1.Organizes all maintenance activities.

It doesn’t take much experience to know that prevention is the best repair and that’s why this is the very basic necessity your EAM solution should be satisfying. If you are working with an EAM solution, most of your requirements and activities are going to involve organizing maintenance of your assets. Proactive and regular scheduled maintenance to repair wear and tear reduces risk and saves on labor costs when things do break down. There are a lot of simple tasks that your EAM solution is going to rearrange and organize and present to let you know when the time comes to get cracking and start tuning things up. If the time does come (knock on wood) for an unscheduled repair, your EAM should provide either your employee or a contractor with all historical and performance information about the asset, making it easy to begin the process of getting things back to normal and prevent downtime.

2.Provides management with information for making decisions.

The main concerns for management when setting up an asset management strategy are planning for new purchases and setting performance benchmarks. When hammering out an asset lifecycle plan, where all assets are accounted for from cradle-to-grave, the EAM solution needs to provide management with analytical reports that establish the foundations of their capital budgeting decisions. This practical and accurate information is key in determining the timing of new assets being introduced to the lifecycle as old ones are retired. Beyond buying and selling decisions, which are not routine events, management will also need information to set benchmarks and analyze performance. This makes the process of determining workflow recommendations and managing work orders grounded into hard evidence.

3.Easy-to-use Interface

Most EAM end-users, such as technicians or field engineers, will not be nearly as comfortable using the management software as they are using the assets. That’s no fault of theirs, but it does put emphasis on setting up an EAM solution that has time saving functionality and simple navigation. After ongoing training and internal communications reinforcing the benefits of using the software, ease-of-use will be a key determining whether an organization is getting full use out of the software. It’s no surprise that usability is one of the major trends in EAM in 2011, as end-users interactions with the software continue to add to the company’s knowledge base. That’s the collection of invaluable historical data used to make decisions, which takes us back to management’s role in analyzing reports during asset lifecycle planning.

4.Filing all the documents

This point goes hand in hand with the proactive approach preached for asset maintenance strategy. Assets come loaded with documentation, from vendor information to technical specs and manufacturer’s warranties, and its up to users to keep these accessible and organized. While accessing and using these documents may not happen often or be any person’s particular responsibility, there are few instances when the importance of these documents becomes crucial. These include major breakdowns, when service agreements need to be examined, and analyzing vendor relationship during the purchasing process. In terms of the other benefits highlighted above, this may seem trivial, but in the spirit of saving time and getting the most out of your investment, it’s a great feature to demand and use.

The main concerns for management when setting up an asset management strategy are planning for new purchases and setting performance benchmarks. When hammering out an asset lifecycle plan, where all assets are accounted for from cradle-to-grave, the EAM solution needs to provide management with analytical reports that establish the foundations of their capital budgeting decisions. This practical and accurate information is key in determining the timing of new assets being introduced to the lifecycle as old ones are retired. Beyond buying and selling decisions, which are not routine events, management will also need information to set benchmarks and analyze performance. This makes the process of determining workflow recommendations and managing work orders grounded into hard evidence.

Most EAM end-users, such as technicians or field engineers, will not be nearly as comfortable using the management software as they are using the assets. That’s no fault of theirs, but it does put emphasis on setting up an EAM solution that has time saving functionality and simple navigation. After ongoing training and internal communications reinforcing the benefits of using the software, ease-of-use will be a key determining whether an organization is getting full use out of the software. It’s no surprise that usability is one of the major trends in EAM in 2011, as end-users interactions with the software continue to add to the company’s knowledge base. That’s the collection of invaluable historical data used to make decisions, which takes us back to management’s role in analyzing reports during asset lifecycle planning.

This point goes hand in hand with the proactive approach preached for asset maintenance strategy. Assets come loaded with documentation, from vendor information to technical specs and manufacturer’s warranties, and its up to users to keep these accessible and organized. While accessing and using these documents may not happen often or be any person’s particular responsibility, there are few instances when the importance of these documents becomes crucial. These include major breakdowns, when service agreements need to be examined, and analyzing vendor relationship during the purchasing process. In terms of the other benefits highlighted above, this may seem trivial, but in the spirit of saving time and getting the most out of your investment, it’s a great feature to demand and use.