Getting a Handle on CMMS
By: Rachel Bennett
More than 300 Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) solutions are available to K-12 schools today. With all of these choices, no school has the time or manpower to review all of them.
To make an informed decision, a manageable set of criteria can help you match the requirements of your school and deliver the greatest Return on Investment (ROI). This critical information helps you make the best decision when you select a CMMS.
Although technology continues to evolve, the results have remained constant since the inception of CMMS in the 1980s. Schools consistently require the following results from a CMMS:
1) Improve Asset Performance
2) Improve the Availability of Assets
3) Foster a Culture of Productivity and Improve Reliability
4) Increase Labor Productivity
The first two results deal with assets. Most schools consider assets as mechanical equipment (boilers, chillers, elevators, etc.), non-mechanical assets (printers, projectors, office furniture, etc.), buildings, classrooms, infrastructure (roads, parking lots, parks, etc.), materials (supplies, warehouses, etc.), tools (drills, lathes, saws, etc.), vehicles, and personnel (in-house staff, contractors, electricians, carpenters, etc.).
Without a maintenance system in place, you risk a reduction in productive time because assets couldn’t be scheduled, or you risk loss of production because of repairs.
The third result deals with fostering a culture of productivity and improved reliability. Similar to the top two results, this has an asset focus implied in the term reliability. However, the result is worded in the form of a cultural shift. Schools are struggling to move away from the shackles of the “firefighting mentality” to a relative calm, planned environment of a CMMS.
This planned environment offers a potential to save money. Working directly with the assets alone would make it easy; however, much of the difficulty surrounding this issue lies in changing the attitude and behavior of maintenance, engineering and operations personnel at all levels.
The fourth result, labor productivity, is a favorite of administration. During a budget crisis, they are always looking for ways to cut full-time employees from the payroll. During good times, good administrators want to know if personnel are being used effectively. It seems people will always be in the spotlight, even when labor costs are a small percentage of the total cost of maintaining a school. The three key measures of labor productivity are:
1) Utilization (percentage of productive time as opposed to percentage of non-value-added time, such as waiting for an assignment)
2) Performance (percentage of standard times required to perform an activity compared to the time required by your workforce)
3) Effectiveness (submeasures such as percentage contracted, overtime, training, innovation, etc.)
No Guarantee
While a CMMS has become an essential tool for the maintenance professional, it only produces what has been put in the system. The old adage “garbage in, garbage out” still applies. Ensuring that the school has accurate data for making decisions starts with the employees – and their ownership of the CMMS.
Having an automated system is only part of verifying that your school’s data is accurate. The more important part resides with your maintenance staff. Some schools have the resources of an extensive work control operation to perform data entry and review functions. Other schools may need to rely on a limited clerical staff or the technicians themselves. Whatever the situation, these employees play a major role in how the maintenance operations are portrayed.
It is absolutely vital that technicians write good comments, not only for reports to the administration, but also to serve as a viable maintenance tool for learning, diagnosis and prevention. While good comments are vital, it’s equally important that employees interpret, classify and code them in a manner that truly represents the work performed.
Finally, the need for a manager to include reviews of closed work orders cannot be underscored enough. It is the only way to verify employee performance with any certainty and to ensure that statistics being generated from the CMMS are portraying the school with a high degree of accuracy.
In the End
There is no easy street or universal remedy when a school decides to purchase a CMMS. Best practices will determine the maintenance department’s success more than the actual software. However, best practices should be the result not the driver of success.
What drives success from any CMMS?
* Start at the top of the administration
* Motivate stakeholders to change the culture and their behaviors by showing them what’s in it for them
* Make people accountable for quantifiable results
* Use a participatory management style that combines external expertise with good, old-fashioned, internal innovation to develop the set of best practices that work for each unique school
For best results, implement a continuing program of change rather than waiting for the next big crisis to bring things to a halt.
Rachel Bennett is the marketing coordinator for TMA Systems, www.tmasystems.com.
Case Study
Christian Academy Improves Services and the Learning Environment with Web-Native Operations Management Technology
By Erin Tucker
A growing trend across America is Christian schools to become better facility stewards and to operate in a more technologically advanced manner that promotes efficiency and effectiveness.
George Skeeters, director of facilities at Christian Academy in Louisville, Kentucky, is no exception.
Recognizing the impact quality facilities have on student learning, as well as how technology can provide budget savings for the maintenance and operations department, he embarked on a personal and professional mission to become a good facility steward with the help of his trusty computer.
Skeeters and his 3,000-student Christian school are not the first to recognize the value of technology. Christian school administrators have known for years that operations management technology can streamline business processes, increase efficiency and improve accountability. But despite these benefits, traditional “installed” or “desktop” systems often miss the mark with private schools because the technology has overly complicated features and high price tags that do not benefit smaller schools.
Web-native technology, however, fills the need for effective business and facility operations tools that provide Christian schools with affordable solutions that are powerful yet easy to use. Unlike traditional desktop systems, which come with seemingly endless costs (for software upgrades, licenses, servers, IT support, data backup), Web-native applications eliminate these hassles and reduce the total cost of system ownership 60 to 90 percent.
Seeing the value of Web-native technology, Skeeters and other Christian Academy administrators standardized their facility and business operations with several Web-native solutions, which helped improve communication and efficiency while providing increased accountability and immediate cost savings.
Christian Academy automated the school’s work-order process with a Web-native work-order management system, enabling school personnel to submit work requests over the Internet and automating the process of routing requests for approval and completion. Requesters receive status updates on their work requests at all stages, from assignment to completion. This information is also available online through a requester’s personal request page, allowing school personnel to easily review all submitted work orders and the request status.
“Our department has become more efficient as the use of a paper work-order system has been eliminated,” Skeeters said. “The technicians can now look at work well in advance, check equipment history and schedule the next week’s work by priority, assuring that the parts and materials needed are in stock and ready to go.”
Skeeters added, “This tool also eliminates missed work orders and allows us to track our efficiency through comparative analysis. Using this information, we are able to identify repetitive problems and issues as we become more proactive, reducing overall maintenance costs and elevating service.”
Skeeters also determined that utilizing a Web-native solution that both tracks and schedules needed preventive maintenance (PM) work is the key to a successful PM program.
Christian Academy’s Web-native preventive maintenance system tracks PM schedules and automatically generates PM work orders as work is due. The maintenance staff then receives those work orders through the school’s Web-native work-order-management system. According to Skeeters, the integration between the PM and work-order systems helps the maintenance department with load leveling, cost reporting, work-order attachments and equipment history.
In addition, identifying maintenance problems earlier by performing preventive maintenance has reduced maintenance costs and can help the school prevent emergencies and catastrophic events.
“The ability to ensure that preventive and predictive maintenance tasks are completed on time saves the school system time and money by prolonging the life expectancy of the equipment, reducing unexpected breakdowns and keeping a cleaner, more energy-efficient plant – thus creating a better learning environment for our students,” Skeeters said.
Reducing “reactive” maintenance work has also enabled Christian Academy’s maintenance team to increase their focus on providing quality service and improving facilities, benefits that are easily noticed by personnel and students throughout the entire school. Most preventive maintenance work is now performed with no distraction or disruption to the educational process because scheduling maintenance has reduced classroom interruptions for repairs – improving the learning environment for students.
Skeeters concluded, “Web-native technology is a valuable tool in centralizing our maintenance operations. The ease of operation and integrated modules allow us to organize, schedule and assign our workflow for maximum efficiency."
Erin Tucker is the marketing communications coordinator for SchoolDude.com.
