Articles tagged Value

Effective Quantification of RCA Benefits

Barringer Process Reliability – Your “factory” performance on a single page

Paul H. Barringer invented the Barringer Process Reliability (BPR) process. Paul was a fellow Reliability Engineer “extraordinaire” and an outstanding mentor for myself and countless others in this field of practice. BPR highlights operational issues. If not addressed or mitigated, those could have significant revenue impacts on an operation. A BPR analysis uses the Weibull probability plot which happens to be a very well-known tool in the field of Reliability Engineering. On one side of a sheet of paper only, the BPR plot can tell the true “story” on the operation. One of those “stories” relates to high impact events best tackled by a Root Cause Analysis.

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by Pete Stuart Leave a Comment

Shaping Organizational Behavior

When conducting a Human Reliability Assessment (HRA), we use the terminology errors of commission or errors of omission. It behooves every professional to question why we focus on one metric in preference to all others in an objective and constructive manner in order to discern whether we are exposing our organization to errors of professional omission or commission. The other conclusion is that we are doing the right thing and this is also an empowering piece of knowledge.

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by James Reyes-Picknell Leave a Comment

Cost Control or Value Generation?

If you can’t sell all you can produce, then reducing costs is often the only way to improve margins, but that simplistic accounting perspective is not always the case.

Cost control is often thought to be key to attaining profitability but it the case of maintenance it can get you into trouble.

Cost control can have a big opportunity cost if you don’t take advantage of the opportunities you have. [Read more…]

by Fred Schenkelberg Leave a Comment

10 Ways to Find Reliability Value

Most everyone agrees that improving a product or process reliability is a good thing. It’s good for customers, factories, and our business. And sometimes it’s difficult to answer the question,

‘What is the value of that reliability activity?’

What if your boss asks you what value you provide to the organization? Your answer may to harder to compose than you think.

How would you quantify your skills, experience, and knowledge and your role within the complex formal and informal working environments? [Read more…]

by Fred Schenkelberg 1 Comment

What is the Link between Reliability and Brand?

In short, you probably do, better reliability performance the better the brand image.

When I’m making a purchase I prefer to buy items that I either have personal experience work well over time (reliable) or have many comments and reviews noting the durability.

As a reliability engineer, I am often asked what kind of car I drive (a Toyota Highlander, if must know). Reliability does matter -not only to me- it matters for many making a buying decision.

When a product’s actual reliability performance exceeds the customers expected reliability performance, the customer may consider the product reliable. This experience builds and when supported by other experiences from the same brand, increases brand equity. High brand equity permits a price premium, increased brand loyalty, and increased positive word of mouth support. [Read more…]

by Fred Schenkelberg 1 Comment

Successful Reliability Engineers Add Value

Value is:

the regard that something is held to deserve; the importance, worth,
or usefulness of something. [1]

As a reliability engineer, we work across the organization to bring a reliable product to market. The value of meeting the customer’s reliability expectations results in customer satisfactions, increased sales, and in some cases premium pricing.

We want a reliable product.

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by Fred Schenkelberg Leave a Comment

Success as a Reliability Engineer

Whether by design or by accident some of us become reliability engineers. Making a career in reliability engineering relies on your ability to make a difference and to add value. Being successful as a reliability engineer, while creating reliable products, permits continuation and growth as a reliability professional.

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by Fred Schenkelberg 2 Comments

11 Ways to Find Reliability Value

Most agree that improving products or process reliability is a good thing. It’s good for customers, factories, and our business.

And, sometimes it’s difficult to answer the question,

What is the value of that reliability activity?

Years ago my boss asked me what value I provided the organization. Working as a reliability professional, I thought that my value was obvious. He asked me to show the value.

It was harder than I thought.

[Read more…]

by Fred Schenkelberg Leave a Comment

Increasing Value

Value for any business activity is a guiding principle to stay in business.

While not always about money, it is about value. We invest in product design and distribution, plant design and operation, to realize a benefit or return on the investment which makes the investment worth the effort and time. Same with our individual work- we endeavor to make a difference and realize not just a paycheck, (well some do). Increasing value is our responsibility as reliability professionals. [Read more…]

by Fred Schenkelberg 2 Comments

HALT Value

It’s always necessary to estimate the value of specific reliability activities. It is needed to justify the investment required to accomplish the task. Prototypes, diagnostics equipment, and environmental chambers are expensive. The difficulty is an inability to know what will be found, before conducting the experiment.

Not doing the test means the certainty of not finding anything. That is often not enough motivation to invest, to learn something about the reliability performance. The following scenario is just one situation, along with a few ideas to help you estimate the value of investments in reliability work. [Read more…]

by Fred Schenkelberg 3 Comments

ALT Value

Here is an example of how to determine the future value of a specific reliability task. Many of us face the challenge of how to justify spending product development resources to provide insights and information to the rest of the team. Accelerated life testing (ALT) is particularly difficult: It is time consuming, expensive, and at times statistically complex. Having a clear method to estimate the value serves your career and the organization well, as both benefit from the right investments.

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by Fred Schenkelberg 3 Comments

Reliability Value

What is reliability management? Reliability Engineering? Would a product design or an organization benefit with a focus on reliability management and engineering? What is the value of a focus on reliability?

Any organization, that develops and produces products, has resource limits. It may be talent, capabilities, time, funding, or some combination of these. Yet, the goal to create a product that meets customer expectations includes the concept of product reliability. The product should provide the expected functions over time, without failure. This expected product reliability occurs, even if the design requirements and advertising do not explicitly mention product reliability. [Read more…]

by Fred Schenkelberg 3 Comments

Good Mind

It is not enough to have a good mind; it is more important to use it well. — Descartes

Learning and Value

Over the past week, I’ve received a couple of questions about the pursuit of a graduate degree in reliability engineering and about preparing for the CRE. One question was particularly interesting – how will a reliability engineering graduate degree or CRE help my career? [Read more…]