How to Define an Asset Management System's Scope
Asset Management Framework Journal
Asset management is referred to as a journey and many times the hardest step in a journey can be its first. The first step is to define the scope of the what an organization’s asset management journey is to accomplish. This AMF Journal entry will detail the perspectives and parameters that need to be considered when defining the scope of organization’s approach to asset management that leads to defining the scope of the organization’s Asset Management System (AMS).
As covered in the AMP Newsletter articles The Asset Management Paradox and Managing Assets in the Context of Asset Management, the value proposition for asset management is realized through coordination of the “managing assets” and “asset management” viewpoints. The underlying ISO TC 251 article of the same name as the second AMP Newsletter article makes the following important points:
asset management is a relatively new management disciplined, only a couple of decades old,
asset management and managing assets are related but involve different activities - they are not alternatives, and
asset management and managing assets have different definitions and measures for value.
Understanding these viewpoints is helpful to charting an organization’s approach to asset management. Today, all successful, sustaining organizations have some mastery of “managing assets”, but many are just being introduced to “asset management” as a management discipline. The organization’s approach to asset management should involve the coordination of both perspectives to maximize value generation.
It is widely recognized across many asset-intensive sectors, to include facilities and built infrastructure, that the old ways of just managing assets are not enough. Decision making driven by resource limitations must be made better. This provides an opening to introduce disciplined asset management as a solution. This is where the discussion on scope of the organization’s approach to asset management begins.