ISO 55000 defines asset management as “the co-ordinated activity of an organisation to realise value from assets”.
This is an eminently sensible objective, but how do you go about maximising “the value” from what is after all a framework, guideline and set of standards?
To manage your physical assets, minimise risk, decrease whole-life costs, and improve asset performance, reliability and uptime, as well as improve safety, you need to provide more than just the logical system and framework that ISO 55000 encourages.
The Holy Grail is to implement Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) successfully at the heart of the organisation where it will define the organisation’s operating model. This is where EAM delivers on the promises of the ISO 55000 framework.
“Many organisations believe that by simply procuring an EAM system they are doing just this, but it takes much more than just a ‘vanilla’ IT system hurriedly or gradually implemented across a few of your key asset classes or business units,” says Andy Evans, chief executive of the Enterprise AMS Group.
With many organisations not understanding what they are truly setting out to achieve, what return on investment (ROI) they can realistically expect and what it will mean to every stakeholder from front-line workers to executives, getting to a world-class standard of managing your assets and safety just doesn’t happen.
Our objective is simple: to enable organisations to become world class in asset and safety management
EAM is exactly that – managing all your assets through their entire asset life cycle for all the asset classes you are responsible for in a strategic, operational and tactical manner, which is optimal in approach. This includes every stakeholder that is touching the assets, whether part of the organisation or external contractors working on your assets.
It is more than strategic thinking; it is providing the organisation with an operating model that supports this. It is the optimisation of your processes to enable process productivity to provide visibility, flexibility and business advantage across the enterprise. It is about the staff, their competencies, and the tools and knowledge that enable them to work smarter and more innovatively in the drive for world-class performance, with a major focus on the ultimate stakeholder – your customer. It is the single line of sight or alignment across the enterprise from front-line staff to executives, with no manual intervention or manipulation of data.
Many organisations continue to invest heavily in systems, but ultimately remain disappointed at their ROI.
“Recognising all assets are definitely not the same, but that they can be managed in a single enterprise system is a light-bulb moment which not everyone has yet had. We often see vested interests working against the greater good of the organisation,” says Mr Evans.
“Traditional IT departments quite like having multiple legacy systems, and a lack of a long-term joined-up strategy, from IT, finance and operational departments, can mean legacy systems get significant tactical investment to upgrade hardware and software.
“The sum of the tactical spend nearly always exceeds the cost of a large EAM implementation programme, but people rarely look at the total cost of ownership and the lost opportunity costs.”
So how to avoid the disappointment? Ultimately it’s all about combining a clear, executive-led asset management strategy, business processes optimisation, deep industry experience and knowledge of the assets you want to control. And managing them in a single EAM system integrated to best-of-breed technologies in mobile, GIS (geographic information system), reporting/business intelligence and integration into your operational systems.
And what about health, safety and environmental management? We believe this should be an integral part of the overall asset management approach, embedded in both your processes and system. Your workforce, contractors and the general public unfortunately have incidents while maintaining and using your assets. Only by understanding who was doing what and when, and the performance of the asset, can you understand and manage an effective response and performance improvements.
At the Enterprise AMS Group we are bringing simplicity and understanding of how organisations can become world class in both asset and safety management.
We have IT EAM Industry Solutions built on IBM Maximo software. These include industry specific “accelerators” that fast-track the organisation to achieving its asset and safety management objectives.
Our Braid Consulting Division assists with the operational excellence, design and business transformation that is required using optimised frameworks and methodologies.
The Braid Technology Division are leaders in industry-specific asset and safety management systems, these include business intelligence and reporting, and mobile solutions.
And our Braid Support Group provides system support and specialist training.
So why Braid? Because Braid is the joining together of all the elements that enable an organisation to become world class in asset and safety management.
These divisions all sit within the Enterprise AMS Groups Centre of Excellence and Innovation. This is used globally to assist clients with their journey to become world class.
For more information or to contact Enterprise AMS Group please visit
