Make reliability the focus of the maintenance and operations departments

An example of a checklist to be used for operator-driven reliability rounds is shown in Figure 3. An example of a pump startup sheet is shown in Figure 4.

Figure 3. The magnitude of failures increases proportionally to the operators’ non-involvement and lack of ownership. Therefore, operator involvement is crucial for improved reliability.

Figure 4. The reliability department needs to develop operator equipment checks and operating maintenance routines; train operators on startup, operation, and shutdown procedures; and instruct them on the basics of rotating equipment.

Justifying operations maintenance routines

How do you convince operations managers and senior company management that you need to establish operator rounds in your organization? If your organization believes in preventive maintenance, then you are halfway there. The cost of corrective maintenance can be several times more expensive, when compared to preventive or predictive maintenance. The cost difference can be as high as 10 times. ODR helps shift and lower the cost of maintenance through the application of preventive and predictive actions performed by the operators. ODR is not a substitute for preventive programs, but ODR will both supplement and complement other actions.

Two other important aspects of successful ODR are automation of the rounds and leadership involvement. Automation permits trending of the data collected and the establishment of alarms at certain key points for the operators to make immediate corrections to the equipment. Such automation can also trigger action by other parts of organization on the issues outside of operations' scope to remediate. Using a deficiency management process, the automated system notifies the operators when equipment is outside normal ranges and enables them to track key performance indicators (KPIs). Timely acknowledgment of alarms and corrective action will result in data that provides feedback to the operators that their work is positively affecting equipment operations. The same equipment can be used to supplement the predictive programs of the reliability department.

Despite all the benefits of automation, some companies persist in using paper checklists on a clipboard. These paper rounds make it difficult to spot trends and set action points and, if not reviewed or acted upon by the organization, can lead to pencil-whipping. Today's handheld devices make it easy to track all the data collected by operators in the field or in the plant, and with wireless technology, these readings and checklists can be linked back to system servers in real time, with relevant notifications sent to the computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) for any issues found while making rounds.

Leadership and cooperation by operations and reliability department managers is critical for successful ODR. Operations must lead this effort with its full support, including a review of metrics and KPIs to ensure the efforts of the personnel are value-added. Additionally, operations and reliability leaders must audit the rounds for completeness and conduct actual rounds in the field to maintain their validity and ensure that the automation process is working well for the operators. The checks and preventive maintenance steps in ODR need to be updated regularly to ensure their validity as plant equipment changes over time.

The reliability department plays a key role in developing and conducting the training and providing refresher training as needed. The organization must also be prepared in the early stages for the newly trained operators to make mistakes at first, assigning mentors and letting "newbies" shadow more experienced personnel. However, as ODR progresses and operators become more proficient with operations maintenance, the benefits will be substantial.

Reliability and operations should collaborate to review and revise standard operating procedures (SOPs) and emergency operating procedures (EOPs). Once completed, operations leadership must review these procedures with staff and conduct drills at least every quarter to ensure each operator can operate the equipment safely and correctly. The EOPs and SOPs should be written well enough that a new employee can pick them up and go through each step correctly without any issues. Tagging all items clearly helps with this process, and pictures from the field in the EOPs and SOPs further clarify the procedure. The tags must be listed and an annual audit for missing tags or as a follow-up to maintenance work will ensure the process does not deteriorate over time.

These are the basic ways to get operations to run equipment and keep it running with a reliability perspective. Although maintenance and engineering also play an important role in reliability, the impact operations can have on the reliability of your equipment is the greatest of the three departments.

Read Part III of this article, Gain control of your repairs and spares to avoid costly downtime.

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