Download the 2011 Edition (PDF) - ReliabilityWeb.com

SUCCESS
Success is something we all strive for but seldom take the time to fully
understand. Few think about why things go right because they are so busy
dealing with all of the equipment, policy, and processes that are going
wrong.
Many of the solutions to our failures lie in our successes. The study of
success, or positive deviance, as it is called, has been used
to solve malnutrition and famine in foreign countries,
political turmoil during wars, and even pump failures in
manufacturing plants.
The Root Cause of Success
(RCS) is simply a process that
includes using your existing root
cause tools to better understand
why your processes and
equipment work reliably.
For example, if you have
a bank of seven pumps
within your facility and
five of the seven have never
failed, then ask yourself why.
What is different about these
successful pumps When you look
into the success factors for the five
reliable pumps, you may discover
any or all of the following: proper
alignment, correct initial assembly, proper mounting, correct up and
downstream piping, etc.
These findings can then be leveraged across the remaining, less reliable
pumps, increasing their productivity and your plant up-time.
If your plant has created a culture where it is OK to use failure
investigations to blame or punish folks within the facility, then
applying RCS may help get your program back
on track. Using this method, you can focus
on the positive, solve problems, reward
good behavior, and change the culture.
For 2011, consider your success. Take the
time to use your root cause tools to
analyze your good fortune. What
have been your enablers Leverage
them and enjoy your 2011.
Shon Isenhour CMRP is the
Director of Education for
GPAllied. His focus is on
providing holistic reliability
improvement and bottom
line performance gains to the
manufacturing sector. You
can read his blog at www.
reliabilitynow.net or reach him
at sisenhour@gpallied.com or
by phone at 843-810-4446.