Maximizing Uptime : The Art of Maintenance Planning & Scheduling

Planning:

Maintenance planning should define the "what," "why" and "how." This means specifying what work needs to be done with what materials, tools and equipment; why a particular action was chosen (why a valve is being replaced instead of a seat) and how the work should be completed

Scheduling :

Maintenance scheduling refers to the details of "when" and "who." when the work should be done and who should perform it.."

Rationale Behind Maintenance Planning & Scheduling:

• That DuPont study and the many studies since then have repeatedly shown that maintenance productivity is often poor, and typically as low as 20% – 30%. We know from those same studies that with an effective maintenance planning & scheduling process you can grow your productivity to 45%. And as you continue to improve you can increase your productivity to world-class levels of 55% or 60%.
• Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) announced that the application of periodic PM activity to its power transmission networks contributes to achieving 100% in the reliability and availability of the power transmission system in Dubai and reducing the average maintenance costs by approximately AED 2 million annually. This also has helped DEWA to be the ‘Best in Class’ among global utilities since 2018.

Benefits of maintenance planning & scheduling:

1. Increase in reliability
2. High wrench time, will enhance the productivity
3. Reduce the spending for maintenance – cost savings
4. Increase in uptime  & Productivity
5. Increase the integrity of critical equipment;
6. Improved safety by performing work in a prepared way
7. Optimized inventory & resource management
8. Reduce delays & lost time during completion of job
9. Increase in coordination of personnel resulting reduce the downtime
10. More job satisfaction & greater sense of ownership among your team.

Principles of Maintenance Planning 

1. Protect the planner
2. Focus on future work
3. Component – level files
4. Use planner judgement for time estimates
5. Recognize skills of the tech
6. Measure the performance with work sampling

Principles of Maintenance Scheduling

1. Job plans are needed for scheduling
2. Scheduling & Job priorities are important
3. Schedule based on the highest skill available
4. Schedule for every work available work hour
5. Daily work is handled by the crew leader
6. Measure the compliance by schedule performance

Implementation of  Maintenance Planning and Scheduling:

1. Identify & Prioritize the work 

Prefer using risk matrix to access risk involved in the job to prioritize

2. Planning

Planner duty to prepare most effective, efficient and safest way to do the job

3. Schedule

Scheduler job’s to group work in an optimized, coordinated sequence & performed at the right time by the

right people

4. Execute

Execute in the way to increase the work efficiency and maximize the productivity of maintenance crew

5. Close out

This step covers the reporting of technical history, work history and areas of improvement

Performance Insight Walks:

The aim is for leaders to see planning & scheduling process in action for themselves. These “Go See” walks highly effective to

“ find out what works well and why ”

“ find out what frustrate “

“ discover opportunities for improvement ”.