The root questions that should be asked of all KPIs is this: Do the values returned accurately align with the reality of your processes, and do these results help drive improvement? For the second part of this blog series, I’m going to suggest a few “sub-questions” that might help you assess your approach to KPIs.
As a reminder for MP2 users, even though you don’t have fancy GUI tools for displaying KPIs on your dashboard, there are many ways to put these figures and data at your fingertips. I would be more than happy to discuss them with you. None of the concepts I discuss here cannot be applied to MP2.
After reading, you might want to consider a KPI audit. Working with a good SQL programmer who is familiar with your CMMS, you should be able to answer each of these questions and likely find some room for improvement.
Is my logic too simple?
Sorry to say, but the best KPIs often require some fairly complex logic, and the simple solution isn’t always the best. It’s fairly easy, for example, to write a KPI to measure the number of equipment/asset records covered by at least one PM. In ‘PKI: Part 1’, I mentioned a few reasons why this metric is less than ideal, the relevant one being that many records are maintained indirectly via their parents or children in the asset/equipment hierarchy (also that it looks at static data, which is unlikely to change often). But beyond that, it doesn’t matter much that a PM record exists if it isn’t actually being performed. So what’s a better metric to quantify the general coverage effectiveness of your preventive maintenance program? How about this (take a breath): “Percentage of active, non-system Asset/Equipment records that have not had any PM WO executed against them or against a direct parent or child during the most recent PM cycle, or where work orders were completed at least 50% late according to schedule, and for which the ‘PM Not Required’ box (that’s a custom field) is not checked.
It might be a bit hard to write all of that into a SQL statement, but in the end, you’ll have a very valuable metric that will give you a general idea of how you’re doing at protecting and maintain your assets. Much better than just counting assets/equipment with no PM records.
Am I missing underlying data that could help me? And is it worth fixing?
Sometimes – OFTENTIMES – the biggest barrier to producing good KPIs is the lack of underlying data. For example, you can’t include reported hours in your KPI logic if your crew isn’t reliably entering labor hours into the CMMS. And if your WO types are too generic, it’s hard to get any useful data based on types. In both these examples and many more, the solution might be easier than you think. Re-structuring WO types while preserving existing data is something that can be coordinated quite easily between you and a good database administrator. And both MP2 and Infor have tools that make it surprisingly quick and easy to enter planned and actual labor, even for crews that are already stretched thin.
Including the two previously-mentioned examples, here are some of the top KPI-related data elements that are often found to be missing or insufficient.
Work (Order) Types
Actual Labor Hours
Planned Labor Hours
Employee Crafts
Employee Departments, Groups, Teams
Employee Schedules (ask me about tricks to do this without laboriously tracking individual work schedules.)
Equipment/Asset Hierarchy
Equipment/Asset Types
Equipment/Asset Priorities
Do I have the tools to easily get underlying data for my KPIs?
Whatever the question that a particular KPI seeks to answer, you need to be able to take the next step of investigating the supporting data. If your KPI shows a dip in PM work, you should have a report or query to easily dial in and figure out why the change occurred. An inventory aging KPI should allow you to quickly identify the specific items that are affecting the metric.
Am I trending and benchmarking?
Whatever system you use, there are tools to help you trend KPI results over an extended period. Benchmarks could be set by yourself, your boss or asset manager, or industry standards or recommendations.
What is the purpose of my KPIs?
To drive performance? To provide reports? To make myself look good (be honest)? If your answer doesn’t include the first question, then there is definitely room for improvement.
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