competency based learning

During the current time globalization and the forces of competition are causing many of the worlds industries to change frequently in order to either remain in the game, or to try to gain advantage in some manner. Organizational structures are becoming transient things used as a tool to facilitate change. For example people often are required to do project work for short periods in order to maintain the continuous improvement focus that an organization may wish to achieve.

As a result here are many and regular changes occurring within the fields of maintenance as well. A CMMS system may be implemented, maintenance strategy review undertaken, business processes reviewed or even the regular addition of root cause analysis projects. TPM and lean maintenance programs have also now entered the landscape as part of the changes open to maintenance departments.

All of these forces can cause the organizational culture to shift somewhat. The organisation of the early twenty first century finds itself in the situation where it is always breaking paradigms and accepting new ones only to break them again as their advancement continues.
However much if the continual change within some organizations is due to the lack of success of previous programs. The Program of the Month phenomena. I feel that there is somewhat of a misunderstanding of this issue. Mindsets such as these are often attributed to the fact that management are not fully behind the concept, or a coping mechanism for a workforce that has reached a saturation point in terms of the continual changes that they need to endure.

By Cynthia Rishko, National Technology Transfer, Inc.

Training Pays

Employee training programs cost money that employers might be reluctant to spend-especially in tough economic times. Often times giving serious consideration to an employee training program is delayed until an incident occurs that highlights the need for a change in the status quo. The truth is that money spent on training employees well can benefit a company in many ways for years. The benefits come in the form of increased efficiency and productivity; less downtime or complete breakdown of systems; less reliance on high priced outside consultants to resolve issues, as well a decrease in insurance liabilities due to accidents on the job, along with their potential for OSHA penalties.

By Chuck Kooistra Sr. Vice President, General Physics Corporation

The most pressing issue in North American manufacturing does not involve competition from overseas. The critical issue involves the short supply of qualified technical labor available to get the work done.

By: Wes Hines, Director, Reliability and Maintainability Engineering Program, College of Engineering,

University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996-2300

 Abstract

This paper presents the development of a Master of Science (MS) degree program in Reliability and Maintainability Engineering at the University of Tennessee. The maintenance program at UT began a decade ago with the formation of the Maintenance and Reliability center and the academic program grew through a National Science Foundation curriculum development grant.  The academic program was initially limited to a few classes leading to undergraduate and graduate certificates.  This paper describes the curricular development process including surveys designed to measure industrial demand and presents the final MS curriculum.  Lastly, the dual delivery system, that includes a web-based distance delivery system, is presented.