Reliability Tips

July 2005

Managing Maintenance

Mahatma Gandhi was once asked what he thought of western civilization. He replied that he thought it would be a good idea. The same though comes to mind when considering management skills in maintenance departments.

Maintenance leaders often become leaders by the touch of the magic wand. The wand works in mysterious ways. The wand will transform a person that has never been in a leadership position into a leader without training, coaching, job description or direction from peers. The Wand touching usually happens around 5:30 pm and magically (hence the name) transforms the person to a maintenance leader by 6:00 am the next morning. It may be the best maintenance tool yet on the market!

Examples of magically transformed people are young engineers taking supervisory positions, senior engineers becoming maintenance managers, craftspeople becoming maintenance planners, and purchasing people becoming maintenance spare parts managers.

In the continuation of this article series I will be presenting some management ideas for the professionals.

The above thoughts are the start of an article series IDCON consultant Tor Idhammar will publish in the new magazine “Reliable Plant” .

The article series above will be published late September or early October of 2005. Sign up for the magazine in time to read the article series. If you work in a plant/ mill you probably qualify for a free copy.