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Utility companies depend on critical infrastructure assets to drive their businesses. In contrast to field service operations like meter and home services, the mobilization of asset management processes gets scant attention. These relatively unglamorous processes - preventative maintenance, corrective maintenance, and asset inspections - have a significant impact on power generation, transmission, and distribution operations. The Untapped Opportunity
Energy and utility companies depend on critical infrastructure assets to drive their businesses. With billions of dollars invested in these assets every year, it’s no surprise that companies are interested in ways to leverage existing investments and avoid new capital outlays. Hence, maintenance expenditures represent a significant portion of utility O&M budgets.

When it comes to mobility solutions for utilities, most of the focus has been on field service operations like meter and home services. In contrast, scant attention has been paid to mobilizing asset management processes like preventative maintenance (PM), corrective maintenance (CM), and asset inspections – relatively unglamorous processes that have a significant impact on power generation, transmission, and distribution operations.

The reality is that mobile Enterprise Asset Management initiatives represent untapped opportunities for direct improvements in reliability, compliance, and operations costs; and for indirect improvements in customer service, return on assets (ROA), and shareholder value. Moreover, mobile Enterprise Asset Management solutions deliver rapid payback and return on investment. As a result, utility companies are realizing that connecting mobile workers to Enterprise Asset Management systems and processes is a strategic imperative. Why Now?
According to Jill Feblowitz, Energy & Utilities Research Director at AMR Research, “Economic conditions in a post-Enron world have energy companies focusing on assets. After looking at assets strictly from a financial valuation standpoint, some companies are exploring what it takes to maintain the asset as well. The cuts in spending and capital investment have hit Energy particularly hard, and companies are seeking to get more life out of existing assets while reducing costs of maintenance and repair.”

The central challenge for utilities is this: Critical assets are distributed and employees are mobile. At the same time, employees must interact with the organization’s Enterprise Asset Management system. Mobile workers need information at the point of performance to do their jobs; information like location-equipment data, work and failure history, job and safety plans, and more. Managers need critical information from the field for better planning, scheduling, and decision-making. So, it’s not enough to simply have an Enterprise Asset Management system. To be truly effective, utilities providers need to connect maintenance employees to the system – wherever they are. Benefits of Mobile Enterprise Asset Management Solutions
Benefit #1: Reliability & Asset Life
Public Utility Commissions (PUCs) and customer groups demand that regulated utilities meet service interruption standards like SAIDI, SAIFI, CAIDI, and MAIFI. When technicians have access to information at the point of performance, first-time fix rates increase, PMs get done properly, and utilities avoid equipment failures and outages. Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) standards outline best and worst asset management practices (Figure 1).

Programs like Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM), Total Productive Maintenance (TPM), and Predictive Maintenance (PdM), require information for trend analysis to fuel better scheduling, maintenance, and capital planning decisions. Mobile Enterprise Asset Management solutions provide managers with accurate and timely information from the field (e.g., labor time, materials usage, and failure data), ultimately creating more proactive organizations. (Figure 2).

Benefit #2: Safety & Compliance
Utility providers are faced with a myriad of regulations that protect public and employee safety. Lack of compliance can result in significant fines as well as personal injury to citizens or employees.

The Department of Transportation (DOT) specifies rules for relief valve inspections and operator qualifications necessary for those inspections. The Occupational, Health, and Safety Administration (OSHA) mandates inspection of fire extinguishers and eye wash stations. Mobile Enterprise Asset Management solutions facilitate the completion of standard PMs, proper CM procedures, and inspections by qualified employees.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is charged with the development of “a comprehensive national plan for securing the key resources and critical infrastructure of the United States including power production, generation, and distribution systems.” Mobile Enterprise Asset Management solutions contribute to systems integrity and accountability of critical assets across an entire organization. State and local utilities face additional financial regulations. Governmental Accounting Standards Board Statements (GASB 34 & 35) call for the use of Enterprise Asset Management solutions to maintain assets and to consider the accurate physical condition of the asset in accounting. Mobile Enterprise Asset Management solutions make it more economical to comply with these regulations.

Benefit #3: Operations Costs & Productivity
Experience shows that organizations can save between 45-120 minutes per day per worker in unproductive time (administrative paperwork, data entry, and travel time). This means that utilities providers can effectively reduce overtime costs, clear maintenance backlogs, complete required PMs and safety work orders, expand capacity without adding crews, and cope with an aging workforce. (Figure 3)

Benefit #4: Customer Service & Shareholder Value
Mobile Enterprise Asset Management solutions help utilities comply with service level agreements (SLAs) that are required to meet regulatory requirements and maintain positive customer relations. Performance Based Rates (PBRs) permit utilities to earn higher rates of return if they meet reliability, safety, and customer service standards.

Benefit #5: Low Risk. High Reward.
Mobile Enterprise Asset Management initiatives typically provide fast payback. According to META Group² , field workers (e.g., service technicians, linemen, “trouble men,” meter readers) and site rovers (e.g., warehouse staff, plant maintenance technicians, garage staff) are associated with initiatives offering short term Return on Investment.

5 Habits of Highly Effective Mobile EAM Initiatives
Despite the fact that mobile EAM initiatives deliver significant benefits and fast payback in most cases, it’s still possible to fail. Yet successful utilities set themselves up for success by adopting winning habits. Figure 4 summarizes these practices.

Habit #1: Understand goals and benefits
Author Stephen Covey advocates that one should “begin with an end in mind.” Organizations should decide which Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are important to them, where they are now, and where they want to be relative to these KPIs over time. They can determine which mobile solution benefits affect those KPIs. (Figure 5)

Habit #2: Determine processes, roles, responsibilities, and data needs
The next habit is critical because it forces organizations to think through problems independent of specific technology decisions.

• Which assets are most critical?
• Which Enterprise Asset Management processes affect those assets?
• Which day-to-day data collection processes, would improve productivity or bring about better, faster decisions, if they were performed without manual, paper-driven methods?
• Which workers will execute those processes?
• What are their working conditions?
• Which Enterprise Asset Management data do these workers require?

Habit #3: Select the right solution
Software
The right mobile applications change the game by recognizing that the needs of mobile workers are different from those of planners, schedulers, and supervisors. The right solutions deliver simplicity to minimize unproductive work and maximize productive work. The right solutions provide the usability necessary to achieve the benefits we’ve discussed.

• Does the solution facilitate both real-time and occasionally connected synchronization with the EAM system?
• If occasionally connected, how robust is the client application so that people can keep working with or without a connection?
• How usable is it?

Devices & Peripherals

• Do conditions dictate the use of ruggedized devices?
• Do employees work real-time with always-on connections?
• If so, battery life can be an issue. If not, synchronizing once or twice a day with the EAM system is appropriate.
• Do you require that data be captured using barcode scanners? Barcode scanners can eliminate errors due to manual data entry and provide rapid visibility of assets, tools, and parts.

Communications
There are many ways to communicate and synchronize (e.g., docking cradle, local area network (LAN), wireless LAN (WLAN), phone line, cellular network, and wide area network (WAN). Each method has its own pros and cons. Companies need to validate the costs and benefits of each versus their own business needs.

• Will employees operate in a completely connected (storeroom) or occasionally connected environment (field)?
• How will employees connect?

Support

• Does the mobile EAM solutions provider experience and a track record of ROI and customer satisfaction?
• What size deployments have they done?
• How much do they invest in R&D, training, services, and support?
• Is their solution built on technology that is ready for the next 5-10 years, not the last 5-10?
• Are they financially viable?
• Does it make sense to buy from your EAM software provider to have one point of support?

Habit #4: Follow proven change management practices
Implement systematically. Experience has shown that mobile EAM solutions can be rolled out incrementally in stages starting with the most critical assets, the most important teams or business units, and the most crucial work processes. Make your mobile employees part of the process (e.g., by training the trainer), especially your most influential leaders who can influence the rest of the team. Reward and recognize them for using the technology to better support the processes.

Habit #5: Measure and review
Document your processes before and after to understand the cost savings. Capture process flows, task times, and results. Metrics to track include:

• PM compliance
• Proactive vs. reactive work
• Work orders tracked
• Regulatory fines
• Data quality
• Worker satisfaction.

Muhammad Ali said, “The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.” Mobile EAM solutions deliver significant benefits for utility providers. So why are your employees still walking around with paper and clipboards?

In Conclusion
Muhammad Ali said, “The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.” Mobile EAM solutions deliver significant benefits for utility providers. So why are your employees still walking around with paper and clipboards? ¹Assumptions: Asset Touches = # of techs x 1 more touch per day x 220 days. Cost Savings = # of techs x .75 hours/day x 220 days x $60/hr.

²Service Delivery Management and Service Mobility, META Group report, 2003