How To Improve Maintenance Strategy

An effective maintenance management strategy can mean the difference between remaining competitive or falling behind in today’s competitive marketplace. Minimizing downtime, minimizing costs, and increasing the safety, reliability, and lifespan of equipment and assets may appear unattainable if your organization is primarily reactive in its approach to maintenance.

This article will look at ways you can improve your maintenance strategy. We will discuss well-known, essential best practices you can use to get results and how LLumin’s Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS+) can provide the features and tools your maintenance team needs to succeed.

Types of Maintenance Strategies

Maintenance strategies range from preventive, which involves regular inspections and maintenance, to more advanced strategies, which use predictive data analytics to determine when equipment failures will occur and when corrective action should be taken.

Each strategy listed below has advantages and disadvantages depending on a company’s unique needs, costs, and equipment criticality. It’s important to note one or more of these strategies might be needed to create an effective maintenance strategy. 

How to Improve Maintenance Strategy

The following best practices can help your organization improve its maintenance strategy, reducing unexpected downtime and costs and improving equipment performance, lifespan, and reliability. Use them to take practical steps toward making necessary changes, paving the way for smoother and more efficient operations.

Equipment Management 

You can’t manage equipment and assets if you have lost track of their current counts and types. The first step in improving your maintenance management strategy should be thoroughly assessing all equipment and assets. 

After completing this process, you must determine which pieces are critical to your daily operations. This will allow you to prioritize your maintenance approach, ensuring that your efforts are deployed in a way that supports smooth operations. 

Preventive Maintenance 

Reactive maintenance is known for high costs, lack of visibility, and inefficiency. A preventive approach is critical for identifying emerging issues before they cause unexpected downtime and costly emergency repairs. 

You can dramatically improve your maintenance strategy by scheduling preventive inspections and maintenance and ensuring that these maintenance tasks are completed on time.

Maintenance Planning and Optimization 

Maintenance planning is critical for improving maintenance strategies because it ensures that all activities are properly scheduled, tracked, and executed. This process should start by identifying and documenting all necessary maintenance tasks, followed by creating detailed work order checklists to ensure that nothing is overlooked.

To ensure thoroughness and accuracy during deployment, your work orders should include all the details your employees need to prevent oversight and improve results. You must also have a reliable way to distribute the required information to your maintenance team. This is best supported by a work order management system, like LLumin’s CMMS+. 

Further, regularly review and update your plans. This will ensure that your maintenance operations remain effective over time and can adapt to changing operational needs. 

Resource Management 

Managing human resources, equipment, parts, and materials is essential for ensuring safe, efficient, and uninterrupted operations. Regular training for your maintenance team will ensure they have the skills and knowledge to support your maintenance strategy, use cutting-edge technology, and complete their daily tasks more safely and efficiently.

Resources should also be managed so that your maintenance teams can access all the tools and materials needed to complete their daily tasks.

Technological Integration 

Your maintenance strategy should be supported by cutting-edge technology. Integrating CMMS software, such as LLumin’s cloud-based, mobile-ready CMMS+, can help introduce the advantages of digitization, automation, advanced analytics, condition-based monitoring, and much more. 

Choosing the right technology to support your ongoing maintenance operations can reduce the likelihood of human error, improve communication between departments and across the organization, and significantly improve equipment performance and reliability.