The Future of Asset Management?

Where are we going is a perennial question of continuing interest for all of us, and 15 years ago, a few colleagues and I got together in London to consider where AM might go. Using a Scenario Planning framework, we selected three pathways, each with two outcomes: strong (positive) and weak (negative) and 4 indicators to monitor each pathway.

So six scenarios in all. An interesting thing about scenarios is that they can be used to track what is happening - but they may equally be used (albeit with considerably more effort!) to create the future we desire. 

They may also be used, as our illustration by Michaela suggests, to leaf back and forth through time, as through a book. So we can look at how AM has developed over the last 15 years, and we can use the same thinking process to cast our eyes forward over, say, the next 15 years. It is often easier to start the thinking process by looking back. This may help us decide what pathway is needed to secure our desired future. Then it is a matter of ensuring that this pathway dominates.

The three pathways we considered were:

1. A world where regulation dominates, and AM becomes a set of mandated operations and procedures; 
2. A world where the emphasis is on technology, AM becomes technical;
3. A world where AM becomes the dominant management philosophy.

And the four indicators we chose to monitor were:

1. How senior management viewed AM,
2. The content of AM Plans, 
3. The impact of automation, IT, and risk, and 
4. How AM was treated in teaching, research, and publication. 

Here, as an example, is Scenario 4, the weak (negative) outcome of the Technology pathway. 

A world where the AM emphasis is on the technical.

Scenario 4, the weak (negative) outcome.

Major characteristics in this scenario include: a lack of understanding by senior management, a failure to communicate, and a world in which asset management becomes mechanical, algorithmic, without considered judgement. 

Senior management view 

Senior decision-makers do not understand asset management. The asset management tools and technologies that staff are so interested in are dismissed as ‘toys for the boys’ and considered too expensive. Staff have to fight to secure funding and feel neglected and frustrated. Cost-saving innovations are made out of necessity but are not disseminated. Service is defined in technical terms.

Asset management plans

Asset management plans are a combination of operational tools and funding proposals and sometimes tend towards a ‘wish list’ of desirable projects. Management fails to clearly communicate organisational goals and staff are left, by default, to invent their own goals, few of which are documented. Asset management is seen as a subset of engineering, with little or no multidisciplinary involvement and very little communication between asset management and other areas of the organisation.

Automation, IT and risk/uncertainty

New models and approaches are eagerly seized on, and just as rapidly discarded in favour of newer models. Risk Management is highly regarded by staff, but uncertainty is either treated as a risk or not treated at all.

Teaching, Research and Publication

More emphasis is placed on teaching than research. There is little publication in academic journals, and such publication as there is tends to appear in association and trade journals, often focuses on only one group of assets rather than assets in general, and is more operational in nature.

Where to now?

These scenarios were developed in 2010 in discussion with Ruth Wallsgrove, Chris Lloyd, and Linda Newton. While Ruth was to go on and publish two books on AM (with Lou Cripps), Chris to edit three very popular collected works, Linda to become the major contributor to the United Nations’ work on AM, and I to write ‘The Story of AM’; this was still all in the future. I wonder how we would frame the scenarios today and what indicators we would look for now?   

The full study is now available in Articles.