Improve Your Preventative Maintenance Program

Preventative maintenance today is the key to avoiding costly repairs tomorrow. Still, even the most well-designed preventative maintenance plans will need modifying from time to time. As you discover areas of weakness, here’s how to improve your preventative maintenance program in 10 steps.

Put together a team

As the facility manager, you may have spearheaded your organization’s current preventative maintenance program when you first joined the company. It’s possible you are the only member of the team, which isn’t too uncommon. However, the first step is to decide whether a single-person team is best, or if you should bring a few others alongside you.

Take an inventory of your assets

Do you know everything within your building, such as its equipment and appliances? Probably not. While you may have started or even developed an asset list years ago, the second step to improve your preventative maintenance program is to take a full and thorough inventory of everything.

Pick a single asset to focus on

Now, focus on one asset. For the rest of this blog, we’ll assume you chose your HVAC system, but you can start anywhere you want.

Define failure

The fourth step is to define failure. What is the worst case scenario for your HVAC system? Probably for most, it would be if the system didn’t cool the place down during the dog days of summer. Ask yourself what part of the system is most likely to fail?

Define proper restoration

Once you know that, define proper restoration of that component. If it’s the condenser failing, how would you get it repaired or replaced? If it’s a defective blower, do you know the name of the appropriate vendor to fix it?

Develop an action plan

Assuming you know the answer to both of the last two questions we just asked, the sixth step to improve your preventative maintenance program is to develop an action plan. Do you call your Integrated Facility Management company as soon as there’s a problem? Or, if you’re operating without an IFM partner, do you spend some time investigating the issue first before calling an HVAC service tech? What are your follow up procedures if the tech doesn’t show?

Communicate to stakeholders

The seventh, and possibly most critical step to improve your preventative maintenance program is to communicate. Let your building tenants know who they should call if there’s an issue, whether it’s you or the IFM’s dedicated support number for your building.

Develop your database

Now that you’ve done this research for your HVAC system, update your database with this info. Add in what you’ve learned, such as the age of the components, the name of the vendor you need to call, and how long you expect remediation to take.

Repeat steps 3 through 6

So now that you’ve done all of this for your HVAC system, repeat the process for the rest of your building’s assets. Not all of them will look the same, but the steps will be similar.

Work with an Integrated Facility Management firm

The final step to improve your preventative maintenance program is to simply work with an Integrated Facility Management company like LESCO360. We’ll handle these steps so all you have to do is make a quick phone call to our team and we take care of everything from there, including improving and refining your preventative maintenance program!