Magazine

The words maintenance and maintainability are often used interchangeably. Maintenance is the performance of fixing or replacing an asset. Maintainability is a designed-in parameter. As shown in the graph, by the time a machine is built, you’ve lost more than 95% of the possibility for life-cycle cost reductions. Maintainability needs to be implemented in the…

  As the Omicron variant surges, it’s important that facilities consider revamping their health and safety plans to best protect their employees, property, and buildings. Many industries are already dealing with staff shortages and with the increase in COVID-19 cases even more employees will be calling out from work. During these times it’s important to…

  As I discussed in a previous blog, organizations, and even different documents produced by the same organization, define hazardous material differently. NFPA 400, Hazardous Materials Code, defines hazardous material as: A chemical or substance that is classified as a physical hazard material or a health hazard material, whether the chemical or substance is in…

Automating data collection for condition monitoring makes the most of new and existing technologies. By Drew Mackley, Emerson All plants strive to operate at peak safety and efficiency. As supply chains are disrupted, resources constrained, and experienced personnel become scarce, reliable operations become even more critical to achieving those goals. As a result, reliability teams…

  Presentation skills are a critical part of being an effective leader. Whether you’re speaking to your team at a standup meeting, presenting an update at a town hall, or giving a keynote presentation at a conference, there are critical skills needed to communicate in a way that’s clear and compelling. The 2020 GLOBE leadership…

  Everyone knows that if you work from home once everyone else returns to the office, you’ve obviously decided your career doesn’t matter. Right? A recent article on Insider.com includes remarks made by Morgan Stanley CEO, James Gorman, who has some strong views about remote work and believes we need to go back to the…

  Everyone experiences good or bad luck at some point in their lives, like being born into a loving or not so loving family. This ‘blind luck’ just happens to us, with us having no control over it. But there’s another form of luck – ‘smart luck,’ or serendipity – that we can influence. What…

Leaders who don’t pause to reflect, leaning instead on endless cycles of acting and re-acting without first thinking, often run into trouble. True leaders ponder issues before acting or re-acting. This reflection, in its simplest definition, is akin to time-thinking. Knowledge is the residue of thinking. The results of knowledge-thinking are new alternatives, perspectives, and…

  Earlier this month, Albertsons’ CEO, Vivek Sankaran, said that the US grocer had been struggling with low inventory for months. Just about the time he thought their supply chain issues were resolved, the Omicron spike put them back where they were six months ago. Albertsons has no stores outside the US. So is Sankaran…

Boris Johnson, UK Prime Minister, was forced this week to apologise to Parliament and to the UK people for attending a party in the gardens of No. 10 Downing Street during last year’s lockdown, which he later described as a “work function” in a feeble attempt to justify his error of committing acts that the…