Chapter 3 - Maintenance Organization

Maintenance Management

CHAPTER 3

MAINTENANCE ORGANIZATION

Organization - Basic Concepts 1. Establish reasonably clear division of authority with minimal overlap. 2. Keep vertical lines of authority and responsibility as short as possible. 3. Maintain an optimum number of people reporting to one individual

Maintenance Organization Objective

Maintenance Workload

Maintenance Resources (manpower, spares, tools and information)

Sustaining, at minimum total cost, plant which is capable of producing the desired level and quality of output.

The Main Elements of Maintenance Organizations

The Main Elements of Maintenance Organizations • Structure: – The resource structure: the location, mix, size, function and logistics of the maintenance resources – primarily the manpower. – The administrative structure (the so-called organizational chart): the allocation of managerial responsibilities and interrelationships.

• Systems: – The short- and long-term work planning system.

Modeling the Organization • One way of visualizing a maintenance organization is as a three-dimensional structure, as a pyramid of personnel. • The maintenance staff and the plant operators are at the base of the pyramid – the resource structure – and the management make up its remainder (the administrative structure). • All the positions in the structure have work roles, i.e. duties, responsibilities, interrelationships, etc.

Two-Dimensional Model of the Resource Structure

Modeling the Organization

The work planning system can be represented as an information and decision making system running across the structure.

Factors Influencing the Design of Maintenance Organization

• The maintenance schedule is influenced by many factors to include the plant-operating pattern (which is a function of the product demand), statutory safety requirements, etc.

• The maintenance schedule defines the maintenance workload which in turn has the largest single influence on organizational design.

Power Station Workload • A base-load power station using three 500 MW turbo generators. • Traditionally each generator has a life plan based on 3-yearly major overhauls, each lasting for about 8 weeks. • This generates a workload of the type shown in the figure. The station management would be forced to consider contract labor to handle the work peaks. • In addition they may have to consider shift working to handle the high-priority work occurring on a 24-hour basis.

Power Station Workload

Food Processing Plant (FPP) Workload • The FPP operated 15 shifts per week, 50 weeks per year to satisfy product demand. • The maintenance schedule was built around the weekend windows and the annual shutdown, generating a workload of the type shown in the figure. • The FPP management had to use mid-week shift maintenance teams (to cover the high priority work) and a weekend-planned maintenance group. • Contract labor was needed during the annual shutdowns.

Food Processing Plant (FPP) Workload

Sugar Refinery Workload • A sugar refinery operates continuously for 6 months to match the sugarcane harvesting period and is then offline for the next 6 months. • The major preventive and corrective maintenance is scheduled for the offline period in order to provide high availability during the online period. • The sugar refinery management has to provide shift maintenance cover during the online period and a planned maintenance group during the offline period – in this case contract labor is not required.

Sugar Refinery Workload

Factors Influencing the Design of Maintenance Organization

Specialized Personnel in the Maintenance Organization Technically Trained Engineers: 1. Maximum utilization of the engineer’s technical background. 2. Maintaining a professional approach to maintenance problems. 3. Greater probability that long-range thinking will be applied, i.e., less concern with breakdowns and more with how they can be prevented in the future. 4. Better means of dealing with craft-persons’ problems by interposing a level of up-from-the ranks supervision between them and the engineer.

Specialized Personnel in the Maintenance Organization Clerical Personnel: •

• •

Here there are the two primary considerations. Paperwork should be minimized consistent with good operations and adequate control; the clerical staff should be designed to relieve supervision of routine paperwork that it can handle. The number of clerks used varies from 1 per 100 employees to 1 per 20 to 25 employees. These clerks can report at any level of the organization or can be centralized as proves expedient.

Specialized Personnel in the Maintenance Organization Staff Specialists: •

The use and number of staff specialists—electrical engineers, instrument engineers, metallurgists— depends on availability, required need for specialization, and the economics of a consulting service’s cost compared to that of employing staff experts.

Training & Selection • Selection: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Education, General Intelligence, Mechanical Aptitude, Past Experience, Age.

When it is possible, personnel with previous craft experience offer the easiest and most satisfactory method of staffing the maintenance engineering department, particularly when the cost of a formal training program cannot be economically justified.

Training & Selection • Training: – Craft Personnel: 1. 2. 3.

Formal Instruction, Informal Instruction, On the-Job Training

– Supervisory Personnel: 1. 2. 3.

Orientation, Training, On the-Job Coaching