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Profit, Profit, and More Profit

Profit, Profit, and More Profit

One of the common misunderstandings about business profit among non-finance professionals is that it there is more than one way to define it.

At its core, profit is calculated as Revenue minus Costs. If you bought a bicycle at a yard sale for $50, then sold it a week later on Craigslist for $80, your profit is $30. In a simple transaction, profit is easily understood. But within an organization, different types of profits have to be defined to better understand the flow of money through it. [Read more…]

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Cloud Based CMMS vs On-Premise

Cloud Based CMMS vs On-Premise

Is your organization best suited for a cloud based CMMS or on-premise maintenance software? As the price of bandwidth and storage continues to decrease, cloud-based maintenance software is becoming an increasingly popular choice. Many cloud-based CMMS/EAM software vendors are pushing this technology as a convenient and cost-effective alternative to traditional, on-premise software, but cloud-based solutions aren’t necessarily right for everyone. There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all solution, so you would be better off exploring the pros and cons of cloud-based vs on-premise CMMS options before committing to any particular technology. [Read more…]

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Creating a Dot Plot

Creating a Dot Plot

Graphs contain information and often tell a story. Our interpretation of the graphic can be aided or hindered by the design or style of the plot. Cleveland and McGill (1984) studied graphical perception and found the use of dot plots to aid viewers to understand the data’s message clearly.

The nature of a dot plot is like a bar chart, yet without the bars. Less ink, just a dot to indicate count or position along an axis permits conveying information simply. Due to its simplicity, it also permits adding additional information useful for comparisons or spotting trends, and more. [Read more…]

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Dealing with Reliability Related Uncertainty

Dealing with Reliability Related Uncertainty

Uncertainty is another word for risk. Reliability uncertainty or risk is neither good nor bad, it just a bit unknown. Until we know the outcome, the eventual reliability performance, we will not know the impact.

So, how do we deal with reliability uncertainty? Will our product or system work as expected over time, or will it fail? Let’s examine a few of the common approaches in use and when and why the approach is effective. [Read more…]

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Root Cause Analysis: The Justification Game

Root Cause Analysis: The Justification Game

In last month’s introductory article, we discussed some of the barriers to selling not only the concept of Root Cause Analysis (RCA) but also the recommendations generated as a result of these analyses. We also laid the framework for making better predictions by generating and accessing better data—namely predicting our Mean Time between Failure (MTBF) and Mean Time to Restore (MTTR) earlier and, therefore, implementing a fix faster.

Given this background, let’s explore how we can now justify conducting a RCA and implementing the recommendations as a result of the analysis. By and far, conducting a true RCA is viewed as luxury not a necessity. Think about the objections we hear when we offer the idea of gathering RCA teams. What follows is a list of common objections to RCA accompanied by rational justifications that any manager can employ. [Read more…]

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The Importance of Post-delivery Feedback

The Importance of Post-delivery Feedback

In the article Reliability in Equipment Design it was stated that a project team can set reliability target(s) for new equipment using historical reliability data. One option OEMs have for capturing historical reliability data is a Failure Reporting And Corrective Action System, or FRACAS. The data captured can provide a comprehensive view of how the equipment is performing. This data can be used to improve legacy equipment and drive decision-making on new equipment. [Read more…]

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Do Degrees Hurt or Help?

Do Degrees Hurt or Help?

Remember how we were told as kids in school that we had to study hard to get into college or university? There was that ongoing, implied threat that not getting into university or college would ruin our career. Or at least, be very bad.

It turns out it may not be that bad after all. For example, over half of Apple’s employees don’t have 4-year degrees. Why? [Read more…]

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Failure Reporting, Analysis and Corrective Action System (FRACAS)

Using a System to Record, Report And Eliminate Defects

Why is that some organization seem to break the reactive cycle and others don’t?  After all most organizations have a PM program and some form of a planning and scheduling program right?   The key difference between those that do is their ability to use their failure data and systematically eliminate defects and issues from the processes and equipment.  This doesn’t mean adding a new PM everytime some fails, which just won’t work.

To eliminate the defects and issues, the organization needs to collect meaningful data to analyze and act on.  This is where FRACAS comes in. [Read more…]

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Where’s Our Next Shock Coming From?

Where’s Our Next Shock Coming From?

Guest Post by Geary Sikich (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

The Coronavirus pandemic (COVID19) continues to spread throughout the world despite the best efforts of governments and the medical community.  With no vaccine becoming available in the near term and perhaps even in the long term we are faced with growing uncertainty.  It seems that ever since the emergence of COVID19 that conflicting advice, information and guidance has exacerbated the situation and created a lack of trust on the part of the public on what measures to take.  Wear a mask. 

Don’t wear a mask.  Social distance.  Don’t social distance.  The only advice that seems trustworthy is “Wash your hands”; and, that is something that we should do regardless of the pandemic – it’s good common sense. [Read more…]

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HALT shouldn’t be “H.A.L.T.”

HALT shouldn’t be “H.A.L.T.”

The fist part of this post you likely already know.  It’s the second part that may be helpful.

I love HALT testing and almost always include it in a new program.  With a team new to the concept there is always the hurdle of getting them to understand it’s value.  It’s not intuitive to see value in destroying a product with stepped stresses.  Often these stresses aren’t even apart of the product’s use case. Why vibrate a lab electronic device that spends its entire life on a bench? Seeing the failure mode is a capacitor flying off the PCB at 50 G’s doesn’t reinforce the value of the activity without some explanation.

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Building and Using Pareto Charts

Building and Using Pareto Charts

You may have heard of the 80/20 rule. The idea is that 80% of the wealth is held by 20% of the population. As an Italian economist, Vilfredo Pareto made this observation that became generalized as the

Pareto Principle: 80% of outcomes are due to 20% of causes

For field returns, for example, we may surmise that 80% of the failures are due to 20% of the components, for example. This principle helps us to focus our work to reduce field failures by address the vital few causes that lead to the most, or most expensive, failures. [Read more…]