Corrective Action for
Complex Enterprises:
Principles and Practices
Approach to the Successful Deployment of an
Integrated Corrective Action Program
For Owner-Operators
A Bentley White Paper
Danie Saaiman
Independent Industry Expert
Published
August 2011
www.bentley.com
Introduction
Owner-operators in highly-regulated industries, such as energy, transportation and utilities, are constantly challenged with simultaneously increasing operational efficiency
while maintaining or improving safe and compliant operations.
To achieve these objectives, executive management must be aware of the advantages
that asset and process performance improvement programs offer the enterprise. This
paper provides a framework for increasing the emphasis on continuous improvement
through an integrated Corrective Action Program.
“A basic tenet of safety
regulation is that the
Contractor shall not profit
more by non-compliance
than by compliance.
Further, the Contractor
should benefit by placing appropriate emphasis
on safety. These are the
targets of the program.”
– Corrective Action
Program Description
U.S. Department of Energy
RL/REG-98-06 Rev 4
Success for these programs is vested in processes that ensure a holistic approach
towards optimizing environmental, health, and safety requirements against process
efficiency and asset utilization.
Factors conducive to continuous improvement require constant attention to the execution of day-to-day operational activities. The cornerstone to a successful asset and
process improvement program is the ability to detect an opportunity for improvement,
which can then be followed by steps necessary to prevent or correct a future occurrence.
An integrated corrective action program (CAP) provides the framework for the creation of
a culture focused on excellence. CAP is an encompassing term. It integrates and applies
management and technical disciplines that are advantageous to the lifecycle (concept,
design, construct, operate, maintain, disposal) of highly engineered infrastructure assets
and are both critical to business objectives and bound by regulatory requirements.
Business & Operational Drivers
Management objectives .are achieved from a leadership position that secures the
most effective results by exploiting the processes of planning, organizing, leading,
and controlling.
This principle signifies the management effort toward continuous improvement, i.e.,
securing the most effective results. It also identifies the element of control, which is
required to access and regulate work to ensure results.
Management regulation of work is a fundamental aspect of controlling enterprise activities involving business, engineering, operations, logistics, and maintenance. Extending
this control to continuous performance improvement for the entire enterprise implies
an integrated approach.
The CAP objective is to provide the necessary infrastructure, facilitate management
control, and support the culture toward enterprise-wide performance improvement.
An integrated CAP interfaces and interacts with every internal and external business
process critical to realizing enterprise objectives. It addresses the business, engineering, operations, logistics, and maintenance processes—including the associated
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
2
product or service, people and organizations, projects, assets, systems, equipment, and
related parts. A CAP facilitates rational decision-making by providing a holistic view of
all relevant dimensions to be considered in designated management control actions.
“In physical science the
first essential step in the
direction of learning any
subject is to find principles
of numerical reckoning
and practicable methods for measuring some
quality connected with it.
I often say that when you
can measure what you
are speaking about, and
express it in numbers, you
know something about it;
but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot
express it in numbers, your
knowledge is of a meager
and unsatisfactory kind; it
may be the beginning of
knowledge, but you have
scarcely in your thoughts
advanced to the state
of science, whatever the
matter may be.”
– Electrical Units of Measurement
Volume 1 1883
William Thomson, 1st Baron
Kelvin (1824-1907)
A successful CAP ultimately establishes a framework that provides management with
information access to critical enterprise processes in the context of:
•Related business, technical, and regulatory requirements;
•Performance measurement and detection of nonconformance or opportunity for
improvement;
•Quantification and qualification of nonconformance or improvement impact on
business and regulatory requirement;
•Formulation and management of corrective and/or improvement actions to prevent
recurrence of nonconformance and/or enhance performance; and
•Verification of nonconformance correction and/or performance enhancement.
Process nonconformances and the undesired business outcomes do not just happen;
they are caused. When an enterprise process does not conform to defined requirements, it results in defective products or services, or fails to comply with regulatory requirements. The challenge to the enterprise is to fix the defects and correct the process
in the most cost-effective manner.
A well-established CAP facilitates this detection/correction/prevention effort by providing
the ability to improve and, when required, to correct and prevent nonconformance. The
resulting return on investment is proportional to the degree of conformance with the CAP.
Figure 1 illustrates how a CAP facilitates a closed-loop management control process:
•A CAP provides performance feedback for associated critical enterprise processes.
•Enterprise processes are analysed against valid and concise criteria constituted by
the enterprise business, technical, and regulatory requirements.
•The processes are then underwritten by valid and concise documents and data.
•The CAP documents and data facilitate identification of deviation/nonconformance
or opportunity for improvement.
•Management institutes corrective action and verification to prevent recurrence.
The combination of these principle interfaces and their interactions with the enterprise
processes comprise a CAP.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
3
Disturbances
Capital
Materials
Resources
Management
Infrastucture
Economy
Equipment Failures
Materials Availability
Demand Fluctuations
Resource Availability
∑
Products & Services
Customer Demand
Investment
Enterprise Processes
Management, Infrastructure, Organizations, Projects
Correct
Measure
Corrective
Action Plan
Feedback - Process Performance Results
Information
Policies
Procedures
Standards
Specification
Drawings
Diagrams
Manuals
Directives & Orders
Forms
Records
Requirements
Data & Documents
Information
Corrective & Improvement Actions
Requirements consistent with Data & Documents consistent with Real Enterprise
Regulated by Closed-Loop Change Management
Requirements
Enterprise Requirements
Operations
Maintenance
Logistics
Engineering
Information
Product
Sales & Marketing
Finance & Accounting
Human Resources
Quality Resources
Environment, Health &
Safety Services
Business Requirements
Executive Orders
Product Strategy
Market Strategy
Return on Investment
Business Policies
Fiduciary Duties
Accounting Policies
Financing
Mergers &
Acquisitions
Regulatory Requirements
Executive Orders
Proclamations
Administration
Definitions
Reporting
Limitations
Records
Licensing
Regulations
...etc.
NonConformance
Report
Requirements
Analysis
Deviation / Non-Conformance Reporting
Actual vs. Required - Root Cause Analysis
Correction & Prevention
Figure 1 – Principle interfaces and interactions of a CAP
The overall success of a CAP as a management control tool relies on the degree to
which these interfaces and interactions with the enterprise are established. These
interfaces and interactions allow visibility to be gained through the gathering, processing, and presentation of information that facilitates decision-making.
However, the decisions made are only as good as the information provided.
The importance of accurate information in the decision-making process cannot be overemphasized. This is particularly the case when it is directed at optimizing enterprise
processes within the constraints of technical, regulatory, environmental, and health
and safety issues.
A successful CAP supports management decisions based on the assessment of
real facts provided in time, in context, and with complete integrity. It minimizes, if
not eliminates, decision-making based on fuzzy data adjusted by fudge factors and
historical comparisons.
Possibly the most advantageous by-product of a successful CAP is that it connects
people and processes, the metrics, the business, and its customers. Therefore, it is
imperative to understand CAP principles and practices.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
4
Anatomy of a Corrective Action Program
CAP Fundamentals
Reference to a CAP often calls up a solution consisting of forms that capture
capabilities supported by workflow and status monitoring. Although this is an
underlying component of a CAP, by itself such a solution can only serve as a tool
to support CAP automation.
“Measures shall be
established to assure that
conditions adverse to
quality, such as failures,
malfunctions, deficiencies, deviations, defective
material and equipment,
and non-conformances
are promptly identified
and corrected. In the case
of significant conditions
adverse to quality, the measures shall assure that the
cause of the condition is
determined and corrective
action taken to preclude
repetition. The identification
of the significant condition adverse to quality, the
cause of the condition, and
the corrective action taken
shall be documented and
reported to appropriate
levels of management.”
– 10CFR50 Appendix B
Section XVI:
Quality Assurance Criteria for
Nuclear Power Plants and Fuel
Reprocessing Plants
A successful CAP designated as a management tool for enterprise-wide efficiency improvement must address every aspect of the program in an integrated and consolidated
manner. It must facilitate:
•A valid and concise view with complete traceability to all relevant identified
performance requirements, to real assets and processes, and to relevant data
and documents.
•The continuous identification of ownership pertaining to performance requirements
for critical asset and processes, and their underwriting documents and data;
•The continuous identification, updating, recording, and procedural promulgation of
critical process performance monitoring requirements, including associated performance criteria and testing, measurement, observation, and reporting methods;
•Timely observation and correct measurement against valid requirements, and subsequent valid and concise communication of the identified improvement opportunity or
nonconformance to the appropriate authority;
•The identification and authorization of applicable resources to perform complete
impact analysis supported by risk quantification and prioritization.
This effort is directed at determining the real and potential consequences and criticality for an improvement opportunity or detected nonconformance. It considers business,
operations and maintenance, engineering, logistics, safety, and environmental factors
as well as associated regulatory requirements.
Real and potential consequences are expressed in terms of revenue, cost, schedule,
technical performance, and risk criteria as they pertain to areas of impact:
•The identification and authorization of applicable resources to conduct root-cause
analyses directed at relevant asset and process configurations, supporting documents and data, and associated external and internal processes; results from the
root cause analysis provide the basis to institute improvement, or corrective action,
and prevent recurrence;
•Corrective action implementation planning, including the identification and authorization of resources designated for corrective action execution and the communication
of valid and concise instruction that is supported by defined cost budget, schedule,
logic of execution, deliverable result(s), and acceptance criteria;
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
5
Failure Reporting, Analysis and Corrective Action
Taken - A controlled closedloop system assuring that
all failures and non-conformances are reported,
analyzed, and positive
corrective actions are identified to prevent recurrence,
and that the adequacy of
implemented corrective actions are verified by test
– DoD MIL-HDBK-2155:
Failure Reporting, Analysis and
Corrective Action Taken
•Corrective action progress monitoring and, when required, remedy in terms of cost,
schedule, and technical performance;
•Verification of all corrective actions to ensure complete implementation; it includes
maintenance and safekeeping of records to represent evidence, traceability, and
demonstrated accountability.
CAP Success Factors
The encompassing nature of a CAP to facilitate management control requires interfacing and interaction with a broad range of enterprise processes. The capability of a
CAP to provide this service relies significantly on these interfaces and the degree of
information quality exchanged between a CAP and enterprise processes.
A major cornerstone of CAP success is information quality, where information quality is
defined as the degree to which the information source(s) can:
•Provide use interaction with information where and when required,
•Facilitate finding and using information in direct context of the need,
•Enable the user to quickly define a valid and concise set of information,
•Allow information access and retrieval in the required format,
•Provide information with unquestionable integrity.
The “user” may be man or machine and “information” may be structured and unstructured, irrespective of its source, format, or media.
The information interfaces and interactions with enterprise processes are not the only
determining factors in the successful deployment and operation of a CAP. Cognizance
must also be given to the functions and processes internal to a CAP, as well functions
and processes external to a CAP. These internal and external functions and processes
are denoted in Figure 1.
As the basis for a CAP success factor discussion, this diagram will now be elaborated.
ENTERPRISE REQUIREMENTS
From a business, technical, human resource, and regulatory perspective, requirements
regulate every aspect of the enterprise, through its complete lifecycle. In simplest
terms, nothing in the enterprise happens without a requirement dictating it.
This argument can be extended to conclude that corrective action is a by-product of
deficient requirements (or noncompliance with sufficient requirements).
Management requirements are thus directed at the continuous identification, definition,
maintenance, and promulgation of qualified and quantified performance criteria
to which enterprise processes must conform.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
6
Quaiified & quantified
enterprise process performance priteria
dictates
process design, development, implementation,
0perations & maintenance
Enterprise Requirements
Operations
Maintenance
Logistics
Engineering
Information
Product
Sales & Marketing
Finance & Accounting
Human Resources
Quality Resources
Environment, Health &
Safety Services
Quaiified & quantified
enterprise process performance criteria
dictates
process measurement, verification, and
degree of conformance
Figure 2 – Requirements prescribe process
performance and verifications
Requirements
Specify performance
criteria embedded in
Specification
Diagrams
Drawings
Data Sheets
Procedures
Standards
that pertain to
Systems
Structures
Equipment
Components
positioned and operating in
Locations
being managed by
People
Organizations
executing & controlling
Projects
Processes
Events
that must conform to
Requirements
Figure 3 – Requirements in context to
Enterprise Entities
Enterprise requirements therefore constitute
the absolute performance reference base for:
•All aspects related to the design, implementation, operation, maintenance, and
end-of-life activities for enterprise processes; it specifies what to plan for, do, and
measure, and when to correct;
•Performance measurement to ascertain
and control the degree to which enterprise
processes conform to stated requirements.
The reference base concept is illustrated
in Figure 2.
Requirements management is the foundation
of CAP objectives to monitor, detect, analyze,
and – when required – institute and verify correction to prevent recurrence.
As to the criticality of requirements management in a CAP and the enterprise, a number
of factors require consideration:
•Enterprise requirements are presented by
business opportunity and often conflict with
regulatory requirements. It is imperative to
provide a consolidated view with complete
traceability among all requirements. Figure
1 illustrates this principle.
•Requirements must be expressed and
promulgated in the context of associated
enterprise entities. This concept is reflected
in Figure 3. The full impact of nonconformance or improvement can only be determined if the requirement is identified and
communicated in context.
•The requirements and associated performance criteria selected for promulgation
and monitoring must identify key performance indicators representative of business
and technical success within the boundaries
of regulatory compliance.
•Requirements must be complete, clear,
and valid, where complete means suitable identification and description to allow
unambiguous interpretation by all parties.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
7
Clear means easy to understand and valid means that the outcome will be correct if
associated requirements are fulfilled.
•Consistency must be retained between requirements, underwriting documents and
data, and real enterprise processes with associated resources and infrastructure.
– Herbert George Wells
1940
In a complex enterprise characterized by frequent incidents of change, consistency can
only be retained by instituting a closed-loop change-management process.
The closed-loop change-management process assures the continuous recognition of
change and, when required, the formal implementation and verification that ensures
consistency among requirements, data and documents, and real enterprise. This concept is illustrated in Figure 4.
Requirements
Information
Design
Information
Design
Information
Support,
Maintenance,
Training &
Procurement
Information
What we say there is,
planned & actual
(documents & data records)
C
M ons
us
i
t C sten
on
c
fo y
rm
What needs to be there
(product, process & plant performance criteria)
cy
m
en
ist for
ns on
Co t C
us
M
“An immense and everincreasing wealth of
knowledge is scattered
about the world today;
knowledge that would
probably suffice to solve
all the mighty difficulties of
our age, but it is dispersed
and unorganized. We need
a sort of mutual clearinghouse; a depot where
knowledge and ideas are
received, sorted, summarized, digested, clarified
and improved.”
Product, process,
plant, project
Closed-Loop
Change Management
assures
Consistency and
Conformance
Consistency
Must Conform
Real world, planned & actual
(physical & functional
configurations)
Figure 4 – Assuring consistency between Requirements, Information, and Real Enterprise
DATA AND DOCUMENTS
In the context of the CAP, data and documents describe the enterprise processes and
criteria for fulfilling business, technical, and regulatory requirements. They are the sole
source of information exploited by the CAP and the enterprise processes they describe.
Figure 5 illustrates this concept.
From an information management perspective, this capability entails the identification,
planning, creation or capture, safekeeping, and controlled promulgation of information
in support of enterprise processes, inclusive of a CAP.
In a complex enterprise, a very large range and volume of documents and data, representing both structured and unstructured content in many different formats and media,
has to be managed by this information source.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
8
Data & Documents communicate complete,
clear and valid requirements and
underwriting information to the enterprise
Data & Documents
Policies
Procedures
Standards
Specification
Drawings
Diagrams
Manuals
Directives & Orders
Forms
Records
Requirements are embedded in
data & documents
Data & Documents communicate complete,
clear and valid requirements and
underwriting information to support analysis
Figure 5 – Data & Documents communicate
Requirements & Supporting Information to
the Enterprise
Typical information entities associated with
the complex enterprise include:
• Specifications and regulations that identify, define, and describe a wide range of
requirements and performance criteria for
plant design, operations, maintenance,
safety, environment, legal, commercial, etc;
• Drawings, diagrams, and item lists that
identify and describe components, equipment, and configuration of systems and
structures;
• User and service manuals that provide
instructions for the correct use and maintenance of equipment;
• Training manuals that provide guidelines,
educational content, exercises, examples,
and aptitude assessment for the trainer
and trainee;
• Procedures that provide instructions for the
correct execution of process steps under
specified conditions;
•Calculations that establish and verify the operational envelope of components,
systems, and structures;
•Records that represent data logs, measurements, observations, engineering change,
deviations, failures, non-conformance, maintenance events, modifications, inspection events and outcomes, corrective actions, etc;
•Design baseline documents that represent the operational configuration of the plant
and definitive proof of compliance with regulatory and operational requirements;
•As-built and as-maintained baselines that underwrite past, current, and designated
future configurations of the enterprise;
•Project documents that detail cost, schedule, technical objectives, risk analysis,
responsibilities, procurements, and work authorizations;
Data and documents used in the role of information source for a CAP and the enterprise
must have the following characteristics:
»» The information source must be capable of providing a unified view of all
business, technical, and regulatory requirements data and documents.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
9
Information
is embedded in
Specifications
Diagrams
Drawings
Data Sheets
Procedures
Standards
that pertain to
Systems
Structures
Equipment
Components
positioned and operating in
Locations
being managed by
People
Organizations
executing & controlling
Projects
Processes
Events
for which they require
Information
Figure 6 – Information in context to Enterprise Entities
The ability to assure process conformance is
directly proportional to visibility of and access
to requirements information.
»» The information source must be capable
of providing a unified view of all
technical, commercial, and management
data and documents relevant to
enterprise success.
The enterprise efficiency is directly
proportional to the visibility of and access
to clear, valid, and concise information
underwriting enterprise processes.
»» The information source must conform to
the principles of information quality.
»» The information source must assure consistency between requirements and real
enterprise (see Figure 4).
Information consumers must always be
presented with the correct information,
even when it changes.
»» Data and documents must be identified
in context with enterprise entities. This is
illustrated in Figure 6.
This principle makes it easy to present complete information to the user based on
needs. For example, upon the query “Failure Event X for Pump A,” the user is presented
with related P&ID, data sheets, drawings, maintenance manual, failure reports, maintenance log, and modification history.
»» To demonstrate accountability, the information source must identify and control
information records, and then dispose of these records in a controlled manner
when they have served their useful life.
»» The information source must be able to declare, on a continuous basis, the fitfor-use status of information associated with past, present, and future requirements and associated enterprise configurations.
ENTERPRISE PROCESSES
From a CAP perspective, enterprise processes may be defined as:
Predetermined interaction, regulated by business, technical, and regulatory
requirements, between a given infrastructure and associated resources with
the objective of converting materials and effort to products and services
designed to satisfy specified customer demand.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
10
This definition reinforces the primary objective of a CAP: namely, the continuous improvement of enterprise processes. Ultimately, it is the process that suffers from degradation or
nonconformance when equipment fails or procedures are incorrectly executed.
Corrective action in legacy systems is often found to be only directed at the correction
of process or equipment failure. In this approach, continuous corrective action does not
necessarily imply continuous improvement of the enterprise process.
Repetitive correction of failure directly impedes the two fundamentals to continuous
process improvement:
•Consistent conformance is achieved by communicating complete, clear,
and valid requirements and associated measurements (see Figure 7).
Customer Demand
•Continuous process improvement can only be achieved through
consistent conformance.
∑
Investment
Disturbances
Capital
Materials
Resources
Management
Infrastucture
Economy
Equipment Failures
Materials Availability
Demand Fluctuations
Resource Availability
Enterprise Processes
Management, Infrastructure, Organizations, Projects
Correct
Measure
Products & Services
Corrective action in legacy
systems is often found
to be only directed at the
correction of process or
equipment failure. In this
approach, continuous
corrective action does not
necessarily imply continuous improvement of the
enterprise process.
Requirements consistent with Data & Documents consistent with Real Enterprise
Regulated by Closed-Loop Change Management
Figure 7 – Process consistency and improvement depends on clear valid requirements, data, and documents
In order to advance from a state of continuous corrective action to that of continuous
process improvement, the following conditions must be met for CAP deployment:
•Complete visibility of and traceability to real functional, positional, and physical
configurations that establish the infrastructure;
•Complete visibility of and traceability to both internal and external organizational
interactions with the defined infrastructure to the level where control is required;
•Complete visibility of and traceability to business, technical, and regulatory requirements for designated configurations and related organizations.
These conditions must be met by all the embedded information in data and documents.
The premise here is that management efficiency is directly proportional to the availability and accuracy of information presented in the context of the decision-making event.
As illustrated in Figure 4, the establishment and retention of consistency between
requirements, information, and real enterprise is imperative to the success of a CAP.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
11
MEASUREMENT
While clear, concise, and valid requirements establish the framework for performance
definition, effective measurement provides the ability to verify performance conformance. These two principles — requirements and measurements — are prerequisites
to achieving consistent conformance.
In the context of a CAP, the act of measuring refers to determining a performance
value in accordance with the procedure for assessing a specific performance criterion
stipulated by a requirement.
∑
Investment
Disturbances
Capital
Materials
Resources
Management
Infrastucture
Economy
Equipment Failures
Materials Availability
Demand Fluctuations
Resource Availability
Enterprise Processes
Management, Infrastructure, Organizations, Projects
Correct
Measure
Products & Services
Customer Demand
It is the act of performance verification that affords the chance to detect nonconformance or identify an opportunity for improvement. This principle is illustrated in Figure 8.
Requirements consistent with Data & Documents consistent with Real Enterprise
Regulated by Closed-Loop Change Management
To be analyzed
NonConformance
Report
Figure 8 – Measurement allows the detection of Non-conformance and Feedback
Depending on the entity being verified, the act of measurement in a CAP may imply
either quantification or qualification of a performance value. For example:
•Quantitative statement: “The output voltage Vout shall be stabilized at 5±0.1 VDC
with a maximum ripple current of 15mV RMS through the output current range
of 0 < Iout < 10A.”
•Qualitative statement: “Design documents shall be reviewed and approved for
release by the design authority and the end-user.”
This means the act of measurement may be conducted by suitable instrumentation,
observation, or combinations of these.
Depending on the nature of the enterprise, many types of measurement processes
may be applicable to detect nonconformance or opportunity for improvement. These
measurement processes include:
•Continuous inspection and observation, as dictated by process quality and safety control procedures; this includes real-time process monitoring and data logging systems;
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
12
•Scheduled maintenance events for inspection and calibration;
•Scheduled self-assessment for the evaluation of human and business performance;
•Formal audit or review, conducted by either an external or internal authority;
•Operating experience for the exchange of knowledge by same industries to compare,
identify, and negate potential safety or process degradation issues; Operating experience is also applied conversely to identify the potential for process improvement;
•Benchmarking for the systematic comparison of same industry products, services,
and practices for the specific purpose of identifying best practices and performance
gaps, and setting targets that lead to improved performance or processes;
•Recording ad-hoc failure events associated with structures, components, equipment,
or procedure execution.
As the prime input to corrective action and, ultimately, process improvement, these
measurement processes are critical to the success of the CAP. Therefore, measurements pertinent to the CAP must adhere to the following parameters:
•Conformance measurements must be directed at all enterprise processes representative of business, technical, and regulatory success.
Conformance measurement is an integral part
of the closed-loop
change management
process that assures
consistency among
requirements, data and
documents, and
real enterprise
•Conformance measurements must accommodate change. Consistency, supported by
complete traceability, must be retained among the embedded data and documents
for conformance measurements, requirements, and the real enterprise.
Conformance measurement is an integral part of the closed-loop change management
process that assures consistency among requirements, data and documents, and real
enterprise (see Figure 4).
•Conformance measurement must be assigned to a designated authority with responsibility and accountability to ensure measurement disposition and execution.
•Conformance measurement procedures and policies must clearly identify designated
ownership and methods for measurement, recording outcomes, and processing measurement results. (The latter includes diagrams indicating logical and conditional
flow to assure complete closed-loop communication and disposition of results.)
•Conformance measurement procedures and policies must be concise and
easily applied.
•Conformance measurement records must be retained and preserved in accordance
with record management principles; i.e., demonstrate accountability and evidence of
measurement, and record preservation and disposition.
•Conformance measurement records must be identified in context and be traceable
to the measurement event, designated authorities, target process and associated
physical and/or functional items, relevant procedures, supporting documents and
data, and measurement outcome and disposition.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
13
Identification should include, where applicable, references to conditions and failure
modes, safety and business consequences, failure/nonconformance/improvement opportunity classifications, trending codification, and priority for resolution.
•Conformance measurement records must be traceable to all disposition activities
and status. They include subsequent corrective actions, engineering change, modifications, repairs, training, process verification, and qualification.
ANALYSIS
Analysis in the context of a CAP involves the screening and assessment of conformance measurement to identify process variation, potential degradation, realized
deviation, and non-conformance or opportunity for improvement.
The analysis determines cause and effects, with the subsequent course of action
designed to institute correction, prevention, and improvement.
The analysis process is critically dependent on the accuracy and completeness of the
data and documents that identify and describe the non-conformance. The information
sources must be of high integrity and be supported by clear and valid requirements.
These dependencies are illustrated in Figure 9.
For implementation to designated processes
From measurement & non-conformance detection
Data & Documents
Corrective
Action Plan
Policies
Procedures
Standards
Specification
Drawings
Enterprise Requirements
Operations
Maintenance
Logistics
Engineering
Information
Product
Diagrams
Manuals
Directives & Orders
Forms
Records
Concise, clear & valid information
Sales & Marketing
Finance & Accounting
Human Resources
Quality Resources
Environment, Health &
Safety Services
NonConformance
Report
Concise, clear & valid requirements
Analysis
Actual vs. Required - Root Cause Analysis
Correction & Prevention
Figure 9 – Analysis and its critical interfaces
Analysis is a formal process conducted by a review board with the objective to determine root cause, required correction, and preventative actions. The review board is
typically constituted by authoritative members with specialized skills such as representatives from projects, sales and marketing, operations, maintenance, logistics, design
and system engineering, reliability, quality assurance, and configuration management.
It is the responsibility of the review board to perform the following:
•Screening and disposition of nonconformance or opportunity for improvement;
•Analysis to determine cause, impact, corrective action, and prevention;
•Documenting and promulgating defined actions for correction and prevention;
•Monitoring and controlling corrective action implementation status;
•Reporting of CAP-associated aspects such as trending, impact, action status,
issues, and successes as related to enterprise organizations, processes, and
associated infrastructure.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
14
Screening
Screening is a critical
step of a CAP because it
provides the opportunity to
identify and collate nonconforming performance
measurements. The objective is to identify similar
enterprise-wide issues
and consolidate corrective
actions. It also eliminates
duplicate actions.
Screening is a critical step of a CAP because it provides the opportunity to identify
and collate nonconforming performance measurements. The objective is to identify
similar enterprise-wide issues and consolidate corrective actions. It also eliminates
duplicate actions.
A further objective of the screening process is to establish decision models for the escalation of issues in the context of their business, technical, and/or regulatory significance.
Screening methods may vary depending on the level of conformance measurement effort,
presentation, and results. The most common screening methods applied in a CAP include:
•Statistical analysis ranging from sampling plans and control charts to advanced
techniques such as cluster analysis, ordinal regression, and forecasting models;
Statistical analysis is mainly applied to determine process variation and the potential
for degradation and eventual nonconformance by defect or failure; it is a powerful tool
to detect trends, particularly when the source data allows trending in the context of
time, related events, nonconformance rates, modes of operation, conditions, classes,
associated physical items, functional systems, organization, and location reference;
•Inspection and interpretation of nonconformance reports such as self-assessment,
benchmarking, and operation experience reports.
Cause, Impact, Corrective Action, and Prevention
The focus of this CAP core activity is to determine:
•The cause of non-conformance;
•Its impact on business, technical, and regulatory requirements,
related processes, organizations, and infrastructure;
•Appropriate action to correct and prevent the cause; this includes, when required,
directives to the closed-loop change process, illustrated in Figure 4, to ensure consistency between requirements, data and documents, and real enterprise.
Several investigative or analytical techniques can be applied in root-cause analysis
such as brainstorming, nominal group technique (NGT), failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA), fault-tree analysis (FTA), Ishikawa cause-and-effects diagrams, worst-case/
design-margin analysis, statistical design of experiments, etc.
Lessons learned, best practices, and noteworthy accomplishments should be considered as part of the analysis.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
15
Impact assessment can typically be aimed at four areas of interest:
•Impact on business requirements, addressing criteria such as revenue, costs,
schedule, risk, enterprise reputation and stature, etc;
•Impact on technical performance requirements, addressing criteria such as
availability, reliability, maintainability, operational safety, etc;
•Impact on regulatory requirements, addressing criteria such as safety, health,
environment, limitations, regulations, operating license, etc;
•Impact of change; this addresses the potential consequences of change affecting
enterprise requirements, processes and procedures; infrastructure acquisition and/
or modification; and human resource re-training and qualification. It also includes the
need to update data and documents, and re-establish design and operating baselines.
When the cause and impact of nonconformance, or opportunity for improvement, has
been determined, corrective action must be formulated. Most often, corrective action decisions are made from among several alternatives. These alternatives must be
clearly defined, and their relative merits must be evaluated.
Some complexities and challenges in decision-making may be introduced by opposing
business, regulatory, and risk requirements.
Corrective action formulation must discriminate between immediate correction (i.e.,
material rework, repairs, customer service, etc.) and preventative action to eliminate
potential recurrence.
Corrective Action Documentation and Promulgation
Corrective actions are communicated by the review board through a documented corrective action plan that generally identifies and describes the following aspects in a
complete and valid manner:
•Target process, associated infrastructure and organizations, and supporting data and
documents;
•Corrective and preventative action supported by appropriate data and documents;
•Associated nonconformance events and reports;
•Roles and responsibilities for corrective action implementation;
•Priorities, prerequisites, and logical sequence of implementation;
•Verification methods, responsibilities, and acceptance criteria.
It is always good practice to promote the participation of related organizational entities,
both internal and external, in the compilation and review of a corrective action plan.
However, the corrective action review board is ultimately responsible and subsequently
accountable for the formal review, approval, and release of a corrective action plan.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
16
As illustrated in Figure 9, the corrective action plan constitutes the absolute basis for
execution of corrective actions.
Corrective Action Plan Monitoring and Controlling
Monitoring and controlling are closely related to planning simply because without
plans to set objectives and specify activities, control would serve no useful purpose.
The corrective action plan as described above serves as the basis for monitoring, controlling, and status reporting.
Close interaction between
the review board and the
activities executed during
the correction process
must be established. This
requires CAP integration
with planning, scheduling, and budgeting. Work
authorization and cost
accumulation systems are
key elements for cost and
schedule control.
The review board is responsible for ensuring the complete implementation and closure
of the corrective action—from measurement, nonconformance detection, analysis, corrective action identification, and planning to final execution, verification, acceptance,
and closure.
Close interaction between the review board and the activities executed during the
correction process must be established. This requires CAP integration with planning,
scheduling, and budgeting. Work authorization and cost accumulation systems are key
elements for cost and schedule control.
These systems should be employed in an integrated manner to provide overall CAP
progress monitoring for day-to-day management, and to allow timely and meaningful
decisions when deviation is detected.
The prime areas designated for corrective action plan monitoring and control are:
•Cost and schedule control,
•Technical performance measurement,
•Corrective action reviews.
Cost and schedule planning inherently assumes adequacy of corrective action to meet
technical requirements. Technical performance measurement is accordingly a key element in providing confidence in a CAP; it demonstrates and verifies the degree to which
the technical objectives are achieved. Technical performance assessment points should
coincide with the planned completion of significant corrective action milestones to
facilitate the verification of results.
Successful monitoring and control also requires the establishment of corrective action
reviews. The following reviews should be considered:
•Process and infrastructure technical design reviews—conducted at major milestones
and decision points in a corrective action lifecycle. These reviews should include a
comprehensive examination of the solution design, performed by qualified personnel.
They contribute largely to early verification that the corrective action and its desired
outcome will conform to business, technical, and regulatory requirements.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
17
•Corrective action progress reviews—routine review of corrective action progress
against cost, schedule, and technical requirements. These reviews contribute to
early identification and control of corrective action problems.
•CAP reviews—encompass the entire CAP, with the objective of assessing overall
trends such as process improvement, identification of CAP critical areas, and degree
of conformance to business, technical, and regulatory requirements, etc.
CAP Reporting
Reporting of CAP trends, impacts, action status, issues, and successes across the
enterprise organizations, processes, and infrastructure not only provides essential information to management, but also mobilizes CAP awareness and participation through
all levels and by all members of the enterprise.
CAP reporting applies
to entities that are both
internal and external to
the enterprise. External
entities include contractors, vendors, industry
organizations, and federal
and state regulators.
Figure 10 illustrates a KPI dashboard example.
The value of reporting
is not only vested in the
typical communication of
time-based trends, nonconformance distribution and
status reporting, but also in
the sharing of root-cause
analysis outcome, successes in best practices and
operating experience, etc.
Reporting CAP performance metrics should focus on key performance indicators (KPIs)
designated to associated business, technical, and regulatory requirements, as well as
CAP elements such as processes, organizations, products, and services.
Today’s reporting technologies offer tremendous opportunity to produce flexible,
graphics-laden presentations directed at specific audiences. These applications diminish the IT management efforts to ensure the delivery of suitable and tailor-made CAP
instruction and feedback to every CAP participant across the entire enterprise.
The application of real-time digital dashboard reporting interfaces contributes significantly to a CAP. It is truly a critical element in the manifestation of information quality– i.e.,
the right information at the right time and place, in an easy-to-understand format.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
18
∑
Investment
Disturbances
Capital
Materials
Resources
Management
Infrastucture
Economy
Equipment Failures
Materials Availability
Demand Fluctuations
Resource Availability
Enterprise Processes
Management, Infrastructure, Organizations, Projects
Correct
Measure
Products & Services
Customer Demand
CORRECTION
This CAP element involves the implementation of corrective action plans to institute
correction, prevention, and improvement. Figure 11 depicts the process and interfaces
for implementing the corrective action.
Requirements consistent with Data & Documents consistent with Real Enterprise
Regulated by Closed-Loop Change Management
NonConformance
Report
From Analysis
Figure 11 – The Corrective Action Plan institutes correction, prevention & improvement
Correction requires the
responsible authorities,
assigned by the corrective
action plan, to authorize the
required corrective action
tasks and disseminate
work packages to
designated organizations.
Correction requires the responsible authorities, assigned by the corrective action plan,
to authorize the required corrective action tasks and disseminate work packages to
designated organizations.
Detailed organizational planning and control is typically involved following the prudent
principles of project management.
The project management process directs the flow of work and work authorization to the
individuals, facilities, and organizations that perform the required work within established budget and schedule criteria. It is also engaged in the:
•Identification of applicable work packages, associated statement of work, work
package support documents, and data provisioning such as modification or training
instructions, drawings, diagrams, etc;
•Monitoring and controlling prerequisite events and inputs from other work packages;
•Monitoring, controlling, and reporting progress and completion status of work packages to the organization and the corrective action review board.
In the complex enterprise, correction tasks typically involve many organizations, both
internal and external. For example:
A corrective action plan at a power plant calls for engineering to redesign a process
with participation from reliability to assure safety and availability. At the same time,
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
19
configuration management directs the updating, review, approval, and release of
documents and data to establish new design baselines required by the regulator. This
information is required by procurement, maintenance, and multiple subcontractors
for planning, purchasing, and contracting. Meanwhile, human resources plans for and
implements retraining and requalification. Business, operations, and project management determine the best outage opportunity to minimize business impact.
In such an enterprise, the complexities introduced by the efforts to meet cost and
schedule in concert with business, technical, and regulatory requirements constantly
challenge CAP management. These challenges affect many aspects of plan deployment, including:
•Scheduling, budgeting, work authorization, and resulting time and cost accumulation;
•Meeting objectives to conform to all critical requirements, necessitating continuous
change management’
•Monitoring a multitude of actions and events with respect to progress and status’
•Frequent remedy to remain on track’
•On-time creation, change, release, and use of the correct information to support all
of the above activities.
The ultimate challenge for
CAP management is the
constant influence of a
continuously changing environment. This phenomenon
requires conscientious
management, because
it can be detrimental to
a CAP when the rate of
change exceeds the ability
to accommodate change.
The ultimate challenge for CAP management is the constant influence of a continuously changing environment. This phenomenon requires conscientious management,
because it can be detrimental to a CAP when the rate of change exceeds the ability to
accommodate change. When that occurs, it creates a never-ending spiral of ineffective
corrective action—constantly addressing a symptom and never reaching the point of
continuous improvement.
These challenges can be met by the exploitation of a well-defined CAP that is supported by an enterprise-wide capability to manage and control non-conformance and
associated corrective and preventative work, all underwritten and supported by information with unquestionable quality.
Challenges to Successful CAP Deployment
The challenges faced in deploying a successful CAP can be grouped into two categories: 1) Challenges posed by the nature of fragmented organizations and associated
processes; and 2) Challenges posed by the nature of stand-alone information systems.
Fragmented Organizations and Associated Processes
The complex enterprise is characterized by a collection of diverse organizations representing many different kinds of processes. These organizations include accounting,
marketing and sales, operations, and maintenance.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
20
Each of these entities may further be typified by its own intrinsic complexities.
For example:
•They are often geographically dispersed.
•Unique processes and infrastructure are tailored to the requirements
of the specific organization.
•Unique management systems are tailored to the requirements of the
specific organization.
•They have their own organizational cultures.
For a future plant outage, engineering, project
management, procurement, and maintenance
each perform the required
planning, design, and
procurement—from their
own perspectives and
information sources—only
to discover incompatibilities
and non-conformances at
the time of the outage.
This organization-centric complexity contributes to organizational fragmentation. It is
not uncommon for this fragmentation to result in organizations that are loosely connected by unstructured and uncorrelated interfaces.
Organizational fragmentation presents challenges to a CAP, particularly in achieving the
objective of continuous improvement. The most prominent challenges are:
•Limited visibility and unawareness of enterprise requirements—This invariably
promotes organizational-centric activities based on information sources and experiences that are not always on par with interfacing processes, products and services,
or the enterprise as a whole.
A typical example may be where modifications were performed and recorded during
maintenance events but with no further documented propagation. For a future plant outage, engineering, project management, procurement, and maintenance each perform the
required planning, design, and procurement—from their own perspectives and information sources—only to discover incompatibilities and non-conformances at the time of
the outage. This, of course, leads to repetitive organizational-centric corrective actions.
•High susceptibility to change during the entire lifecycle—Driven by the continuous demand for process improvement to meet changing regulatory, environmental,
investor, operational, and consumer requirements, these organizations and their
associated processes and infrastructures are in a constant state of change.
However, fragmentation again leads to organization-centric change, with little overall
benefit to the enterprise. Not much is gained by improving a process if its integration
with other processes.
•Focus on treating the symptom rather than the cause—Organization-centric
corrective action rarely gets to the root of the identified problems.
For example, a bill of material defined by design engineering may require restructuring
by manufacturing or construction to transform it from a functional hierarchy to a manufacturing/construction hierarchy. This action not only introduces the potential for error,
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
21
but also creates a new baseline that logistics, procurement, and others are unaware
of. There will be a high probability of costly corrective action to expedite/re-procure
components, rework, update documents, etc.
STAND-ALONE INFORMATION SYSTEMS
A complex enterprise is almost synonymous with an extensive legacy of many different IT
systems and associated support infrastructures. These IT systems are deployed in a wide
range of applications, usually functioning as mission-critical management, business, and
technical process tools on an organizational basis. These systems are also recognized for
handling very large volumes of data and documents over short periods of time.
Information systems in a complex enterprise are typically characterized by the
following traits:
•No single system provides a complete enterprise IT solution—Although often
claimed, such a solution is not possible at this time. Typically, multiple organizations deploy the best-of-breed, line-of-business systems supported by a multitude of
proprietary and commercial IT solutions.
•Individual IT systems focus on specific organizational processes—The IT infrastructure supports a narrow range of solution technology typically associated with a
specific enterprise process and its associated organizations.
Examples are enterprise resource planning (ERP) vs. design tools such as CAD, and
enterprise content management (ECM) vs. configuration and change management tools.
•IT solutions are supported by multiple vendors and platforms—Across the enterprise, organizational IT solutions are from multiple vendors, and operate on different
hardware platforms and operating systems.
This situation also demands system-focused and specialized IT support, which often
rules out the efficient leveraging of IT skills across the enterprise.
The enterprise IT scenario described above invariably results in a multitude of standalone IT systems that function as islands of automation with silos of data. The contents
of these data silos are in multiple formats and media, both electronic and physical.
These stand-alone systems present two major challenges to the CAP: information
integrity, and information access and collation to obtain useful information.
Information Integrity
Masses of data and documents are created by stand-alone systems and disseminated
to many users and other systems in diverse organizations. This most often takes place
through inefficient interfaces with an inadequate record of distribution and use.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
22
The very nature of the information in its role of underwriting enterprise processes
predisposes it to frequent change. This tenure, in combination with the information silo
syndrome, poses exceptional challenges to retaining information integrity.
To preserve information integrity, complete closed-loop change implementation
requires visibility to all related information; the information silo syndrome makes this
inherently difficult.
When the rate of change reaches a level where the change management system
cannot completely track the changes within a closed-loop change implementation,
information integrity starts deteriorating.
The use of incorrect information warrants nonconformance, which may manifest as repeated rework or reprocurement, financial loss, and critical safety issues—all of these
initiating chronic corrective action.
The cycle of incorrect information leading to chronic corrective action greatly mitigates
the primary objective of the CAP—i.e. to achieve process consistency and improvement
across the enterprise.
Information Access and Collation
The many sources of information represented by many different systems impede overall
visibility and access to the relevant and accurate information required to execute CAPrelated tasks.
Different silos of information have different content
formats and access
procedures. Information may be in dissimilar
electronic formats such as
different databases, spreadsheets, office documents,
and scanned images, as
well as in various physical media such as printed
reports and paper drawings.
Different silos of information have different content formats and access procedures. Information may be in dissimilar electronic formats such as different databases, spreadsheets, office documents, and scanned images, as well as in various physical media
such as printed reports and paper drawings.
These conditions complicate the ability to hone in on relevant information and then
extract it from the various sources in an efficient and timely manner to satisfy CAP
information requirements.
Challenges common to CAP information access and collation, and to the enterprise in
general, can be found in:
•Obtaining and sustaining the know-how of where to find information. This knowledge is often embedded in an individual’s field of experience. This condition is
aggravated by changes in IT systems or by the availability or loss of the individual;
•A collation process that involves validation to assure relevance and integrity,
followed by manual effort to convert formats and media before producing the
desired output;
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
23
•The validation and elimination of discrepancies from the different information
streams. Conflict may evolve in the quest to ascertain which information source
constitutes the master.
A Working Solution for CAP Success
The CAP challenges described above stem from fragmented organizational processes
and information. The result may be a legacy CAP typified by weaknesses such as:
•Lost opportunities to identify and act on lessons learned;
•Corrective actions backlog with implementations by designated organizations
in an uncorrelated, nonsynchronized way;
•Inadequate trending and root-cause analysis, often attributed to insufficient
or non-existing records;
•Absence of a closed-loop, with incomplete follow-through to root-cause and
preventative remedy to permanently resolve the problem;
•Continuous operation in a reactionary, fire-fighting mode to address recurring problems;
•Focus on interim solutions that preclude the enterprise from attaining process
consistency and subsequent continuous improvement—which remains the primary
objective of the CAP.
To overcome these challenges and achieve a successful CAP deployment—whether by
eliminating the weaknesses from a legacy CAP or by deploying a new CAP—a unified
approach across the enterprise should focus on these critical requirements:
•Introduction and maintenance of a CAP directed at the continuous performance
improvement of processes to meet documented requirements;
•Information quality, which is the cornerstone of a successful CAP; consistency
between the data and documents and the enterprise requirements remains a
prerequisite for continuous improvement;
•Conformance measurement (i.e., inspection, test, observation, etc.) conducted by
designated persons in accordance with documented procedures;
•Documented nonconformance recorded as a set of required data items that fully
identify and describe the observed event in complete context to the enterprise;
Figure 12 depicts this concept.
•Based on non-conformance type, a corrective action must be assigned in accordance
with a predetermined flow logic and responsibility definition for analysis and disposition by designated persons.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
24
•Root-cause analysis conducted by subject experts, supported by complete, clear, and
valid data, documents, and records, and presented in the context of the non-conformance event; the objective of the analysis is to determine root causes and develop
corrective actions to rectify the immediate problem and prevent recurrence;
•Documented corrective action identified and described in complete context of the
enterprise; Figure 12, depicts this concept;
•Controlled work authorization process allocating documented corrective action to
responsible persons and organizations for implementation to ensure accountability
for completeness, cost, and schedule criteria; the documented corrective action
may require formal rework, modification, etc., with resulting change requests and
subsequent change management as an integral part of the process;
•Verification performed by designated authorities to ensure that the corrective action
has been implemented; it includes, where applicable, verification of updated data
and documents and the re-establishment of baselines;
•Complete record establishing accountability by the capturing evidence of the nonconformance, associated events, and consequent activities or transactions;
•Continuous monitoring and trending to ensure that corrective action objectives for
process consistency and process improvement have been achieved.
These CAP requirements present complexities in information management that cannot be
readily solved by the deployment of generalized line-of-business information solutions.
A key success factor is
bringing these systems
together to operate as an
integrated information entity
that provides a holistic solution serving the needs of
all participants at all levels
of the enterprise.
A successful CAP solution requires consideration of the distinctive characteristics associated with the complex enterprise, as well as recognition of some primary principles.
First, the overall information management solution for the complex enterprise is a combination of best-of-breed systems that provide solutions through the complete lifecycle
of the enterprise. This combination of systems implies that the CAP must be capable of
integrating with the enterprise solutions infrastructure to a degree that a unified view
towards all relevant documents, data, requirements, nonconformance, and corrective
action can be established.
A key success factor is bringing these systems together to operate as an integrated
information entity that provides a holistic solution serving the needs of all participants
at all levels of the enterprise.
These individual systems, including the CAP, often materialize as information silos that
create complex challenges in realizing a successful solution. It is thus imperative that
the CAP solution be deployed in a unified manner to interact with and support legacy
enterprise systems.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
25
Introducing Bentley’s CAP Solution
Bentley’s AssetWise platform delivers incident management/corrective action capabilities that provide a consistent, enterprise-wide framework for incident response,
analysis, and dissemination of feedback to relevant parties, and implementing the
appropriate changes.
Locations where there are:
Systems
Structures
Components
Processes
Described by:
Documented
Non-Conformance
Documented
D
Documente
o
Corrective Action
Technical Manuals
Drawings
Procedures
Standards
Managed and controlled by:
Projects
People
Organizations
Participating in:
Processes
Change Requests
Change Notices
Modifications
Work Orders
Figure 6 – Information in context to Enterprise Entities
AssetWise products automate and
facilitate the identification and
resolution of issues and incidents
that are adverse to quality through
user-friendly condition reports, reviews, action tracking, and eventual
closure. Because AssetWise links
all relevant interrelated information
types across disparate repositories,
issues and incidents can be directly
related to equipment, systems, processes, documents, organizations,
and people. This unique approach
enables organizations to analyze
problems quickly and make informed
decisions about corrective and
preventative actions in the context
of a specific role. Furthermore, a
powerful trending feature catalogs
all events and actions for statistical
analysis and reporting.
AssetWise is further supported by proven deployment principles and Bentley’s
extensive expertise and knowledge in:
•Information modeling, requirements/concept definition, design, engineering, construction, operations, and end of life;
•Solution deployment principles that maximize rapid return on investment and, at the
same time, minimize risk;
•Technology and applications capable of providing a complete asset lifecycle information management system in harmony with existing enterprise IT systems.
As a CAP solution, AssetWise provides enterprise-wide process discipline and methods
that enable consistent CAP practices directed at product, service, project, and infrastructure in context with all asset data, documents, and organizational elements.
Corrective Action for Complex Enterprises: Principles and Practices
26
“Forget about tinkering with
your company’s organizational structures, job
descriptions, or machinery.
Instead, prepare to challenge, and in some cases,
abandon fundamental
assumptions on how your
company does its work.
Look beyond tasks, jobs
and organizational structures to focus on processes
- sets of activities that cross
functional borders and
which take information, raw
materials, labor and other
inputs to produce outputs
designed to meet
customers’ needs.”
– Michael Hammer
James Champy
Reengineering the Corporation,
2003
The fundamental principles behind this solution facilitate a timely and complete CAP
cycle, including measurement, nonconformance detection, analysis, and correction/
prevention/improvement, all against clear and valid requirements supported by highintegrity information.
AssetWise provides access to and delivery of complete, accurate, and meaningful CAP
information relative to business processes and the end-user’s role across the enterprise.
Accurate and meaningful CAP information is a critical management tool. An AssetWise
CAP augments management’s capacity to:
•Meet the demands of constantly changing regulatory and business requirements;
•Establish complete and unified CAP visibility and documented traceability across
the enterprise in context with process trends, detected nonconformance, corrective
action status, and process consistency and improvement;
•Optimize process efficiencies by identifying trends and instituting timely correction
to avoid deviation and subsequent nonconformance;
•Moderate the implications of regulatory compliance through an established, documented process that provides complete traceability from nonconformance to root
cause through corrective action and subsequent verification;
•Achieve the objective of process consistency and improvement through preventative
action, in contrast to a reactive and repetitive approach to nonconformance.
To Learn more about Bentley’s AssetWise products and services visit
www.bentley.com/assetwise.
© 2011 Bentley Systems Incorporated. Bentley, and the ‘B’ Bentley logo are either registered or unregistered trademarks or service marks of Bentley
Systems, Incorporated, or one of its direct or indirect wholly-owned subsidiaries. Other brands and product names are trademarks of their respective owners.
BAA018880-1/0001 07/11
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