Operations Management
3. Report on Reliability and Maintenance methods as applied to our study group 1. Introduction
The system of study group’s reliability often depends on the effort of many individual members of the group, making reliability a group good. It is well-known that purely voluntary provision of the group good may result in a free rider problem: individual members of the group may tend to shirk, resulting in an inefficient level of group good. How much effort each individual member of the group exerts will depend on his or her own benefits and costs, the efforts exerted by the other individual members of the group, and the technic that relates individual effort to outcomes. In the context of system of study group’s reliability, we can distinguish three prototypical cases.
Total effort – Reliability depends on the sum of the efforts exerted by the individual member of the group.
Weakest link – Reliability depends on the minimum effort.
Best link – Reliability depends on the minimum effort.
On the other hand study group’s maintenance management is a critical component of the overall study program. The management function should bind the distinct parts of the program into a cohesive entity. What is maintenance and why is it performed? Past and current maintenance practices in both the private and government sectors would imply that maintenance is the actions associated with equipment repair after it is broken. The dictionary defines maintenance as follows: “the work of keeping something in proper condition; upkeep.”
This would imply that maintenance should be actions taken to prevent a device or component from failing or to repair normal equipment degradation experienced with the operation of the device to keep it in proper working order.
Unfortunately, data obtained in many studies over the past decade indicates that most private and government facilities do not expend the necessary resources to maintain equipment in proper
The system of study group’s reliability often depends on the effort of many individual members of the group, making reliability a group good. It is well-known that purely voluntary provision of the group good may result in a free rider problem: individual members of the group may tend to shirk, resulting in an inefficient level of group good. How much effort each individual member of the group exerts will depend on his or her own benefits and costs, the efforts exerted by the other individual members of the group, and the technic that relates individual effort to outcomes. In the context of system of study group’s reliability, we can distinguish three prototypical cases.
Total effort – Reliability depends on the sum of the efforts exerted by the individual member of the group.
Weakest link – Reliability depends on the minimum effort.
Best link – Reliability depends on the minimum effort.
On the other hand study group’s maintenance management is a critical component of the overall study program. The management function should bind the distinct parts of the program into a cohesive entity. What is maintenance and why is it performed? Past and current maintenance practices in both the private and government sectors would imply that maintenance is the actions associated with equipment repair after it is broken. The dictionary defines maintenance as follows: “the work of keeping something in proper condition; upkeep.”
This would imply that maintenance should be actions taken to prevent a device or component from failing or to repair normal equipment degradation experienced with the operation of the device to keep it in proper working order.
Unfortunately, data obtained in many studies over the past decade indicates that most private and government facilities do not expend the necessary resources to maintain equipment in proper
References: 1. Brown, John (1973). Toward an economic theory of liability. Journal of Legal Studies, 2:323–350 2. Cornes, Richard (1993). Dyke maintenance and other stories: Some neglected types of public goods 3. Hermalin, Benjamin (1998). Towards and economic theory of leadership: Leading by example 4. Hirshleifer, Jack (1983). From weakest-link to best-shot: the voluntary provision of public goods 5. M., Daniel G. Arce and Sandler, Todd (2001). Transnational public goods: strategies and institutions 6. Olson, Mancur and Zeckhauser, Richard (1966). An economic theory of alliances. 7. Sandler, Todd and Hartley, Keith (2001). Economics of alliances: The lessons for collective action 8. Shavell, Stoeven (1987). Economic Analysis of Accident Law. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA. 9. Varian, Hal R. (1994). Sequential provision of public goods. Journal of Public Economics, 53:165–186 NASA. 2000. Reliability Centered Maintenance Guide for Facilities and Collateral Equipment. Piotrowski, J. April 2, 2001. Pro-Active Maintenance for Pumps, Archives, February 2001, PumpZone.com [Report online]. Available URL: http://www.pump-zone.com. Reprinted with permission of Pump-Zone.com