How do you incorporate feedback and lessons learned from preventive maintenance into continuous improvement?

Preventive maintenance (PM) is a proactive approach to keep your equipment and systems in good condition and avoid breakdowns, failures, and downtime. But PM is not a one-time activity or a fixed plan. It requires constant feedback and learning from the results of your PM tasks, inspections, and measurements. How do you incorporate feedback and lessons learned from PM into continuous improvement? Here are some tips and best practices to help you.

1 Use a feedback loop

A feedback loop is a process of collecting, analyzing, and acting on the information you get from your PM activities. It helps you identify what works well, what needs improvement, and what changes you can make to optimize your PM program. A feedback loop can be simple or complex, depending on your needs and goals. But it should always have these four steps: plan, do, check, and act (PDCA).

Plan: Define your PM objectives, standards, and methods. Decide what data you need to collect and how you will measure your PM performance.

Do: Implement your PM plan and execute your PM tasks according to your schedule and procedures.

Check: Review your PM data and compare it with your expected outcomes. Look for gaps, trends, patterns, and anomalies. Evaluate the effectiveness and efficiency of your PM activities.

Act: Based on your analysis, take corrective or preventive actions to improve your PM plan and processes. Adjust your PM schedule, frequency, scope, or methods as needed. Document and communicate your findings and actions.

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Steve Richmond

Superannuated Founder at Projetech, Inc
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In order to improve continuously, it's essential to integrate the feedback and knowledge gained from preventive maintenance. It's necessary to create a culture that places value on analyzing and acting upon the data collected to achieve this. More than just collecting data is needed; it's essential to understand the insights gained and use them to make improvements to current practices.

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Syed Muhammad Faisal, PMP® M.Eng.

Manager at National Refinery Limited P.M.P From PMI USA & M.E.(ENERGY SYSTEM) From NED UE&TECH
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For effective Preventive Maintenance , yearly Preventive Maintenance schedule to be prepare on monthly, quarterly or running hours based on the: Business Critical Mean Time Between Failure Past History or Equipment History Card Aging factor Spares availability and obsolescence Operation Continuity Standby conditions Checklist of Each Equipment to be filled accordingly after the planned execution. Defective parts to be replaced and log into the form and format. Based on P.M. next predictive or corrective action to be plan to ensure the smooth and reliable operation of the plant and equipment without any breakdown and lead to business discontinuity in a worst case. All the findings will be record for next line of action as per observation.

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Gnash Aboobacker

"Senior Biomedical Engineer| Manager - Dept. of Biomedical Engineering| Biomedical Engineer| Clinical Engineer| Lecturer"
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Another perspective on feedback loops in preventive maintenance emphasizes the importance of involving frontline workers. By incorporating insights from technicians directly involved in maintenance tasks, you gain real-time, hands-on experiences that might not be evident in data alone. This collaborative approach enhances the overall effectiveness of the feedback loop, ensuring a more comprehensive understanding of the practical aspects of preventive maintenance.

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2 Learn from failures

Even with a well-designed PM program, failures can still happen. But failures are not necessarily bad. They are opportunities to learn from your mistakes and prevent them from happening again. When a failure occurs, you should perform a root cause analysis (RCA) to find out why it happened, what factors contributed to it, and how you can eliminate or reduce them. RCA is a systematic way of asking questions, gathering evidence, and testing hypotheses to identify the underlying causes of a problem. There are different tools and techniques for RCA, such as the 5 whys, fishbone diagram, fault tree analysis, and Pareto chart. The goal of RCA is to find the most effective solutions that address the root causes, not just the symptoms, of a failure.

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Jai Balachandran

Founder - MaintWiz CMMS | Asset Management | Plant Maintenance | TPM Digitalization | OEE | OT-IT Integration | industry 4.0 | SaaS Innovator
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Review failures in preventive maintenance for relentless improvement. Analyze, adapt, and evolve with these strategies: 1. Do Root Cause Analysis to identify causes of failures. 2. Conduct FMEA to anticipate potential failure modes 3. Foster open communication to learn from technicians & end users. 4. Invest in technician training with the latest skills and knowledge. 5. Compare maintenance metrics against industry benchmarks to identify gaps 6. Adopt technologies like CMMS, IoT and AI for real-time monitoring, to predict potential failures. 7. Leverage CMMS data insights to identify performance deteriorations. 8. Refine maintenance plans, incorporating learnings from failures. Failures can become catalysts for continuous improvement.

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Gnash Aboobacker

"Senior Biomedical Engineer| Manager - Dept. of Biomedical Engineering| Biomedical Engineer| Clinical Engineer| Lecturer"
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Failures can also serve as catalysts for innovation. When a well-designed PM program encounters failures, it prompts teams to think creatively and explore new solutions. Embracing failures as opportunities for improvement fosters a culture of continuous innovation and adaptation. It's not just about preventing the recurrence of specific issues but using failures to drive overall improvement and resilience in maintenance processes.

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3 Implement continuous improvement

Continuous improvement (CI) is a philosophy and practice of constantly looking for ways to improve your PM program and processes. It involves setting SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound) goals, implementing changes, monitoring results, and making further improvements. CI is not a one-off project or a quick fix. It is a long-term commitment that requires a culture of learning, collaboration, and innovation. To implement CI, you need to use various tools and methods, such as Kaizen, Six Sigma, Lean, and Total Productive Maintenance (TPM). These tools and methods help you eliminate waste, reduce variation, increase efficiency, and enhance quality in your PM activities.

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Gnash Aboobacker

"Senior Biomedical Engineer| Manager - Dept. of Biomedical Engineering| Biomedical Engineer| Clinical Engineer| Lecturer"
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Incorporating diverse perspectives from cross-functional teams can bring valuable insights into continuous improvement initiatives. This collaborative approach ensures a comprehensive understanding of challenges and fosters a more innovative and adaptive preventive maintenance program.

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4 Involve your team

Your PM program is not only reliant on your equipment and systems, but also on your people. Your team members are the ones who perform the PM tasks, collect data, report issues, and suggest improvements. Therefore, it is important to involve them in your feedback and learning process. This can be done by providing them with clear roles, responsibilities, and expectations for PM activities; training them on the PM standards, procedures, and tools; encouraging them to share their feedback, insights, and ideas for improvement; recognizing and rewarding their contributions and achievements; creating a safe environment where they can learn from failures and mistakes; and empowering them to make decisions and take action for improvement. Involving your team will increase their engagement, motivation, and ownership of your PM program. It will also leverage their knowledge, skills, and experience to enhance your PM performance.

Preventive maintenance is a dynamic and flexible process that necessitates feedback and learning in order to adjust to changing conditions and needs. Incorporating feedback and lessons into continuous improvement can improve equipment reliability, availability, reduce maintenance costs, risks, downtime while meeting operational and business goals.

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