Most of you are probably growing a little weary of reading articles about the high incidents of computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) implementation failures. It's scary when you think that anywhere from 40 to 80 percent (depending on who you believe) of these implementations wind up not meeting expectations.
So what's the problem? You may be surprised to learn that the problem often starts long before the implementation. For many organizations, the culprit is a flawed CMMS evaluation and selection process combined with a poorly structured implementation organization.
The intent of this article is to provide a high-level perspective on a few of the key issues that should be a focus as you evaluate, select and prepare to implement a CMMS package.
The Evaluation and Selection Process—The Importance of Business Process Flows
With hundreds of CMMS packages available, how can you ensure that you're selecting the best one for your organization? The typical evaluation process involves inviting five or six CMMS vendors to demonstrate their products to a cross-section of people in your organization. Often times, the room is full of people who can't figure out why they have been invited to the demo, and at the first cell phone ring or pager call, they are more than happy to depart. During demonstrations, the CMMS sales representatives highlight their software's unique features and functional differentiators. Often, the demonstrations are "canned" and bear little resemblance to your own business practices and procedures. After all the demos are completed (a process which could take a few months), everyone is asked to vote on the package of their choice. Invariably the final selection often comes down to a "gut feel" process rather than a structured approach which systematically analyzes and compares the CMMS products and vendors within the context of the organization's requirements.
This "do-it-yourself" approach for CMMS evaluation and selection is used by many organizations. When you consider that a CMMS package has the potential (depending on the size of the organization) of saving an organization millions of dollars each year— this is definitely the wrong approach.
I've been involved in numerous CMMS implementations in organizations of various sizes and industries. I've seen dismal failures and tremendous successes. The failures all too often used some form of a do-it-yourself evaluation and selection process and little effort was spent matching the CMMS capabilities to the organization's functional needs. On the other hand, the successes were often characterized by a detailed needs analysis based on well-documented business process flows (BPF) developed by independent and objective third party resources combined with a couple of other key ingredients I will mention later.
Any CMMS selection process and implementation project needs to involve a review of your organization's BPFs. If the BPFs are not currently documented, then you now have a great reason to document them. It's essential that all members of the implementation team and any other key personnel be involved when discussing and documenting the BPFs.
The best way to initially document the BPFs is to transcribe the verbal description of the flows onto a paper medium such as a flipchart. This gives you the opportunity to make any changes to the flows without much work as you go. It's usually an iterative approach, and is very effective in highlighting problem areas and critical interdependencies between business processes. Furthermore, it brings to the forefront valuable return on investment (ROI) opportunities in the workflow creation or optimization arena.
Keep in mind that all the flows must eventually end up linked to another. If you end up with a flow that you cannot link to another process, then there is something wrong. All the individual flows when combined make up the "Big Picture" of all the key business processes—which is really one large BPF with many branches. I try to relate it to a map of a city's road ways. You will never see a road that is not in someway attached or linked to another. The same theory applies to flows, you should never have one hanging on its own.
Once you're satisfied with the flows—they should then be transferred from the flipcharts to a flowcharting software product such as Visio, which provides a means to easily manage and distribute the BPFs. Once the Visio form has been distributed to all of the relevant individuals, these individuals can then take these flows to their respective job locations and compare to see if what they mapped is what actually transpires in their work place. Then any changes to the Visio drawings should be made and redistributed for final approval by the team members. Once this has been completed, the flows should be documented and sent to management for review and sign off. Once management has signed off, the BPF should be redistributed to all of the key employees. With the BPFs identified and documented, your organization now has an effective means by which to measure CMMS solutions and their "fit" for your organization. Using the BPF, a needs analysis can be easily documented—thereby taking a structured approach to the selection process and eliminating the gut feel and guessing. The BPF also provides your organization with a point of reference to easily respond with if challenged as to why certain decisions were made. To use the old vernacular, "You need to know what you want to get what you want" is most appropriate. For a generic sample BPF, please visit PopWare's web site http://www.pop-ware.com/support/software_downloads.php
When you consider an organization with three or four sites and a few thousand employees, the overall cost of a CMMS implementation could exceed one million dollars—so spending $20,000 to even $40,000 up front to document BPF in order to ensure that the CMMS is up to the job makes sense. Cut corners where it makes sense, not where it doesn't.
In addition, you must keep in mind that your requirements will change over time. So if you're expecting to use the package for a few years, you need to carefully evaluate the CMMS vendor to ensure that it will be around and eager to support you as well as enhance or customize the CMMS package. Since this is going to be a significant investment, you'll want to be sure it returns dividends in the long term. In order to feel confident about the CMMS vendor, you'll need to get answers to the following questions:
* How long have they been in business?
* What is their financial situation? Do they have money in the bank, or are they running in the red?
* How many customers do they have? What do the customers think of the product and support?
* What is their annual research and development investment?
* How many new customers have they gained quarter over quarter in the last two years?
* What is their support structure and response time? Do they actually answer questions?
* Are they a global company or a regional provider?
* Do they have their own services division or are they totally dependent on third parties?
* How many third parties work with this software? Are they reasonably priced and local alternatives to the primary vendor?
* What is the product roadmap going forward—one year and five years? Does the company have vision or are they simply promoting the same old same old.
If you're spending significant time and money implementing a CMMS package you'll want to be sure that the vendor will still be around five years from now and that they will be able to quickly respond to your changing requirements, technological advancements, as well as specific changes in industry and regulatory requirements.
SOURCE:http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/how-to-avoid-becoming-another-cmms-implementation-failure-statistic-17811/
So what's the problem? You may be surprised to learn that the problem often starts long before the implementation. For many organizations, the culprit is a flawed CMMS evaluation and selection process combined with a poorly structured implementation organization.
The intent of this article is to provide a high-level perspective on a few of the key issues that should be a focus as you evaluate, select and prepare to implement a CMMS package.
The Evaluation and Selection Process—The Importance of Business Process Flows
With hundreds of CMMS packages available, how can you ensure that you're selecting the best one for your organization? The typical evaluation process involves inviting five or six CMMS vendors to demonstrate their products to a cross-section of people in your organization. Often times, the room is full of people who can't figure out why they have been invited to the demo, and at the first cell phone ring or pager call, they are more than happy to depart. During demonstrations, the CMMS sales representatives highlight their software's unique features and functional differentiators. Often, the demonstrations are "canned" and bear little resemblance to your own business practices and procedures. After all the demos are completed (a process which could take a few months), everyone is asked to vote on the package of their choice. Invariably the final selection often comes down to a "gut feel" process rather than a structured approach which systematically analyzes and compares the CMMS products and vendors within the context of the organization's requirements.
This "do-it-yourself" approach for CMMS evaluation and selection is used by many organizations. When you consider that a CMMS package has the potential (depending on the size of the organization) of saving an organization millions of dollars each year— this is definitely the wrong approach.
I've been involved in numerous CMMS implementations in organizations of various sizes and industries. I've seen dismal failures and tremendous successes. The failures all too often used some form of a do-it-yourself evaluation and selection process and little effort was spent matching the CMMS capabilities to the organization's functional needs. On the other hand, the successes were often characterized by a detailed needs analysis based on well-documented business process flows (BPF) developed by independent and objective third party resources combined with a couple of other key ingredients I will mention later.
Any CMMS selection process and implementation project needs to involve a review of your organization's BPFs. If the BPFs are not currently documented, then you now have a great reason to document them. It's essential that all members of the implementation team and any other key personnel be involved when discussing and documenting the BPFs.
The best way to initially document the BPFs is to transcribe the verbal description of the flows onto a paper medium such as a flipchart. This gives you the opportunity to make any changes to the flows without much work as you go. It's usually an iterative approach, and is very effective in highlighting problem areas and critical interdependencies between business processes. Furthermore, it brings to the forefront valuable return on investment (ROI) opportunities in the workflow creation or optimization arena.
Keep in mind that all the flows must eventually end up linked to another. If you end up with a flow that you cannot link to another process, then there is something wrong. All the individual flows when combined make up the "Big Picture" of all the key business processes—which is really one large BPF with many branches. I try to relate it to a map of a city's road ways. You will never see a road that is not in someway attached or linked to another. The same theory applies to flows, you should never have one hanging on its own.
Once you're satisfied with the flows—they should then be transferred from the flipcharts to a flowcharting software product such as Visio, which provides a means to easily manage and distribute the BPFs. Once the Visio form has been distributed to all of the relevant individuals, these individuals can then take these flows to their respective job locations and compare to see if what they mapped is what actually transpires in their work place. Then any changes to the Visio drawings should be made and redistributed for final approval by the team members. Once this has been completed, the flows should be documented and sent to management for review and sign off. Once management has signed off, the BPF should be redistributed to all of the key employees. With the BPFs identified and documented, your organization now has an effective means by which to measure CMMS solutions and their "fit" for your organization. Using the BPF, a needs analysis can be easily documented—thereby taking a structured approach to the selection process and eliminating the gut feel and guessing. The BPF also provides your organization with a point of reference to easily respond with if challenged as to why certain decisions were made. To use the old vernacular, "You need to know what you want to get what you want" is most appropriate. For a generic sample BPF, please visit PopWare's web site http://www.pop-ware.com/support/software_downloads.php
When you consider an organization with three or four sites and a few thousand employees, the overall cost of a CMMS implementation could exceed one million dollars—so spending $20,000 to even $40,000 up front to document BPF in order to ensure that the CMMS is up to the job makes sense. Cut corners where it makes sense, not where it doesn't.
In addition, you must keep in mind that your requirements will change over time. So if you're expecting to use the package for a few years, you need to carefully evaluate the CMMS vendor to ensure that it will be around and eager to support you as well as enhance or customize the CMMS package. Since this is going to be a significant investment, you'll want to be sure it returns dividends in the long term. In order to feel confident about the CMMS vendor, you'll need to get answers to the following questions:
* How long have they been in business?
* What is their financial situation? Do they have money in the bank, or are they running in the red?
* How many customers do they have? What do the customers think of the product and support?
* What is their annual research and development investment?
* How many new customers have they gained quarter over quarter in the last two years?
* What is their support structure and response time? Do they actually answer questions?
* Are they a global company or a regional provider?
* Do they have their own services division or are they totally dependent on third parties?
* How many third parties work with this software? Are they reasonably priced and local alternatives to the primary vendor?
* What is the product roadmap going forward—one year and five years? Does the company have vision or are they simply promoting the same old same old.
If you're spending significant time and money implementing a CMMS package you'll want to be sure that the vendor will still be around five years from now and that they will be able to quickly respond to your changing requirements, technological advancements, as well as specific changes in industry and regulatory requirements.
SOURCE:http://www.technologyevaluation.com/research/articles/how-to-avoid-becoming-another-cmms-implementation-failure-statistic-17811/
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