On its face, being able to align priorities in an around-the-clock manufacturing environment seems like a no-brainer.
But according to Dave Maher, senior vice president of capital and turnarounds for Delek, the reality isn't that cut-and-dry.
"It sounds like common sense, right? But too often, we fail in a 24/7 manufacturing environment," Maher said. "On any given day, you have immediate priorities. But too often we fail at having the discipline to both plan the events well in advance and follow industry's 'best practice' timelines. There are different versions out there, but they are very similar."
All too often, "the quality of the deliverables in the planning phase that are required to have a successful event" is lacking, Maher said.
"If you talk to networks with a large database, you can see that the period of maximum influence is prior to the event," he continued. "That doesn't mean you cannot influence the outcome during the event. But how many things can be happening automatically in the background without intervention, additional oversight [or] without a lot of manual interaction?
"That's planning. In many applications, we use computers to solve complex math problems. When you think about a turnaround, you can basically break it down into a complex math problem."
Platforms give workers the opportunity to have "a solver," he said, "to help the folks in the field who are executing in the turnaround have much more advanced information than the human brain can compute or people can acquire in an event that moves that fast and with that much complexity."
Maher shared that Delek's current technology strategy for its upcoming shutdown/ turnaround event is to spend approximately half of their efforts on the planning piece.
"That might not be intuitive, because planning moves at a different pace than execution," he said. "A lot of the system is built around quick, real-time information. Things that used to take an hour to acquire now take a minute. Planning doesn't quite move at that pace."
Of the myriad factors of shutdown and turnaround planning that require attention and intense focus, Maher said the No. 1 factor is transparency.
"Too often, we don't have a good view of planning preparation at all levels of the organization," he explained.
Creating a transparent, real-time view with a connection to the raw data systems used in the planning phase, as well as being able to connect directly to those systems with the dashboarding, real-time information and transparency on the system is invaluable, Maher said.
Maher stressed that the more that data is manipulated, the more likely it is that truth and accuracy will be skewed.
"It just stands to reason [it's preferred] that you can grab the data in its rawest form, for example, from the spreadsheets that feed a PowerPoint presentation," he said. "Where is the information that enters the spreadsheet initially? Where does that come from? How far back can you take it?"
Maher strongly recommended connecting with that raw data.
"Get the raw information from the system and let the system tell you where you're at," he said. "It's usually not malicious, but there's potential for misinformation and bias that can slant the view."
Maher also strongly recommended applying technology in the planning phase of shutdowns and turnarounds "just like we're using it for some of the most complex, fastpaced execution scenarios with those same principles of getting the data quickly, having the data be pure and correct, and having the system tell you where you're at and even what to do.
"You work into the plan, by and large. If you can do that, the system becomes extremely powerful and you're working in an optimization mode. You're staying ahead of the event."
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