A strategic plan for incorporating a maintenance strategy to support and sustain maximisation of product volumes.

Abstract

The Acerinox Group has recently acquired Columbus Stainless. With this acquisition, came a dramatic change in operations philosophy. This involves maximisation of product volumes and a low cost strategy throughout the plant. This paper serves to present the management dilemma currently present at Columbus Stainless: Is the current Corporate Maintenance Strategy able to support the manufacturing strategy as laid down by Acerinox? Is there a breakdown in synergy between this corporate maintenance strategy and plant-specific maintenance strategies and why? As part of the research methodology a construct has been developed to perform a gap analysis between World Class/Best Practice maintenance practices and the Columbus Stainless and plant-specific maintenance strategies. A gap analysis is also performed between the Columbus Stainless Maintenance Strategy and the plant-specific maintenance strategies at the Hot End of the organisation. A questionnaire is also used to determine the maturity level of the maintenance management in terms of World Class/Best Practice maintenance theory, the Corporate Maintenance Strategy and plant-specific maintenance strategies. This study has found that the Corporate Maintenance Strategy is able to support the maximisation of volumes and low cost strategy by comparing the World Class/Best Practice maintenance practices found in grounded theory, to the Corporate Strategy and to the plant-specific strategies. The results from this study also find that there is a breakdown in synergy between one plant at the Hot End of the organisation and the Corporate Maintenance Strategy. The reasons for the breakdown in synergy are identified and recommendations are made accordingly.