Criticality analysis
Consequence-based ranking across safety, environment, production and cost, giving a defensible basis for where effort goes.
Practice
Maintenance Optimisation
Maintenance effort is finite. Optimisation is the work of making sure it lands on the equipment and failure modes where it actually protects production, cost and safety.
The challenge
Most maintenance plans are inherited, not engineered.
Walk into almost any plant and the maintenance schedule will contain tasks nobody can justify: intervals copied from a manual written for a different duty, inspections that have never found anything, and overhauls performed on schedule regardless of condition. Meanwhile the equipment that repeatedly stops production is often on a lighter regime than the pumps in the plant room.
Optimisation corrects that imbalance. We reconstruct the maintenance programme from asset criticality and dominant failure modes, remove tasks that add no value, and redirect the recovered hours to where consequence is highest.
- Up to 20%Maintenance cost reduction targeted
- HigherPlanned vs. reactive work ratio
- FewerRepeat failures on critical equipment
Capabilities
What this practice covers
Maintenance tactic development
Task selection from failure modes using RCM logic — condition-based where detectable, time-based where justified, run-to-failure where rational.
Task & interval rationalisation
Review of the existing plan to eliminate duplication, merge routes and set intervals against evidence rather than habit.
Work management process design
Planning and scheduling process, roles, KPIs and weekly rhythm so that good tactics actually get executed.
Spares & materials optimisation
Holding levels aligned to demand, lead time and criticality — releasing working capital without exposing the plant.
Shutdown & outage strategy
Scope challenge, work packaging and critical path planning so outages deliver the intended work in the window available.
How we work
Our approach
01
Diagnose
Analyse work order history, failure records, backlog profile and current schedule to establish where effort and losses sit today.
02
Rank
Apply criticality analysis so subsequent decisions are anchored to consequence rather than opinion.
03
Re-engineer
Rebuild tactics from failure modes for critical classes; rationalise the remainder; align spares and resources.
04
Embed
Load into the CMMS, train planners and supervisors, and track adherence and availability for the first cycles.
Deliverables
What you receive
Tangible, usable outputs — structured for the systems and people who have to live with them after we leave.
- Asset criticality register with scoring rationale
- Optimised maintenance tactics by equipment class
- CMMS-ready job plans, task lists and BOMs
- Task rationalisation report with removed/retained decisions
- Planning and scheduling process definition
- Maintenance KPI set and reporting pack
- Spares holding recommendations with justification
- Implementation roadmap with ownership and dates
FAQ
Common questions
Two years of work order data is ideal, but we frequently start with less. Where records are poor we supplement with structured artisan and supervisor workshops — the knowledge is usually in the plant, just not in the system.
No. Cost reduction is a by-product of correct allocation, not the objective. On critical equipment we often increase intervention; the savings come from eliminating low-value routine work elsewhere.
Schedule compliance and backlog quality shift within one to two months of implementation. Availability improvements on critical equipment typically become visible over two to three quarters, as failure patterns respond.
Yes. Deliverables are structured for direct load into the major EAM platforms, including task list, maintenance item and BOM formats.
Keep exploring
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ExploreGlobal Engineering Support
Embedded and remote engineering teams from Africa's technical talent pool — reliability, planning, integrity and data specialists on demand.
ExploreReady to talk about maintenance optimisation?
Send us the context — asset type, current pain, and what good would look like. We will respond with a practical view of scope and sequence.