IMC-2019 Learning Session 39:28 Minutes

by Marc Stewart and Dave Robertson, AWE Aldermaston

The Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) plays a crucial role in the national defense of the United Kingdom (UK) and has been at the forefront of the UK nuclear deterrence program for more than 60 years. AWE works under contract to the Ministry of Defense (MOD) through a government-owned-contractor-operated (GOCO) arrangement. AWE identified the need to enhance their asset management approach to ensure they retained their capacity to meet MOD needs today and into the future. This presentation describes an organization’s desire to improve an aspect of their asset management program via implementation of a new M&RE organizational structure, and how a staged approach was developed to meet this need. Key elements to be discussed during the presentation include:

• Understanding the requirement for an organizational structure inclusive of a reliability engineering function.
• The transition from an existing maintenance and engineering function to a new maintenance and reliability engineering organizational construct able to move from a reactive organization into a proactive using modern technology.
• The behavioral and cultural challenges associated with an asset management paradigm shift, what progress has been made to date; and what the expected long-term results and benefits of implementing this organizational change.

The information in this presentation is relevant to anyone who wants to begin, or who is already underway with, a structured organizational change activity. Like many business changes, at first the prospect of undertaking a large improvement effort requiring a significant culture change can seem overwhelming. By giving a real world, current, and ongoing example of how incremental steps were planned and executed – we can hopefully help demonstrate how to reduce a very large and complex effort down to manageable steps.