The market pressure can be stated as “shareholders want dividends and they want them now”, but those same shareholders also require a viable and reliable future revenue stream. Of course, that describes the investor as opposed to the speculator, but if we must manage corporations to please that type of shareholder, we will run companies into the ground.

Securing plant and production reliability addresses the concern of stability: a steady, recurrent revenue stream, as opposed to one plagued by unpredictable hiccups. Obviously, other concerns also drive profitability, such as the price of the oil-barrel for petrochemical plants and refineries, but it becomes us to reduce chaos and to manage whatever factors or aspects of business that can be controlled.

When faced with cost considerations for implementation, ask yourself whether or not the current practices can largely guarantee an uncompromised delivery of product in the future, knowing that profitability and dividends tie in directly with that same production. Reliability’s foundation is forethought and confronting probable and possible events with a view to the desired outcome.

© 2010 by François Gagnon

Within the scope of this effort, it is believed many consultants will be put out of work as the “tribblesensor” delivers its extraordinary assessments quite exceeding any need for similar judgment from external contractors.

Only a few primitive analysts dispute the claims of accuracy by saying that a diagnosis of “Something is wrong with the machine” does not suffice in this day and age…

If you have any doubts as to the accuracy of the information, please note the date of posting!

I was once told that the percentage of success of personal therapies lies close to 18%, although I’ll admit I have never sought the truth of the matter (I do recall conversations with a former “significant other” specialized in this area of endeavor, and the gist of these conversations seemed to concur with the appallingly low success rate). Apparently, tribal witch doctors embarked on a similar mission to help an individual seem to achieve a success rate of… 18%… Certain prescription drug assisted therapies are far more successful for specific conditions, but as a whole, the above seems to hold water.

It would be easy to conclude that there may be a repetitive pattern in this accomplishment: therapy seeks to trigger or support change, and in this respect, the therapist’s work parallels the approach of the business or engineering consultant.

How many psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb? Only one, BUT… the light bulb REALLY, REALLY has to WANT to CHANGE!!! And with that relatively stale joke, we uncover one of the great secrets of reliability consultancy: your consultant(s) will not change anything, YOU will! Well, actually, you might! But ONLY if doggedly determined to achieve a continuous improvement loop and/or specific targeted goals.

It would be tempting to jump to the conclusion that the consulting firm therefore serves little or no purpose. Here, then, is another rule of consultancy: if you could, you would! The stern review of current activities, the guidelines to establish a road map for change, the assessment of best and quickest results to be obtained (also called low lying fruit), the benchmark for exemplary or best practices, the traps and pitfalls to avoid, the identification of the areas where MORE money should be spent (and conversely, areas where money can be saved because it is an ineffective or inefficient use of resources), all of those items pertain to the expertise of said consultant.

Many firms choose to sugar-coat everything. Here is another rule: if you HAVE to SUGAR COAT it, the organization likely has not attained the maturity that will allow it to break its previous bad habits!Some years back, one consulting firm’s VP put it succinctly when the author raised concerns in one project: “Doesn’t matter! We get out fat fee anyway, and may get to do it again at the same location in the future…” Perplexed? Dubious? I agree, because so was this wincing writer! We all need the money (the rent, the mortgage, the business expenses), but must we be so crass and uncaring about it? This being said, the blunt reality must be addressed, but doing so with good humor and a view to how best to promote change remains inherent to our mission.

A recent challenge to our consulting wisdom was issued abroad where management customarily relies on a consensus culture. The rule applies: if you could, you would! Therefore, if they had been able to promote needed changes, or had they been capable under the current hierarchy, organization, system and culture to deliver (product, improvement, KPI, other) on target, we would not have been involved.

And Consensus?
Too many cooks… Imagine if the purchase of a car were open to negotiation or discussion for each and every component of that car. The process would be laborious and tedious, and the end result would quite likely be a monstrosity.

Somewhere along the line, the “car” would surely become a “vehicle” and every possible function of that car within a family, business or industrial context would be considered by participants. The size and footprint of small cars is interesting and so is their energy efficiency, but that shovel on the payloader is “oh so very useful”… What do you mean by “the shovel is heavier than the car”. Never mind the hydraulics, we’ll just leave the shovel at ground level all the time. Or install hydraulic stabilizer legs on the car to stabilize it when we lift the shovel. This is the underlying cause to the “camel” joke: a horse designed by a committee. And perhaps this writer can raise a few smiles by latching on to one of the Hispanic definitions of camel: difficult, laborious, improbable to bring to term. Clearly not our target!

Consensus implies input from various parties, and discussion. Some people will lend tremendous ideas to the process and will definitely have an impact on the end result. Some participants around the table, or involved at arm’s length (teleconferencing, minutes of the meeting, email distribution) will lend a cursory opinion, and no more. And someone will have to choose a course of action and take a decision. Managing is not a democracy!

A brief parenthesis about democracies, since I mentioned cars earlier: one individual had several daughters and to cut short “consensus” issues on car color, each daughter in turn chose the color of the family car. That is how the poor man ended up in a lemon yellow car for a few years.

Back to our main topic:

Seeking consensus about change ignores some basic principles of human psychology. We tend to resist change. We tend to reject it if we can. There is strong criticism whenever change is proposed, and such may be brushed aside as an agent of resistance to change. Yet, change for the sake of change serves no purpose.

What do you seek to accomplish? As consultants, we have waltzed in so many places where metrics (KPI or otherwise) were weak, distorted or inexistent at the outset. Can we rely on bad data? Can we nail our targets down when the underpinning of information paints an inaccurate picture of what we want to change?

In fact, we can, but it also becomes part of the mission to get the numbers to truly reflect the reality of the situation. Often times, a client would like the current numbers to become the basis for payment. This is feasible, but rife with problems when the numbers have been manipulated.

To be continued…

© 2009 by François Gagnon

Feedback from other parties (different location or facility within the corporation, friends, colleagues, or other) may point out severe problems.

Very often, some person voicing a legitimate concern may not be capable of fully expressing the reasons behind their reticence (oddly enough). The objecting party “feels” the proposed solution to be wrong for their environment.

If consensus must be achieved, develop a checklist and discuss the proposed goals with the vendor / service provider, and never forget to get the agreement in writing, detailing the issues, what the solution will address, and how it will achieve this.

© 2009 by François Gagnon

There are legitimate concerns, there’s contrariness, there’s fear of change, there’s protectionism, there’s a confrontation with a history of failed or abandoned initiatives, and finally, refusal to execute the work involved in the implementation of change, which unfortunately amounts to plain laziness.

Arriving at a consensus within a group of people may well face every previously stated type of objection, making compliance and adoption of almost any novelty / improvement / project difficult or even impossible at the best of times, no matter the value of the proposed initiative or change.

Over the course of the next few days (we hope), the author will endeavor to write out a few thoughts on each of the above.

Contrariness
The contrarian takes two forms: he can be a naysayer to anything he does not himself initiate, and thus, becomes a negative influence and rarely a helping hand in any of the activities of the group, corporate or otherwise, or he can be a conscientious critic of unlikely, unpalatable, unreasonable, inefficient or ineffective practices, methods or proposed “advances”, seeking to ensure quality and thoughtful of achieving specific goals. Of course, whether or not the contrarian can deliver his message in palatable form remains a challenge, and the (often different or opposed) views tendered by said contrarian can clash with the majority or the view adopted by leadership. Both require considerable maturity to accept the opposing current and trigger intelligent discussions based on analyzing what that impopular person is saying to obtain the value or pointed correctives that his views may contain.

In the above, “unlikely, unpalatable, unreasonable, inefficient or ineffective practices, methods or proposed “advances”…” could merely signify that there may be room for better adjustments or they may be downright necessary: the person deemed a contrarian may merely seek a slightly better approach, or more bang for the (same) buck…

As examples… 
One anecdote I often use (and may even be found in another posting on this site) is the advent of the first Windows-based or Windows-compatible (the Microsoft registered brand used without permission, not the household-type) vibration condition-monitoring software. Given the current preponderance of that operational system or platform, the reader will understand a few years have gone by since the anecdotal incident.

That software’s main qualities were:
1) it was going to be first to market under the increasingly dominant Windows (see previous disclaimer),
2) it actually worked without crashing,
3) it simplified report printing and layouts, but only for what was now extremely basic (or entry-level) reporting.

The same software principal defects were:
1) It offered little except basic functions, made readily accessible not through any ingenious design, but merely through the Graphic-User Interface’s benefits,
2) the software did away with many of the useful application functions that were readily available under DOS (but of course, that was going to be rectified in the future, meaning probably never),
3) it cost a frightening amount of money

My attempts at making suggestions to achieve expansion from the foundation we previously had, as opposed to devolution in terms of application, were met with allusions to “resistance to change”, when in fact, the nature of my objections was “Nice eye-candy, where’s the meat?” or where was the substance to assist analysts in better doing their jobs.

Another valid example, when faced with various problems during a reliability audit done under another company’s auditing process (or lack thereof), was to ask whether the process had been the subject of an FMEA (Failure Modes & Effects Analysis). After all, if you sell the science, the execution and the mindset, you should be interested in applying all of the previous to your own product, whether physical or service oriented.

In the previous statement, my “or lack thereof” was unfair, and of the naysayer contrariness type: in all fairness, they did have a process, but the process should have been accompanied by clear directives and guidelines as to “do’s and dont’s”. The process should have benefitted from strong warnings against allowing corporate tag-alongs during execution. My suggestion that an FMEA would clearly have established problems with such a practice came from obvious hurdles such as the reluctance of audit interview participants to formulate their answers in the presence of a corporate representative.

Opposing views leads to (minor) confrontation, and people are increasingly uncomfortable with disagreement or argumentation. Yet, out of the clashes of ideas are born the better or even best solutions. HBR (Harvard Business Review) and other management article sources state that the increasing disappearance of differing opinion hurts business.

For the well-meaning contrarian, perhaps the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

© 2009 by François Gagnon

- Execution (of various tasks)

- Results (metrics, or KPI)

- Accomplishments / ambitious achievements to aim for over the next 12 months

Even the efficiency and effectiveness of PdM must be assessed and measured to set the bar a little higher until the calendar year takes us over into 2010.

Where is the trap? Failure to measure and failure to set goals for improvement leave you far away from the ever elusive continuous improvement nirvana…

© 2009 by François Gagnon

In a recent discussion regarding the age-old approach of first dealing with high maintenance cost assets, the sad realization that these could only be identified through subjective impressions of personnel left us perplexed: the problems of old are still alive and well.

Simply put, you can not manage what you do not measure, and measuring (metrics or performance indicators) can fall short of the target if the proper controls were never established from the start (or some time in the past).

© 2009 by François Gagnon

The French language instantly applies a caveat to that now sacred cow of a buzzword: it becomes Exemplary Practices. We immediately get a different sense of importance as that critical nuance gets introduced, since Best and Exemplary ring altogether different bells.

The problem with Best can be readily summed up: “Best” for the people who use it, in their business, industry, context, environment, management style, CMMS or EAM, may well be far from the bull’s eye for YOUR plant. Sadly, “Best” may be a lie! 

“Exemplary”, on the other hand, avoids the pushy arrogance of stating “this is the way you should also manage, work, implement, or execute”. Instead, it gently introduces itself as an example of methods that work for certain people in their very specific circumstances.

Thus, the reader may concur that “exemplary” may well be much better than “best”! An odd conundrum, to say the least!

© 2009 by François Gagnon

Changing any one “train of thought” is possible, but even that requires patience and dexterity in managing the change and shifting attitudes towards new goals. Attempting to change several known parameters towards newfangled ways of doing things can thus be readily demonstrated as both dangerous and most likely ineffective in the long run. A change can be achieved in the short run whilst a constant push is maintained to hold up the massive “old ways” but the second we remove the sustaining presence of that force, the old ways will seek to return back into familiar patterns.

How does this affect reliability efforts? Another author (and I seemingly can not readily find the reference at present) calls it the “6 months rule”. People will (albeit often grudgingly) go along with new methods for a period of six months and then, if no obvious results or benefits can be identified from their point of view, these same people will stop believing (if they ever did) that potential rewards will soon appear.

Six months is an exceedingly short time when projects are handled in parallel to regular tasks. The vaunted “trial period” may be shorter than many implementations when execution is handled internally, and contracting out requires adequate budgets and an ever expanding relationship with the contractor to achieve the desired ends within a short time period.

Bottom line: if implementation must succeed, sustained efforts (and money) must be provided to deliver quickly!~

© 2008 by François Gagnon