Editor’s Viewpoint: My Kinship with Welding and Maintenance

Two job functions I have a special affinity for are maintenance and welding (and sometimes they go together). I have family and friends who are welders, and I know how hard they work and how what they do is vital to our nation’s infrastructure. As editor previously at a sheet metal magazine, my appreciation for welders deepened when I took a weeklong course on the basics of welding. As I performed different kinds of welding, I also gained a healthy respect for skill and hard work required of welders.

My kinship with maintenance has the same origins — family and friends who work in various industrial maintenance functions. That’s how I’ve known for years that maintenance and reliability are central to productivity and uptime. Often, though, manufacturers struggle to prioritize the time and investment necessary to put a comprehensive asset-management strategy in place, because so many other expenses compete for limited budgets.

But trends in manufacturing employment and other factors are making company leaders realize that asset management needs to be a high priority. As you’ll learn in this issue of The Journal, these managers are developing comprehensive asset-management strategies and using digitalization tools that provide metrics like OEE and RONA so maintenance decision-making is data driven. That’s how you turn maintenance from an expense into a strategic, competitive asset.

Until next time….

Theresa Houck

Executive Editor

The Journal From Rockwell Automation and Our PartnerNetwork™

^{The Journal From Rockwell Automation and Our PartnerNetwork™ is published by Putman Media, Inc.}