This article is one of our favourites from around the web. We've included an excerpt below but do go and read the original!
When everything feels urgent, nothing truly is. Maintenance teams face constant pressure from competing demands - emergency breakdowns, scheduled preventative work, improvement projects, and routine requests all vie for attention. Without clear prioritisation, teams bounce reactively between tasks, critical work gets delayed, and frustration mounts. Here's how to bring order to the chaos.
Create a simple, universally understood priority system that everyone uses consistently. Most organisations succeed with four levels:
Define each level explicitly so requesters and technicians interpret priorities the same way.
The most important question when prioritising any work order is: what happens if we don't do this now? Equipment failures affecting critical production processes, safety systems, or revenue-generating operations obviously rank higher than issues with redundant systems or non-essential equipment. Consider both the severity of impact and the scope - a problem affecting multiple operations outweighs one impacting a single area.
Safety concerns override almost everything else. Any issue presenting immediate danger to personnel - exposed electrical hazards, structural risks, malfunctioning safety equipment - demands immediate attention regardless of other priorities. Even potential safety issues warrant higher priority than operational efficiency concerns.
Some problems worsen rapidly if ignored, whilst others remain stable. A bearing showing early vibration symptoms might run for weeks, but ignoring it risks catastrophic failure causing extensive damage and much longer downtime. Understanding failure progression helps distinguish between issues that can wait and those requiring prompt intervention before they escalate.
The constant temptation is letting emergencies consume all available time, pushing preventative maintenance aside indefinitely. This creates a vicious cycle where deferred preventative work leads to more breakdowns. Protect time for scheduled preventative maintenance even when reactive demands pile up. A good rule: reserve at least 60-70% of maintenance capacity for planned work, keeping reactive work below 30-40%.
Sometimes the "most important" task isn't what gets done first because you lack the right person, parts, or equipment. Practical prioritisation considers resource availability. If your specialist is tied up all day but you have three general technicians available, it may make sense to tackle several medium-priority tasks they can handle rather than everyone standing idle waiting for the specialist.
When multiple tasks share the same priority level, consider how long they've been waiting. A two-week-old routine request probably deserves attention before today's similar request, preventing any work from languishing indefinitely in the backlog.
Technicians need to understand not just what to do, but why one task takes precedence over another. When priorities shift (and they will) explain the reasoning. This transparency helps teams make good independent decisions when new situations arise and reduces frustration about constantly changing directions.
Priorities aren't static. Hold brief daily planning meetings to review the upcoming work, adjust priorities based on new information, and ensure everyone understands the day's focus. Weekly reviews of the entire backlog identify work that's been overlooked or needs reprioritisation based on changing conditions.
Effective prioritisation isn't about perfectly optimising every decision - it's about ensuring critical work happens promptly whilst maintaining the preventative programmes that reduce future emergencies. Get the framework right, and maintenance teams spend less time debating what to do next and more time actually doing it.
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