When using your EAM or CMMS software, or paper based system if that is what you use for work management, insure you measure your backlog or 'open work' by using the 'Duration' field on the work order screen. Estimated hours are better than entering '0' hours.

Counting open work orders provides very little value to management when we know a work order used to track an outage or major overhaul of a critical asset is NOT equivalent to a work order written to track changing an air filter element or a burned out light bulb.

Estimate your backlog based on person hour backlog and you will understand better if you are winning or falling behind in the amount of work which needs to be performed to support the success of your business.

Reader tip provided by Steve Toth, VP, Maintenance/Asset Reliability, Covanta Energy, Fairfield New Jersey

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