Can You Be More Valuable to Your Boss?

Maintenance leaders are faced with a myriad of decisions that have the potential of affecting their company’s bottom line.  Yet, the maintenance department at for-hire companies and the fleet management office of private companies are often considered an expense.  Smart managers, however, are finding ways to communicate their value to their senior management.

Take a food distribution company we work with.  Cranking issues are a common plague for this segment and this company was no exception.  They noticed roadside failures involving  cranking system had been increasing over the past year.  Their Parts Manager and Maintenance Director took a risk.  They decided to upgrade the battery used.  Although that only cost an extra $45.00 per vehicle, multiplying it across a good sized fleet, the spending became material.

How could they know their risk paid off?  Just as important, how could they justify the increased spending to their company?  They accomplished this by tracking the frequency of their cranking system roadside failures.  In the first six months following this change, their miles run between a cranking system failure improved 75%.  More important, their spending on batteries and cables decreased 84%.  Both service levels and costs were improved due to this single decision.

Can you imagine the next meeting with their management?  This maintenance team can now quantify a problem they identified, explain their plan to address and, even though their plan initially increased costs, they can clearly communicate a significant net savings.

I’m sure you make good decisions for your company every day.  Using data can confirm the value of these decisions not only to you, but your leadership team.