Efficient Lean Daily Management: A Guide for Facilities Maintenance Groups

Daily management plays a pivotal role in facility maintenance for managers to continually improve the operations of systems and teams by analyzing key metrics to quickly show abnormal conditions, reduce downtime, and increase profits. Whether it's a manufacturing plant, a commercial building, or a residential complex, a well-organized maintenance group is essential to keep operations running seamlessly. In this blog post, we'll delve into the strategies and best practices for effectively managing a maintenance group's daily tasks, all while optimizing your approach for maximum efficiency, productivity, and problem-solving.

Understanding the Significance of Daily Management

Progress toward daily management goals can be achieved from above through executive-directed change initiatives. Still, real progress that makes a lasting impact comes from below, at the level of the job site itself, and is directed by managers and teams who are empowered and accountable to understand and improve the quality and quantity of their work.

Jeffery Liker and Gary Convis offered the simplest definition of daily management in their book The Toyota Way to Lean Leadership (2012) as “the process of checking actual versus target results and engaging the team in creative problem-solving." Their reflection that "the goal is as much to develop people as to get the results" is critical to understanding how daily maintenance reinforces the cultural expectations of continuous improvement at the ground level of any organization.

Task Prioritization and How to Execute Your Plan

The foundation of successful daily maintenance lies in good planning. Each level of the organization will, of course, have to create a different plan. As a manager, my program looks something like this:

PLAN:

• Confirm Staffing and Training Plans- We want to consider whether we have enough staff to do the jobs that need to be done and whether those members have the correct training. We use a simple spreadsheet with employee's names and training classes/CEU to keep up with this task. On the spreadsheet, we use a simple Harvey ball graphic to indicate skill level with 25% - Introduced to the skill, 50%- Can work with help, 75%- Can work alone, and 100% Can Teach or kaizen.

• Confirming equipment status- Since I work in a manufacturing environment, I need to know quickly what the status of my equipment is. We use a CMMS and a Microsoft system (Power BI) to pull reports from it. For each significant system (Fire System, HVAC, Doors, Chillers, etc., we have a System Health page. This page tells us if preventative maintenance is past due or unplanned work has occurred. Power BI then color codes these items in a simple red, yellow, and green format that is easy to visualize. These reports are displayed on monitors in the shops and refresh data every fifteen minutes.

  Anyone from the company's president to the team members can see the condition of our equipment at a moment's notice.

DO:

• Coordinate Staffing Alignment- Daily, we can see who is onsite via a badge check system. Before a badge check system was available, we used magnets. It might seem labor intensive, but it helps the team know their co-workers' status.

  Same thing for vacations. We keep a large electronic calendar posted on a monitor. Our group keeps track of people's vacations, time out of the office, and training.
  

• Pre-shift observations- We run a three-shift operation with a weekend work crew, so a handover meeting between shifts is crucial to good communication. This meeting is used to discuss daily operational items; the manager can pick up on the general mood of the group, answer policy questions, and ensure actions taken directly support company needs.
  

• Confirm current operational availability of equipment- Whether working in manufacturing, hotels, restaurants, or any industry-specific equipment must be functional for the business to succeed. What is going to make your customer happy? Does it have hot water? Then, having sensors on your boilers needs to be a priority. Is it clean restrooms? The sensors or a method to check for cleanliness and stocked paper products are in your future!

CHECK:

• Go & See- Speak with your team members- With meetings, emails, and daily tasks, it's easy to get isolated from your team. This is where the Gemba walk comes in. Gemba is the Japanese word that means the actual place where value is created. In manufacturing, that is the shop floor; in retail, it may be the warehouse or the sales floor; and in hospitals, it may be anywhere from the operating room to the patient's room. The point is that in any operation, there are multiple areas of "handover" or "friction" where processes hand off to another process within the same organization.
  
  Within each sub-group, an opportunity can be found, but usually only by careful observation. This careful observation is best done in person so you can use all your senses. Video or pictures are okay, but nothing can substitute hearing, smelling, and feeling the actual job site and the activities that go on there. At least three days a week, schedule thirty minutes to an hour to go to floor level, walk around, and converse with your employees.

  You need the best information so you can make the best decisions. Your employees can be the source of "real world" information if you take the time to listen to them and see the problems they are working on or have to deal with.

• 5S Condition- I won’t go into detail about 5S. There are plenty of articles online regarding 5S, and Google is your friend here. We may do a piece of our own at some point in the future on the benefits of 5S. Suffice it to say that you need to set some schedule to regularly check your areas to ensure that things are clean and orderly.

  
  We had a problem where one shift would leave our machine shop a mess, and the oncoming shift could only do their job once they had removed the debris and, even then, had problems finding tools, etc. Have your teams ever encountered that problem/ We solved that issue by creating a "turnover app" using a Microsoft product (Power Apps). The outgoing and oncoming shift Team Leaders then walk the shop using the app on their mobile devices. The app asks things like Shop Condition, Equipment Condition, Vehicle Condition, Active Jobs being Turned Over, etc. The Team Leader must take a photo of any discrepancy and correct it before accepting the handover from the previous shift. The app then emails management a summary of the information.

• Confirm progress of KPI Improvement Activity- For the manager role, confirm critical KPI (Safety, Equipment Readiness, Training, etc.) abnormality situation countermeasures are working and effective. This is done by going to the gemba (if possible) or meeting with key stakeholders—document countermeasures to be used for future projects across job sites or projects.

ACTION:

• Adjust maintenance activity to meet targets

1. Review safety day for the previous period

2. Review downtime or major Breakdowns from previous periods

3. Review any unplanned events that affected the daily plan

4. Make adjustments based on what was found and create a new plan

Target Item Ideas for Visual Boards- I am leaving you with a few ideas of what may be helpful to measure.

• Safety- Number of accidents (lost time, near misses)

• Quality- Equipment run time

• Maintenance cost- Spare parts price, per piece of equipment, etc.

• Equipment productivity- Yield based on time

• Maintenance work- Planned maintenance rate, planned maintenance achievement rate

• Spare parts control- Cost/turnover rate

• Equipment malfunctions- Number of equipment failures, Mean Time Between Failures, Mean Time to Repair.

• Human Resource Development- Individual Skill Change evaluation, employees with qualification

Potential Challenges and Conclusion:

I'd like to address the perception that daily management and Gemba walks may be too time-consuming. I agree that, on the surface, it may seem that way. However, day-to-day management can be structured around a visual control method, either using a manual approach with a whiteboard and magnets or more technical using monitors with a CMMS system and Power BI pulling data. The secret to the system's success is first to set an expectation of bad news. It's not that you don't want to hear and celebrate accomplishments, but you are trying to identify abnormalities daily.

You want to see and listen to abnormalitilities so you can work through countermeasures and create solutions. Only talk about abnormal conditions, which hopefully will be fewer.

The second idea is to have the daily management meeting standing up. A standing meeting energizes everyone; no one eats or drinks and the flow is much faster. Aim to keep the discussion at most 10 to 15 minutes.

Efficient daily maintenance management is a cornerstone of operational excellence in any facility. By prioritizing tasks, utilizing technology, fostering effective communication, and investing in continuous training, you can optimize your maintenance group's performance and ensure the longevity of your equipment and systems. Remember, a well-maintained facility is a reflection of effective management and a testament to your commitment to providing quality services.