Efficient Plant Jan./Feb. 2023 - 8

column | implementations
Successful A
R&M Requires
Culture Change
Dr. Klaus M. Blache
Univ. of Tennessee Reliability and Maintainability Center (RMC)
T THE MOST-RECENT Reliability & Maintenance Center
members meeting, we collected answers to questions to get
a feel for the current " state of reliability and maintenance
(R&M) " as we usher in 2023. All companies that I've been in contact
with during the past year are struggling to recruit and retain skilled
workers, including engineers and plant-fl oor technicians/trades.
Because of the many rapidly changing infl uences, bottlenecks, challenges,
and opportunities, today's company organizational models
must change to thrive or survive. It remains that 70% of the challenge
is getting the culture right. Here are our poll results. EP
Of the companies responding, 54%
have adequate to very signifi cant
eff orts underway to upskill their workforce.
This includes upskilling operators
to assist in maintenance.
Insuffi cient workforce availability
was the largest common challenge,
driving much of the upskilling
initiatives.
Digital technology adoption is growing but still not that signifi cant.
Advanced HMIs have the most implementation when looking at a
weighted level of adoption.
CMMS satisfaction is not eff ective to
only satisfactory, according to 60% of
respondents.
Cobots are coming, but not too fast
according to the respondents.
Supply-chain issues continue to have a
large negative impact (80% signifi cant
and very signifi cant).
Finding workers continues to be
a signifi cant issue with 40% of
respondents fi lling less than 25%
of approved headcount.
Based in Knoxville, Dr. Klaus M. Blache is director of the Reliability & Maintainability Center at the Univ. of Tennessee
and a research professor in the College of Engineering. Contact him at kblache@utk.edu.
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Efficient Plant Jan./Feb. 2023

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