A cornerstone of Ideal Setech’ s value creation is our site subject matter experts resource who functions as the key technical liaison for plant operations, maintenance and outside vendors by providing assistance in identifying and developing effective cost saving opportunities with a focus on improving equipment performance and reliability. Additionally, this individual supports preventive maintenance programs and identifies and optimizes spare parts required to support those activities.
Although we hire staff with industry specific experience and from previous maintenance, production and procurement work roles, we see that one of our very important responsibilities is to act as coordinator and facilitator of external subject matter experts. It is our site practice to attend daily maintenance and production meetings to address material availability, provide root cause failure information of failed and/or repaired components, receive communication on production/maintenance and shift coverage changes, assist with asset down or component recovery efforts and to help provide informed access to external sources of technical expertise.
This interaction with the plant maintenance, production, and engineering areas results in initiatives that produce cost reductions and process improvements. Furthermore, the technical support program requires data analysis on product usage, equipment variation and spend trends, with a coordinated approach to subject matter experts within the supply community. Some examples of target areas and potential projects for all technical resources are:
• Usage reduction – longer life items
• Operational assessment – bench-marking current state and optimizing processes
• Spend reduction – consumption management and new technology
• Lean manufacturing initiatives
• Training for new technology and product application
• Obsolescence recovery and avoidance
• New asset spare parts setup and forecasting
• Interface with supplier’s technical resources
• Identifying bottleneck areas and suggesting improvements
• Root cause analysis on product and process inefficiencies
• Product standardization and substitution
• OEM spare parts conversion