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MARCH 2016 • E&MJ; 57 www.e-mj.com M A I N T E N A N C E Modern mining equipment manufactur- ers will prescribe a total maintenance requirement for their equipment. If craft personnel perform the prescribed mainte- nance in the separate, disjointed fashion of craft organizations, they handicap their abil- ity to satisfy the skill needs of the equip- ment they must maintain. They limit their practical maintenance capabilities by their one-skill orientation. The craft organization is unlikely to be flexible and responsive and while they may control their own resources properly, they may not have direct access to all supporting labor resources. Instead, there is often considerable "horse-trading" among craft supervisors as they haggle over exchanging people to assemble the right skills for a major job. In the meantime, valu- able response time is lost adding downtime. Area organization—An area organization makes one supervisor responsible for all main- tenance within a specific geographic plant area like a refinery or smelter. The area organ- ization includes all of the craft personnel nec- essary to meet day-to-day maintenance needs. Therefore, mechanics, millwrights or electricians could be in the same crew, depending on the workload of a particular plant area. The area organization successfully eliminates the craft jurisdiction problem of the craft organization (Figure 2). The area organization also suggests that operations would be more satisfied because problems requiring several craft skills are responded to sooner. Therefore, for a plant operation, the characteristics of the area organization are more promising than the craft organization because of their greater flexibility and responsiveness. Area organizations also have access to other craft personnel required to reinforce them during peak workloads. This suggests that the areas must be supported by other craft groups. Therefore, these groups must have a variety of craft personnel to meet the diverse needs of peak workloads of several areas concurrently. Consequently, the alloca- tion of labor resources is more likely to meet plant-wide priorities than is the craft organi- zation. Typically, plants wishing to be able to reinforce field areas with additional craft per- sonnel during peak workload periods prefer the area organization. They find that the clear definition of responsibilities is more effective. The most common support organization for the area organization is a pool of backup per- sonnel of all skills needed. Personnel from this pool are awarded to field areas experi- encing peak workloads, like a periodic shut- down, based on plant-level work priorities. Pool personnel are returned to the pool after completing work assignments. Depending on plant needs, these personnel are assigned elsewhere to meet labor demands. In contrasting the craft and area organi- zations, the best choice in terms of flexibili- ty and responsiveness would be the area organization. However, the quality of plan- ning, the use of technology and quality infor- mation are also important considerations. Team organization—The visualization of smaller, more productive workforces using "teams," operating without supervi- sion and working efficiently to yield high quality work at lower cost, has great appeal. Organizations visualize better work control through employee empowerment and reduced operating cost with fewer peo- ple and potentially greater productivity. However, moving successfully from a tradi- tional maintenance organization to a team organization is a process that must be care- fully prepared for and expertly implement- ed. Thus, forming a team is more than a matter of identifying a group with compat- ible skills and congenial personalities. It is, more importantly, a matter of making cer- tain the fundamental work control proce- dures are in place, fully functional and the team members are competent in their use. Team organizations emerging from a tra- ditional supervisor-crew arrangement often have difficulty coping with "who's in charge" now that they are without a super- visor. As a result, few traditional mainte- nance organizations can move directly to a "self-directed" team. Generally, they make this transition by using a rotating coordina- tor. With a rotating coordinator, one of the team members calls the shots for two to three weeks and then another replaces him. Team members suggest different or better ways of getting the work done. Soon, work- able methods emerge for some, but not all, aspects of work control. The ones that work best are retained. Then, another rotating coordinator takes over and tries other meth- ods, focusing on the areas still in need of improvement. Finally, the whole team devel- ops an acceptable way of working together, and they discontinue the rotating coordina- tor and graduate to a self-directed team. The Challenges of Implementation Implementing team organizations brings some challenges. Team members must be convinced that the team will help them to operate more effectively, produce better work and realize greater job satisfaction. While productivity, improved performance and cost- reduction are among the team expectations of management, they know the cost of main- tenance will not go down unless the number of people doing it and the frequency at which it is done are reduced. Employees are also aware of these facts and opposition to fewer people can result in an adverse reaction to the idea of teams. The maintenance program can provide a framework for team members who as craftsmen had significant experience in diagnosis and repair, but little experience Figure 2—Each area supervisor has all of the right craft personnel to meet day-to-day maintenance requirements. The area organization is often operated with a back-up group providing access to reinforcing craft personnel dur- ing peak workloads.