Following-up on yesterday’s announcement of the upcoming DoD Product Support Manager’s Workshop, wanted to share a few perspectives on the PSM’s role when it comes to maintenance planning and maintenance management.

Maintenance, defined as the action(s) necessary to retain or restore an item to a specified condition, is essential to the availability and capability of DoD systems. DoD PSMs, partnered with Systems Engineers, play an essential role in establishing and periodically updating the system’s maintenance plan. The DoD PSM Guidebook states maintenance planning and management, one of the 12 IPS elements, “defines the repair and upkeep tasks, schedule, and resources” and DoDD 4151.18, Maintenance of Military Materiel, adds the plan should “be designed for minimizing the total life-cycle cost.” Led by Reliability & Maintainability (R&M) Engineers, with a team of Warfighting customers (e.g., maintenance SMEs), organic maintenance product support provider (e.g., depot) SMEs, PSM IPT representative(s), and the OEM/vendor, the program office develops the maintenance plan and updates it throughout the life cycle to deliver optimum availability and safety. Key processes in developing the maintenance plan include Product Support Analysis (e.g., Failure Modes Effects and Criticality Analysis, Fault Tree Analysis, Level of Repair Analysis, and Maintenance Task Analysis, etc.) defined in MIL-HDBK-502A. Two pivotal processes are Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) and Condition-Based Maintenance Plus (CBM+). The PSM or designee should participate in each of these processes to ensure a comprehensive understanding of the data, analysis (including assumptions), and results that guide the maintenance plan’s design. Government maintenance SMEs are worth their weight in gold here!

The PSM or designee also plays a central role in liaising with Service or materiel command representatives who oversee Depot Source of Repair (DSOR), Core (10 USC 2464) and 50/50 (10 USC 2466) requirements to ensure the system’s maintenance strategy/plan is aligned to the Service’s strategic goals and for complying with these statutes and DoD policy while meeting Warfighter objectives. A best practice in maintenance plan design is to use modeling & simulation, such as the Army’s LogSIM capability, and other Digital Product Support principles such as a Digital Twin. Often part of a robust CBM+ program, Digital Twins and sensor-based algorithms enable the Warfighter to identify impending failures and perform maintenance upon evidence of need, at a time and place of their choosing, reducing unscheduled maintenance and its associated adverse mission impacts. See Chapter 5 of the IPS Element Guidebook for additional details on Maintenance Planning & Management.

On a related note, DAU offers a wide range of related learning assets including:

• ACQuipedia Articles
  • Depot Activation and Capacity Establishment
  • Depot Level Maintenance
  • Depot Maintenance Inter-service Support Agreement (DMISA)
  • Depot Maintenance Statute - Title 10 USC 2460
  • Depot Maintenance Statute - Title 10 USC 2464
  • Depot Maintenance Statute - Title 10 USC 2466
  • Depot Maintenance Statute - Title 10 USC 2469
  • Depot Maintenance Statute - Title 10 USC 2474
  • Depot Source of Repair (DSOR) Determination Process
  • Condition-Based Maintenance Plus (CBM+) ACQuipedia Article
  • Prognostics & Health Management (PHM) ACQuipedia Article
  • Public-Private Partnerships (PPP)
  • Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) ACQuipedia Article

• Training Courses & Defense Acqusition Credentials
  • ​CLCL 004 Maintenance Planning and Maintenance Management Credential
  • LOG 0060 Public-Private Partnerships
  • LOG 0220 Title 10 Depot Maintenance Statute Overview
  • LOG 0230 Title 10 U.S.C. 2464 Core Statute Implementation
  • LOG 0240 Title 10 Limitations on Performance of Depot Maintenance (50/50)
  • LOG 0250 Depot Maintenance Interservice Support Agreements (DMISA)
  • LOG 0260 Depot Maintenance Capacity Measurement
  • LOG 0290 Condition-Based Maintenance Plus (CBM+) Online Training
  • LOG 0300 Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) Online Training