Asset Management – Head in the Cloud with Feet on Firm Foundations

I recently attended a conference for a well-known Asset Management Software company. I was very impressed to realise that the tools available to us are amazingly clever in this day and age. 

From a software perspective, the conference raised questions around the use of the cloud, the Internet of Things, and how artificial intelligence can take on more mundane tasks and possibly provide better consistency than a person.  The possibilities seemed endless.

But the user presentations at the conference also highlighted that those Councils who are maximising the capabilities of their asset management systems are those who have built from the ground up, doing the basics well and often. 

It’s not always glamorous keeping an asset register up to date and accurate and plotting the locations of assets.  But these are the infrastructure management foundation stones that, when done well, will allow you to build on top of that foundation stone with confidence.

And those Councils whose systems are well implemented all echoed the sentiment that they could have done the process well on a piece of paper. 

Of the three parts of a quality business, they knew the process, they resourced and trained the people and only then, finally, did they implement the system. 

And obviously, the system allowed them to do more than the paper could ever do. 

But it isn’t the system that provides confidence. It is the people and the process.

We saw users at the conference who are now easily managing tens of thousands of work instructions in a year.  And they are able to easily locate, review, audit and alter any of these. 

The system has eliminated the risks of the information held only by individual staff; has allowed for the ability to forecast cashflow and commitments. 

All of these tasks were impossible prior and riddled with assumptions.  That is the power of what a system can deliver that was not achievable back when we managed with purchase order books and clerks of works.

So while we now all dream with our asset management heads in the cloud (literally now for modern software!), we know it is the foundation that we have laid down in the process and people that allows us to build upwards with confidence.

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