive, predictive-based maintenance approach.
People are the Main Ingredient for Success
I know that our people have always made the difference for our customers. Here’s a big Thank You to our team!
The Labor Crisis Should Heighten Executive Interest in Reliability
The quote, “Never waste a good crisis!” has been attributed to many people, including Winston Churchill. Upheaval breaks inertia, creating the opportunity
There is a Better Way!
Everyone is talking about the shift in employee mindset that has made quality of life a high priority. Choosing lifestyle over pay has always been a characteristic of millennials and the pandemic has increased this tendency in all other generations.
“Keep Your Axe Sharp” for Real Storeroom Savings
Abe Lincoln famously quipped, “Give me six hours to cut down a tree and I will spend the first four hours sharpening the axe.” A few months ago, I announced the addition of PCA’s field engineering services, which are specifically designed to help keep your maintenance management tools sharp.
PCA Playbooks Drive Teamwork and Manufacturing Excellence
It’s a safe bet that most of us have heard the expression “The left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing” used to describe organizational disfunction. Just imagine the catastrophic consequences of playing a guitar in that condition!
Demystifying Advanced Analytics for Maintenance
Most people in maintenance do not really understand advanced analytics like artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML). Personally, I think advanced analytics have a lot to offer maintenance professionals, but I am an analytics geek.
The Evolution of Reliability Best Practices and Maintenance Whack-A-Mole
Reliability is a good thing, like motherhood and apple pie. Everyone wants reliability because it means that your equipment always does what it should when you need it to; your business runs smoothly and everyone in the organization sees the benefits of increased uptime and operational performance. So it’s easy to see why the term Reliability has become so polluted.
Now Hiring! MRO Storeroom Associate
Performance Consulting Associates Inc. is currently looking to add another MRO Storeroom and Inventory Management Associate. The ideal candidate will have the appropriate years of working experience in a plant or facilities storeroom/warehouse.
New Field Engineering Services: Bills-of-Material Development
The primary objective of the BOM review and creation process is to expedite the kitting process. BOMs help storeroom personnel find the right parts in the right condition, quantity and time required to support the work schedule. BOMs are a critical enabling component to a top-quartile work management process.
New Field Engineering Services: Preventive Maintenance Optimization
Top performers in reliability, as measured by high asset availability and low maintenance cost, perform relatively fewer periodic preventive maintenance tasks like overhauls. They focus their efforts on the work that needs to be done because a failure is known to be developing instead of trying to catch a failure that may or may not be there. PCA’s new PM Optimization service helps clients become more efficient by weeding out poorly targeted PMs.
From Bills of Materials to Preventive Maintenance Optimization, New Field Engineering Services Are Here
Since joining PCA in late 2020, I have been reaching out to our clientele, asking if there is anything else we can do for them to boost their facility’s performance. Two items that kept coming up were bills of materials (BOMs) and preventive maintenance optimization (PMO).
Listen to PCA Podcast, “Journey to Reliability: A Roadmap for Success by Dan Moss”
PCA’s VP of Operations, Dan Moss, headlined a lively podcast episode of Maintenance Disrupted Friday, June 11, entitled Journey to Reliability: A Roadmap for Success by Dan Moss. Hosted by Blair Fraser,
The Secret Sauce Behind 45 Years in Business
PCA is celebrating a very big anniversary this year. Forty-five years in business is extraordinary! Consider all the technological progress and economic, political and social swings that PCA has endured since 1976.
Companies do not survive as long as they used to. Today, the average age of companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 is less than 14 years and has declined steadily from an average of 61 years in 1958. PCA has achieved a milestone that many of today’s elite companies never will.
Journey to Reliability: The Roadmap for Success
Achieving maximum equipment reliability is a journey, and just like any other trip, it requires a functional roadmap to ensure arrival at the desired spot through the most expeditious route. In this month’s blog, PCA Director of Operations Dan Moss draws a parallel between the roadmaps his family used for childhood vacations and the roadmaps that PCA helps its clients develop to ensure the desired outcome.
Inventory Levels Impact Production Planning and Scheduling More than Ever: Why that Matters and How to Fix It
As demand for U.S. manufacturing rises and falls, optimizing inventory levels becomes even more important to effective planning and scheduling. If your plant personnel aren’t excelling at inventory management, read this article, in which PCA Director of Operations Dan Moss provides sensible strategies to help alleviate the strain.
Obsolete Inventory: Addressing an Enemy of Efficiency
Volumes have been written about how plants and other facilities are impacted by poor inventory management — and in particular, excess inventory of all types. Obsolete inventory is one of the culprits, and tackling it poses two specific challenges.
The SMRP Conference Exposed Some Big Industry Challenges
At the recent SMRP Conference in Louisville, PCA’s booth was approached by attendees looking for inspiration. We engaged in several days of thoughtful discussions about the future of maintenance and reliability and saw a lot of interest in our new Pharmaceutical/Life Sciences Industry Playbook.
Reliability-Centered Leadership in the Age of Industry 4.0
With the advent of Industry 4.0, facility management may be reevaluating or extending the role of the reliability engineer (RE). Given its process-centered, highly technical focus, Industry 4.0 presents a perfect opportunity for REs to shine. Nevertheless, in my opinion, organizations that assume the majority of the RE’s work will be process centered are making a grave miscalculation.
Purchasing in the Pulp and Paper Industry: Creating Predictability Where None Exists
Profit margins for forest products industry firms are volatile, at best, due to raw materials availability and pricing, competitive pressures and market forces. PCA helped one paper mill gain a measure of predictability — and save $1 million per year — by moving to best practices machine parts purchasing.
Storeroom Staff Mismanagement, Pt 2: The Dangers of Indifferent Personnel
Earlier this month, PCA Associate Jim Clifford shared a true story of storeroom staff mismanagement that illustrated how just one bad personnel decision can snowball into a big problem (with corresponding significant financial loss.) Here, the author expands his tale to discuss the damage that non-committal employees, whether in the storeroom or outside of it, can do.
Lessons in Storeroom Staff Mismanagement
For personnel involved in maintenance repair and operations (MRO), how storerooms are staffed may be one of the greatest mysteries of all time. In reality, the answer is often disappointingly simple: whoever is available at that time and will not object too severely to being put in there. Unfortunately, that’s generally the worst possible course of action. In this article, PCA Director of MRO Services Jim Clifford shares a painful, real-life experience and explains why careful selection of MRO storeroom staff (and especially storeroom management) is critical to the efficient storeroom operations that help boost bottom lines.
The True Cost of Spare Parts Inventory: The Calculations May Surprise You
In every industry, spare parts are crucial to equipment reliability. That sometimes leads purchasing managers to overstock items that are frequently used. This approach is OK (if not great) as part of a cohesive inventory management plan to use those parts efficiently, but most of the time, it is not. In a modern, well-run facility, there simply is no room for excess spare parts. This article explains why overstocking is so detrimental.
Best Practices MRO Purchasing Drives Reliability and Uptime; Propels Dramatic Improvements
MRO purchasing is often overlooked by procurement professionals, and opportunities are masked by the transactions themselves which are high-volume but low-dollar. Resources are often allocated to other areas, and responsibilities for the purchasing function are transferred to maintenance or the storeroom where procurement capabilities are limited. In addition, the imperative for rapid repairs drives immediate, reflexive action and prevents the development of long-term strategic initiatives.
The MRO Spare Parts Storeroom: Make It a Critical Quality System
The Maintenance, Reliability and Operations (MRO) spare parts storeroom is an indispensable appendage of the Maintenance and Facilities departments. Yet, despite the clear value of a well-run MRO spare parts storeroom to ensure operating efficiency, it is rarely managed to function at optimal levels. The result is reduced productivity, excessive MRO spare parts expenses and unnecessary waste and downtime.
PCA’s Trip to MARCON 2019: What an Amazing Event!
PCA hosted a booth at MARCON 2019, staffed by our MRO experts. They had discussions with a continual stream of attendees, all of whom were eager to hear our advice on topics ranging from ensuring availability of critical spare parts to controlling inventory spend. The hottest topic, by far, was the importance of having a robust set of work management processes in place — and the challenge of achieving that goal.
MRO Best Practices Adoption: Beyond Inventory Management
In our last blog, we talked about MRO inventory management—ensuring that the right parts are available at the right time and in the right place. This effort is one pillar of a best-practices MRO program, but it is not the only one. In conjunction with optimizing storeroom inventory and the storeroom itself, organizations must develop an ecosystem of best practices that support handling and usage of MRO parts and tools.
Inventory Management: A Cost-Saving Strategy that Works
For many, the term “inventory management” conjures images of neat, orderly warehouses and storerooms. While well-organized storage is an important component of inventory management, it’s just one link in the chain. Properly structured, inventory management ensures that the right parts and/or materials are in the right place and always available at the precise time they are needed. Furthermore, inventory levels are kept at an optimal level to meet demand. Anything more wastes both space and money. This may sound simple in concept, but it’s complex in practice. Inventory management can be applied in two ways—materials for production and/or parts and materials for equipment maintenance.
Proactive Maintenance—Boosting Business Value; Ensuring Operational Excellence
Equipment operation is, at its core, a business activity, and proactive maintenance is an investment in that activity. Unlike reactive, or break-fix maintenance, proactive maintenance involves vigilant asset management and a dedicated strategy that plans not only for component replacement on a recommended schedule (e.g. preventive maintenance) but also equipment analysis to identify root failure origins—excessive vibrations, part contamination, and other issues—and take action to avoid impending part and machinery failures (predictive maintenance).
Is Your CMMS Working as Hard for You as It Could? The Unfortunate Answer Is “Probably Not!”
Computerized Maintenance Management Systems, or CMMS, are designed to streamline maintenance and extend the life of equipment. For many facilities, however CMMS never achieve management’s stated goals. Vast sums of money is spent on these advanced information processing and analytics platforms (also known as Preventive Maintenance Systems or Preventive Maintenance Software), only to have them be underutilized and even ignored or abandoned.
On-boarding Research and Development Partners—Inventory Counts
For companies in highly regulated industries (HRI), acquiring the research firms that develop technologies, solutions or products that they use or sell can be complicated. The process ties up lawyers, accountants and human resource personnel for months, if not years. In our experience, one area that is often not given sufficient attention is the merger of physical elements, such as parts and finished inventory. Unless the research is intellectual property alone, there will likely be raw materials, components, prototypes and products over which the parent company is taking control.
Storeroom Practices for Highly Regulated Industries: Traceability Is Crucial
For HRIs from motor vehicle manufacture to medical equipment and pharmaceuticals—where environmental and/or public health and safety are at risk—the stakes are incredibly high, and failure to ensure safety can be disastrous. To meet strict regulations imposed on HRIs and reduce liability, companies must closely track inventory and its components—and maintain readily available records that document their oversight.
Managing the Candidate’s Expectations
The primary reason candidates accept other offers, or drop out of an interview process, is not the length of time from interview to offer. Candidates know, pending various logistics, the process can be lengthy. The true reason is that they do not know the next step in the process, and they lose confidence they are being managed properly through the very important process that has a profound impact on their career.
How to Make the Right Impression Recruiting
Who likes being sold to? Not many people like the feeling of being pressured to make a decision. It is no different when contacting candidates in the job market. Some are “passive” job seekers and are somewhat testing the current job market. When contacting a candidate, take the time, and truly get to know this person’s background, interests, and talents.
Achieving Equipment Reliability—Is Outsourcing the Solution?
Ensuring equipment reliability is one of the great challenges for industrial operations, from plants to mining companies. Many organizations do not have the staff expertise to develop and effectively run an asset management system, including such core functions as reliability-focused maintenance. Often, they have no idea where to start.
Proactive Maintenance: Boosting Business Value; Ensuring Operational Excellence
Equipment operation is, at its core, a business activity, and proactive maintenance is an investment in that activity.
Unlike reactive, or break-fix maintenance, proactive maintenance involves vigilant asset management and a dedicated strategy that plans not only for component replacement on a recommended schedule (e.g. preventive maintenance) but also equipment analysis to identify root failure origins—excessive vibrations, part contamination, and other issues—and take action to avoid impending part and machinery failures (predictive maintenance).
Accountability and Traceability
The goal of the storeroom is to have:
The right quantity of, the right parts at, the right place at, the right time.
The key to accomplishing that goal is complete accountability and traceability of everything that goes into and comes out of the storeroom.
At PCA we find that because of logistics and staffing restraints, many clients split receiving and issuing duties between stores, and shipping & receiving personnel, as well as maintenance and operations personnel.
Stocking Strategy
Carrying a spare part within the facility’s storeroom seems like a simple strategy not requiring much thought. But a second look at internal stocking options reveals there is much to consider in setting optimal stocking levels. Several strategies need to be considered.
The use of free issue stock, vending machines, and vendor managed inventory are potential strategies that control cost, reduce transaction work load, and reduce consumption, while ensuring spare parts availability.
KPI’s
It is true, you cannot manage what you do not measure. But Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) can be detrimental to an operation if not properly established.
KPIs need to be top-down driven. First and foremost are enterprise KPIs that support an organizations mission. All facility, functional, departmental, and individual KPIs need to support those enterprise KPIs.
Too often, departmental or functional KPIs can work against each other. A PCA consultant once encountered a situation where the plant manager had two conflicting KPIs …
The Perfect Storeroom
The question is often asked, “What makes the perfect storeroom?” Is it brick and mortar? Is it the correct financial ratio of storeroom inventory to facility asset value? Is it a certain measurement of inventory turns? Is it a certain ratio of personnel to inventory value?
While it can be argued that any one of, a combination of several, or all of the above are important, the perfect storeroom consists of a combination of strategies working together to assure the operations have …
MRO Materials Team
A cross-functional, multi-disciplined team that focuses on MRO issues is a must.
MRO inventory management is too often thought of as just a storeroom function. In reality, it is a horizontally, cross-functional activity involving, maintenance, operations, capital projects, procurement, and stores.
At PCA we promote what is referred to as an MRO Focus Team. This team consists of personnel from accounting, maintenance, maintenance planning, manufacturing, capital projects, purchasing, reliability, and the storeroom who represent their function’s concerns with parts availability …
MRO Cycle Counting – An Inventory Trap
Some Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) can be misleading, if you only see part of the picture of inventory health.
Inventory reporting as a financial matrix is required by shareholders and, in most cases, by the laws of business operation. But only reporting inventory value (which is an accounting average of overage and underage) can have disastrous consequences. Reporting a benchmark financial value of 98% accuracy is of little concern to operations and maintenance if a critical part is not available when needed …
Supply Demand Planning
Effective MRO (Maintenance and Repair Parts and Operating Supplies) materials management is simply a derivative of the time-honored function of Supply Demand Planning.
Day one in Econ 101, the professor presents a graph explaining the supply demand continuum. That same simple concept applies to MRO parts management. There is certainly the supply aspect; does the storeroom have what is needed when it is needed? But the key to having what is needed, when it is needed, is dependent upon robust demand-side signals …