What Information Should I Capture When Completing a Work Order?
Determining what information to capture when completing a work order is a question that all maintenance organizations struggle with. This question can be especially daunting to organizations transitioning from a paper based work order management system to a CMMS. In order to effectively answer this question one must start with the end in mind. In other words, what information will be useful to track over time? Below are some key pieces of data that should be captured when completing a work order and the value of tracking that data.
Completion Date & Time: This information allows the user to track when specific work was done. It allows for the development of historical trending which can be used setup preventive or predictive maintenance plans and calculate meantime between repairs or failures. This information should be captured for all resources working on the work order.
Labor Resources: This should include all resources that worked on the work order. This will make it possible to determine the true labor cost of the work order and the impact on resource for future planning.
Completion Comments: Completion comments should state in sufficient detail the work that was performed to complete the work order. Just putting "Complete" should be considered insufficient. The completion comments may capture discrepancies in the work suggested by the work order versus the work actually performed. It may indicate follow up work that needs to be done requiring the creation of additional work orders.
Materials Used: This information determines the true materials cost of the work order. It allows improved materials planning future work. It also provides the ability to trend material usage for specific assets over time.
Special Tools: Special tools such as man lifts, power tools, and specialty tools should be captured when completing the work order. This will allow for improved work scheduling by ensuring that work is scheduled when the necessary tools are available. By assigning cost related to the use of these tools, a better understanding of their impact on the overall work order costs can be determined.
Capturing the information above when completing a work order will allow the maintenance organization to get a better understanding of costs associated with specific work orders and specific assets. It can help an organization determine the appropriate staffing levels and skills needed to maintain the equipment and insight into what predictive and preventive maintenance programs should be put in place to improve equipment reliability. Capturing, trending, and reviewing these data elements will help a maintenance organization move from a reactive culture to a proactive culture.
