leadership for reliability

“If maintenance costs get high enough, we’ll just replace it.” This phrase represents the prevailing attitude about asset management that is taught in graduate business schools and heard in conference rooms in most, if not all, manufacturing and production facilities around the globe. From the perspective of reliability concepts, the phrase is a manifestation of a belief system that represents an inaccurate understanding of where high maintenance costs come from and what the proper method for reducing them would be. From a financial perspective, the phrase is correct at face value, but the actual threshold limit for the replacement decision point is substantially higher than what is commonly used in industry. This article contains an explanation of the logical pitfalls of the commonly held beliefs, as well as an explanation of the calculation of the threshold limits for the replacement decision.

It is a resounding fact that the need for advancement in the plant maintenance field gave birth to the function of reliability. But isn't it about time we disconnect this child from its umbilical cord and allow the reliability function to stand on its own feet, independent from maintenance? Shouldn't we now let this child unleash the true potential it has to offer to the industry by being an autonomous external entity, focusing on asset reliability at every level of asset lifecycle management (ALM)?