Any organisation that is responsible for physical assets would benefit from a joined-up approach to the overall system by which those assets are looked after.
As previously discussed there is a distinction between managing assets (the things you do to assets) and asset management (the overall system by which an organisation achieves its strategic objectives through it’s assets).
Yet in too many minds- asset management is only the concern of engineers and maintenance staff.
If we want to improve this, we need to find ways to teach people who don’t ‘manage assets’ about asset management, why asset management is important, and how they’re connected to asset management.
This article lists out a coupe of tips for having conversations about asset management. It’s not in any way exhaustive, so please do comment with your own suggestions below.
1. Start with a Smile
Everybody is human, so connecting on a human level is going to be a good place to start. If you want to land any message, you want the other party to want to listen.
If you’re negative people will switch off and disconnect.
If you’re positive, sincere and passionate, people will be much more ready to listen to what you have to say.
2. Be respectful of the other person - are they available?
Building on the first point, if you want someone to listen, they need to be available to hear you.
Imagine the situation: you’re in a lift, on your own, waiting to go up to the office floor where you work. The Chief Financial Officer gets in. He knows everything there is to know about finance, but has never really connected with asset management. Sounds like this is time for your perfectly rehearsed “elevator pitch”.
But wait! Before launching into the benefits of asset management, you absolutely must check they are ready to listen. “How are you” goes a long way. For all you know they might have had the worst day imaginable. Likewise, they might have had the best day. And that should absolutely impact how you talk to them about asset management, if you should at all.
3. Avoid acronyms
What is the point of an acronym?
At their best they save you a few tenths of a second. And being charitable, if other people know the acronym, using them like a shared secret code can bring you together.
But that highlights when acronyms are at their worst. Acronyms are exclusive terms that hinder communication. They create a form of secret club for ‘people in the know’. Worse still, they make less confident people feel stupid for having to ask you what they mean.
Generally using acronyms is a way of demonstrating knowledge. A better way of demonstrating knowledge is talking in plain language and being understood.
The other reason why acronyms can be unhelpful is that they can lead to confusion.
I remember once talking to someone for at least an hour about “RCM”, before we realised, they were talking about “remote condition monitoring”, and I was talking about “reliability centred maintenance”.
We’re all human and it’s not the end of the world to use the occasional acronym. Generally though, acronyms aren’t going to help you spread asset management concepts to non-asset managers.
4. Don’t assume knowledge
Which neatly leads to the next point about assumed knowledge. It’s quite normal to use our own frame of reference and our own personal experiences, to construct explanations of concepts.
As with acronyms, if people don’t have your reference point, they might feel too embarrassed to ask, or just generally switch off from the conversation.
5. Talk about things that matter to both of you
So aside from things to avoid, what should you talk about? Ideally you want to find things that overlap between your interest and theirs.
In great organisations there will be overall strategic objectives that unite the whole organisation. If you’ve successfully developed Asset Management Objectives, that align to the overall organisations strategic objectives, then this can be a good place to find common ground.
6. Use practical examples
Quite often the things that matter to both of you will lead to a practical example to do with your work. Even if they don’t, you can usually find examples outside of work.
For example, I often talk about a garden fence when explaining the concept of whole life cost. I might pose the question “is it cheaper to paint the fence every year, or let it rot and rebuild it?”
Why all this is important
Ultimately, good asset management saves money, increases production and reduces risk. If we believe that asset management is good, we should want to share the knowledge and practices of asset management far and wide.
If you enjoyed this article, the best compliment you could give me would be to share it with someone else who might like it.
And please do comment below with your tips for talking about asset management.
Please do get in touch if your organisation needs help with asset management training!