How To Choose CMMS Software? Key Considerations

Maintenance and asset management are considerable concerns for organizations across several industries. Whether your organization is in the Medical, Automotive, Aviation, Utilities, Energy, Educational, or Food and Beverage Industry, you will likely have expensive assets and equipment that require ongoing maintenance and oversight. 

How can you choose CMMS software that will allow you to properly manage and maintain your assets and encourage an environment of continuous improvement? This article will explore this topic in depth. We will also introduce you to LLumin’s CMMS+, an advanced Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) solution with the essential features and tools you need to achieve your goals. 

What Is a CMMS?

Tracking maintenance tasks and maintenance history, performing repairs and inspections on time, and managing inventory can be an immense challenge when attempting to do so with manual tracking methods alone.  

A CMMS is a software designed to help organizations better manage maintenance operations. Its foundational features enable clients to track, manage, and maintain critical assets and equipment. The software also acts as a centralized database for maintenance teams needing up-to-date information access. However, more advanced CMMS features offer capabilities that enable organizations to exceed basic standards and goals and their previous management capabilities. 

Understand Your Maintenance and Asset Management Goals

Many advanced CMMS solutions are available on the market with a wide range of features and tools that can initially seem very desirable. The key to getting the most out of any new solution will require keeping an up-to-date list of your inventory and assets, performing a risk-based assessment of your current assets and inventory, categorizing your maintenance and asset management needs based on risk, and understanding your short and long-term business goals.

How to Choose CMMS Software: Understand Your Goals
Updated Inventory	If you’re asking, “How to choose CMMS software?” The first step should be a solid understanding of the assets and equipment that require management. Keep your asset and equipment inventory up to date to get started.
Risk-Based Assessment	Perform a risk-based assessment of your current inventory. What assets and equipment are business-critical? What are the potential risks associated with unexpected mechanical failure?
Categorization	Categorize your equipment based on criticality. This will help you better understand what your maintenance efforts should focus on and help you choose the best CMMS to meet your needs.
Business Goals	What types of equipment do you need to maintain? What are your short and long-term asset and maintenance management goals? Consider your current challenges. Do you need to control your budget better? Do you need to ensure adherence to critical safety and compliance standards? Answering these questions will help you choose the right CMMS.

How to Choose CMMS Software

Equipped with an understanding of your CMMS drivers and organizational goals, choosing the right CMMS should start with focusing on several key areas. Start by evaluating core features and conclude by considering how to cultivate an environment of continuous improvement in your maintenance operations. 

Below, we have expanded on these areas in greater detail.

Features

When evaluating a new CMMS software, it will be essential to understand the solution’s main features and tools. Many CMMS solutions provide similar core features, such as work order and inventory management. However, more advanced solutions, like LLumin’s CMMS+, have condition-based monitoring (CBM), predictive analytics, and mobile access capabilities. 

The CMMS solution you are considering may not offer these advanced features. If you’re unfamiliar with their importance, you should consider them carefully. As technology quickly advances with AI and machine learning capabilities, choosing a CMMS that lacks the features needed to stay competitive could leave your organization at a loss over the long term. 

Customer Support

Customer support is essential when choosing and implementing a new CMMS solution. While many solutions advertise customer support options, not all provide ongoing, one-on-one support when critical issues or questions arise. Deciding what solution provider will be responsive and helpful when support is needed can be challenging. 

In addition to asking the CMMS provider to explain their customer support options upfront, it can be extremely valuable to read customer reviews of your chosen solution to gauge how other clients feel about their experience. 

Training

The success of a new CMMS solution depends on selecting the right solution for your organizational needs, a successful implementation process, and ongoing training. While many CMMS solutions are available on the market, not all providers have the resources or expertise to offer comprehensive training options. 

While your CMMS solution provider may provide some initial training to get your maintenance teams up and running, they may not provide ongoing and more comprehensive training to help you excel in several maintenance and asset management areas. A solution provider that provides expert-level training can be extremely valuable. 

Continuous Improvement

When considering how to choose CMMS software, it’s essential to consider how your new CMMS will help cultivate an environment of continuous improvement. Will your solution simply meet your most basic requirements? Or, is your new solution intuitive and easy to use, and does it equip your maintenance teams with accurate, up-to-date information on asset and facility conditions, inventory, KPIs, and the tools needed to plan for success?

It might be advisable to take a tour or schedule a demo with your solution provider and your maintenance team to properly determine if the solution will enable your organization to manage assets and equipment and consistently meet new performance goals well into the future.  

CMMS Software: Essential Features

As previously mentioned, many CMMS solutions on the market provide basic features such as work order and inventory management. However, they may not offer essential features needed to stay competitive in an increasingly technologically advanced market. We’ve highlighted and explored the most essential features you will need to stay competitive in Industry 4.0 below. 

KPI Dashboards

When considering how to choose CMMS software, verify if your solution provides fully customizable dashboards that display critical maintenance KPIs and metrics such as Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE), Mean Time to Repair (MTTR), and more. 

Maintenance KPIs and metrics are important indicators that can help your teams measure their performance levels and meet critical organizational goals. 

Condition-Based Monitoring and Predictive Analytics

Condition-based monitoring uses Internet of Things (IoT) technology and machine-level sensors to monitor equipment performance around the clock. If the CMMS solution you’re considering does not enable your maintenance teams to access real-time, up-to-date information about equipment conditions and assets, it would be wise to consider other options. 

CBM is also the next step to enabling a more advanced maintenance management strategy that includes predictive analytics. Verify if your CMMS solution provides predictive analytics. This AI-powered capability relies on historical and real-time data to identify failure patterns and accurately determine when you need to repair or replace working equipment. 

Mobile Access

Your CMMS solution should enable your maintenance teams to access the system using their handheld devices. This is especially important for mobile workforces that need access to material and safety data and historical equipment data.

Leveraging real-time and historical data can help your maintenance teams prevent costly, unexpected downtime and repairs. It can also dramatically reduce risk and ensure your workforce complies with industry standards.

Choose Between On-Premise, Web-Based, or Cloud

There are various types of CMMS software that can be deployed in a few different ways. When choosing CMMS software, we’ve listed the main types you should consider below. The following types of CMMS have different strengths and are equipped to meet various organizational needs.

Types of CMMS Software
On-Premise	On-premise CMMS software requires an organization to own and maintain the hardware and IT infrastructure needed to host the solution. It also usually requires the organization to purchase the license to use the software solution. However, there is an added benefit to this: After the initial licensing purchase, the solution is entirely in your control. You will likely have the option to customize and better control how your organization uses the software and manages its data.
Web-Based	While a web-based CMMS solution shares some similarities with cloud-based solutions, they differ. Not all cloud-based CMMS solutions are web-based. Web-based solutions are accessible via web browsers and can also be hosted on-premise, which can provide an organization with greater deployment flexibility and options.
Cloud	Cloud-based CMMS solutions are a good option for organizations that do not want to invest heavily in IT infrastructure and equipment. These solutions are hosted on the vendor’s servers and accessible via the Internet, which may reduce the need to maintain an in-house IT support team. However, this solution usually comes with additional, ongoing subscription fees.

LLumin’s Advanced CMMS+ Solution

LLumin’s CMMS+ is a mobile-ready, HTML5-compliant, and browser-independent solution. It is fully customizable and can equip your maintenance teams with several advanced features and tools to manage the most challenging asset and maintenance management concerns, regardless of your industry.

When you choose to work with LLumin, you will gain access to the foundational features you need to improve your daily maintenance operations and the advanced features you need to stay competitive in the market.

LLumin’s top features include the following:

• Asset management: Improve how company stakeholders, managers, and maintenance teams monitor and control company assets, tasks, cross-department communication, and information flow between systems.
• Work order management: LLumin’s automated features will provide peace of mind that necessary maintenance and inspections are automatically scheduled. This will make any maintenance strategy easier to implement and maintain accountability for. 
• Preventive maintenance: Our software enables the implementation of a preventive maintenance strategy that seeks to stop developing mechanical issues before they lead to costly downtime and emergency repairs. LLumin’s CMMS+ also enables users to implement more advanced maintenance strategies, such as predictive maintenance. 
• Inventory management: Having the necessary parts and materials to perform maintenance can help avoid costly delays. LLumin allows for the full streamlining and optimization of inventory management, from enabling automated purchasing based on historical and real-time data to managing vendor relationships. 
• Mobile CMMS:  Mobile capabilities will enable your maintenance teams to monitor equipment, access important historical and safety data, and control ongoing maintenance tasks with the convenience of a handheld mobile device.
• OEE utility: This feature can help the most challenging maintenance environments become more efficient and actively address the issues that are limiting progress in critical areas.
• KPIs and reports: Equip your teams with access to important performance metrics and KPIs so they can keep themselves informed about progress. Generate advanced reports that make it easy for decision-makers to make data-driven decisions. 
• Condition monitoring: Real-time equipment monitoring can take your maintenance operations to a higher performance, efficiency, and reliability level. This feature provides a more comprehensive understanding of equipment performance. It also enables users to set customizable triggers to initiate specific actions, from alerting teams to developing issues to automatically generating and assigning tasks to the right technicians. 
• Integrations with existing software: Integrate your new CMMS solution with your current IT solutions and equipment, from ERP software to IoT sensors, telematics systems, and more. 

LLumin—Choose The Best CMMS Software 

When searching through available solutions and having doubts about how to choose CMMS software, it’s essential to take a methodical approach. While the number of available solutions can initially seem overwhelming, identifying your CMMS drivers and organizational goals and choosing the right solution to meet your needs is the right approach.

LLumin’s CMMS+ is a preferred solution across industries because it offers a full suite of advanced features combined with a honed implementation process, ongoing support, and expert CMMS training to meet short- and long-term goals. As your organization grows and changes over time, LLumin can provide you with the features, tools, and support you need to get the best return on your investment.