Asset maintenance strategic planning

Strategic planning is an important step for businesses to recognize what is needed to stay competitive. One of the most effective planning tool is Technology Roadmap (TRM) which was created by Motorola in the late 80s. The TRM is simply a roadmap that helps in identifying what is needed to obtain a certain technology to gain competitive advantage. It is usually comprising of 5 years plan. The TRM comprise of 3 sections against a timeline. The sections are Technology, product and market/business drivers. some of its benefits are:

External benefits:(McKeen & Smith, 2006)

• Achieving business goals by identifying the current technological gaps and fulfilling them.
• Reducing complexity of technological advances by focusing on one area.
• Increase the speed of implementation resulting in a faster time to market.
• Reducing difficulties with the deployment of technology.

Internal benefits:(McKeen & Smith, 2006; Lee et al., 2011; Phaal et al., 2003)

• Building a consistent technology base
• Implementation is simplified by moving in planned phases
• Creating a global solution for international and global companies
• Reducing the cost of development and maintenance.
• Improve communication and coordination
• Supports planning and decision making
• Supports the business strategy and planning even beyond the product and technology planning phase

This tool is important for Asset Management as it helps to identify if a certain technology can help in increasing the benefit of it. Moreover, it gives an insight on how it can be linked to the business strategy than using it as a stand alone management tool. Furthermore, creating such a plan by the cooperation of management and R&D can give a path on what needs to be done to achieve this state. An important aspect to remember is that it has to be updated constantly as business conditions change rapidly and strategic planning should be aware to control the situation.

Continuing on maintenance strategic planning, TRM can be used to plan on how our department can acquire the technology of electrical servo-actuators. This will demonstrate what business drivers are their to justify this project. Moreover, workshops can be created to include market, product, technology and roadmapping (Phaal et al., 2011).

Ahmed Alali : 11 Jun 2013 17:28 |  Tags: Kbam |  Comments (0) |  Report a problem