Executive Summary

The goal of all continuous improvement is either reduction to the inputs of: Labor, management effort, maintenance parts, materials, supplies, raw materials, energy, capital and overhead, or improve reliability and repeatability of process, improve output and improve safety for the employees, the public and the environment. Continuous improvement of failures is a multiple step process. These steps are: Commitment, Measurement, Investigation, and Action. Organization should be committed towards continuous improvement and devote time, and encourage workers. The company should establish ways to measure the maintenance department. The process of setting up measures is called benchmarking. Review the production and then the maintenance incident history. After investigation, take action. Improve the tooling. Make it easier to do the maintenance tasks. Automate some of the maintenance tasks.