What is a maintenance work order system and do you need one?

Introduction

Work orders are the fundamental organizational foundation of Computerized Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS). In industrial maintenance management, when created for a particular functionality of a productive sub-system, they call for actions that will resume or keep the output of that sub-system within design or production goals.

As we will see below, work orders centralize all the information required for an efficient maintenance job from spare parts to cost analyses. Companies have different needs and it is possible though unlikely that one company will use all the features that come with a CMMS, even more so for Small to Medium sized companies which are usually more interested in streamlining the work order flow above anything else, at least in a first stage.

As with the majority of the technical articles we write, this article has an applicability bias towards companies with medium-complexity operations. At the risk of gross generalization (!), if the company has 25 or less maintenance technicians, it is considered to be a small to medium sized operation.

What Are Maintenance Work Order Systems?

A maintenance work order system is a digital or paper-based tool that organizes, prioritizes, and tracks equipment maintenance tasks. In this day and age and considering the target reader, we are actually only talking about digital tools - it is just not reasonable to be doing things in physical paper anymore!

Work orders serve as the official document that guides maintenance technicians, telling them what needs to be done, where, and when (in some cases also "how").

Work orders capture and aggregate essential job-related details such as:

1. Task descriptions: What specific work needs to be performed, usually through a short summary and a longer description.
2. Equipment information: Which assets or machinery are involved.
3. Location: Where the work should happen.
4. Scheduled time and deadlines: When the task is due.
5. Assignee(s): Who or what team should perform the work?
6. What spares and special tools may be required?

Essentially, work orders centralize and interlink maintenance-relevant information. The result is a tidy "paper" trail that assists during and after the actual job increasing overall efficiency with a corresponding positive effect on costs.

The 5 "Ws" of work order systems.

As a complement to what has already been addressed, it is sometimes said that work orders represent the practical expression of the 5 Ws of industrial maintenance which are the 5 general aspects that should be described in order to properly organize a job. Those are: "When?", "What?", "Where?", "Who?" and "Why?". If your work orders address all of these, then you are doing something right!

All of those are pretty much self-explanatory, but even so, allow us to expand a little on each:

When?

Refers to when the job should be done and is a reflection of the scheduling responsibilities of a maintenance department.

What?

This describes the work to be performed. It includes details such as the problem or issue that needs attention, the specific task or tasks required, and any relevant instructions.

Where?

This indicates the location of the asset or equipment that requires maintenance.

Who?

Who is the technician or the team that is going to tackle this job?

Why?

What are the performance targets? What is the summary of the detected issue? Easier to answer on the extreme of a machine breakdown (target is above all to restart operation) but important when production throughput is below operational targets due to a need to spare the equipment when something still works but not optimally.

More on work orders

At this point, we would like to take the opportunity to describe in some detail some other components of work orders, namely priority, deadline and type.

The priority is easy to define: considering the impact to the operations and maintenance departments and in view of what the combined goals and constraints of each are, jobs are slotted into levels of importance. Those levels are then used by the maintenance planners to make things happen before others.

The deadline is a way to organize the technician's work. Knowledge of the working reality is required so that a reasonable estimate is targeted. The expectation of when something will be resumed is of utmost importance for all involved to be aware of.

Finally, the work order type corresponds to a classification of the maintenance type that needs to be performed. This is important mostly for performance analysis. Is the maintenance department mostly tackling machine breakdowns? What follows is a quick reference to typical job type classifications.

Maintenance work will usually be:

1. Preventive - These are actions done to keep the machine running longer at or above production targets. An example would be regular lubrication of bearings.
2. Corrective - Something has already happened that either impairs operation altogether or constrains operational performance.
3. Predictive - Refers to jobs triggered upon detection of an upcoming fault. This is, of course, highly desirable as time-consuming actions are only taken if needed.

For additional details on this point, please read the article: What are the different maintenance types out there?

Types of Maintenance Work Orders

Manual work orders

Manual work orders are directly created by a user. This is the case for operators that are reporting some kind of issue to the maintenance department or perhaps the result of a maintenance inspection check list done by a technician that detected something wrong.

In this type of work order the elements of the 5 Ws need to be defined by the user as clearly as possible. Therefore, the location, the summary of the issue (basically why is this an issue? Remember, it may not be immediately obvious) and other aspects all need to be reported.

Because this type of document may not be started by a maintenance manager (it almost certainly will not), there is an extra step on the workflow. The job request, needs to be "accepted" by the maintenance team. An example of where this is a usual occurrence is duplicate reports for the same issue. There is no point in escalating the most recent report when there's already another for the same problem. In this example, the maintenance person responsible may simply not accept the work request.

In most CMMS systems, this first stage of the workflow is actually called "Work request" rather than "Work order". A work request becomes a work order when approved.

Automatic work orders

These work orders skip the work request step and are directly created by a scheduling agent such as a maintenance plan. The maintenance department generates scheduled actions based on some maintenance management framework that trigger the creation of work orders at regular intervals. Those work orders follow source templates that include the team to be assigned (e.g. shift 1), the location and the list of tasks to perform.

Additionally to scheduled jobs, it is also possible to trigger automatic work orders based on a counter reading. In this case the maintenance actions are dependent on actual operation hours instead of simple calendar intervals.

Finally for this topic, work orders can also be generated from external triggers coming from predictive fault detection methods. Other equipment analyses operational data and informs the CMMS of an impending fault through the creation of an automatic work order.

Benefits of Using a Work Order System for Small to Medium-Sized Manufacturing Companies

Small and medium sized companies usually do not have very complex maintenance management workflows. As such, SMEs stand to benefit immensely from a CMMS or work order system simply by the fact that those systems inherently organize internal procedures and that results in an overall "tidiness" that benefits everyone.

Once that basic organization is secured, then it is an easier process to implement more sophisticated maintenance frameworks such as RCM and/ or FMECA.

In general terms and regardless of the complexity of the operations, a work order system improves the following points, among others:

1. Increased organizational efficiency through improved inter-departmental communications, access to relevant information and coordination.
2. Enhanced productivity for maintenance workers due to access to current and historic information on the field.
3. Cost savings, through the aforementioned efficiencies and productivity but also through increased equipment lifespan and decrease in unplanned downtime.
4. Data-driven planning and budgeting. Historic data of multiple types (work hours, spare usage, etc.) allows for informed decision-making. Managers can plan-ahead, estimate future needs and allocate budgets wisely.

All organizations with an important industrial maintenance component, will benefit from implementing a work order system. It is true that usage of generic solutions such as Microsoft Excel can fulfill most if not all of the basic requirements but there is a reason why there are dedicated platforms whose sole purpose is the support of maintenance management.

All companies have operational specificities, and no standard package will fit like a glove. That could justify the use of "home-brewed" solutions, but the truth is that maintenance management workflows are done and tested and commercial packages are really good at what they do. More times than not the specificities can be accounted for with generic features such as user-defined tags. Custom development of additional features built on top of the standard is also possible for most CMMS providers.

Conclusion

Let's quickly recap the benefits of a work order system:

1. Efficiency: Work order systems streamline communication, reduce paperwork, and ensure timely execution.
2. Data Tracking: By maintaining a historical record of maintenance activities, work orders empower decision-making and resource planning.
3. Cost Control: Preventing breakdowns and optimizing maintenance schedules directly impacts the bottom line.

All pretty good reasons in favor of such a system. Of course, only you and your company can make a decision on whether to go ahead with a dedicated work order system or not. In the end, it all boils down to the level of support (think the adaptation of the standards to comply with the specificities) the vendor can provide and how much the company is willing to invest (in both time and money) to make it happen.

-------------
Help us get better for the benefit of all in the industry: if you spot any errors and/ or would like to contribute with your knowledge to increase our database of technical articles, please feel free to contact us at info@commacmms.com or checkout our main site. We'd love to hear from you.

-------------
Comma CMMS is a cloud-based computerized maintenance management system that helps businesses manage their assets, work orders, inventory, and preventive maintenance. In operation since 2013 the company supports a wide range of industries that have an industrial maintenance component to their operations from technical entertainment to manufacturing. Know more at https://commacmms.com.