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A Guide to Onsite Training Requirements
Another key component for the success of your Maximo training is to
create an ideal training environment. To aid your understanding and preparation
for successful training delivery, the following are typical onsite training
requirements. Actual requirements may vary based on the actual scope
of training, number of training attendees, etc.
- An adequate training environment, such as dedicated training
facility or suitable conference room.
- A networked PC for each attendee with Maximo access,
and similar PC for the Instructor.
- A dedicated or available non-Production Maximo environment
which mirrors the current Production configuration
and deployment, with current sample data.
- Ensure that trainees have system permissions which
mirror their functional roles and capabilities in the
Production system.
- A LCD projector and screen.
- A whiteboard and/or flipcharts.
- Supplies for each attendee (notepad, pens, dry erase markers,
post-its).
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How Does Your Maximo Training Program Measure Up?
The overall success of every Maximo Enterprise Asset Management implementation,
upgrade, or support project can be measured by the effective and full
utilization of the system, adherence to business practices and policies,
understanding of the features and functionality of the system, and end
user acceptance and perceptions of the system. Key components for meeting
these factors and achieving a high level of operational excellence includes
ensuring that the people using the system understand how it works and
how they should be using it to effectively perform their day-to-day work
duties, responsibilities, and operations.
Most organizations make sizable investments in Maximo to maintain their
assets – shouldn’t a similar investment be made in the
people using the system responsible for maintaining those assets?
Unfortunately, we often see the opposite:
- Training is often one of the first areas reduced or cut when scoping
and investing in a deployed enterprise system.
- Users struggle following policies and procedures and
properly utilizing the system because they have not been
fully and properly trained.
- Training responsibilities are often not defined, which
impacts the development and delivery of training, limits
the ability to measure the transfer of knowledge, and affects users’ ability
to use what has been taught.
- Training is often perceived as an implementation activity,
instead of an ongoing program which allows new users and
existing users with new responsibilities to maintain
their proficiency in Maximo.
 Ascension
Strategies’ Maximo
Implementation Component Timeline (MICT)™ is the answer
for evaluating a training program, using the 3 “D’s”: Define, Develop and Deploy.
The MICT methodology incorporates best practices to ensure
the training program
is also measurable, maintained, repeatable,
and enforced.
 With the availability of ever-changing technology, extensive and scalable
options are available to enable your organization to embrace best practices
to deploy and support a complete and effective training program for the
immediate and long-term success of your Maximo
Enterprise Asset Management system with these things in mind.
At Ascension Strategies, we understand these, and can evaluate and tailor
a training program for your specific needs.
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Training Best Practices
 Let’s
get started by examining some training best practices,
categorically. We’ve said that an effective training
program should be measurable, maintained, repeatable,
and enforced.
How is it measurable? The training can be measured
in a couple of key ways. First, by assessing if the training
and training material reflect your specific system configuration,
deployment, and utilization, and factors in the specific business
processes for the organization and/or the individual in a role-based
capacity. Second, by measuring a person’s knowledge and
system competency before and after receiving training. This
knowledge measurement could be achieved using vehicles such
as “pre” and “post” objective quizzes,
or by demonstration of system usage and alignment with business
processes. Third, by measuring the benefits achieved to date
from Maximo to the original business case. If the organization
is not achieving the goals anticipated by implementing Maximo,
the gap may be due to a deficiency in the training program.
Maintaining a training program is an often-neglected
aspect within many organizations, but is key to effective training.
If something is changed in the system or business process,
those changes should then also be reflected in the training
material to ensure it is kept current. Similarly, having a
dedicated training environment which closely mirrors the Production
(live) system, with at least relatively current data, is equally
important. Just as organizations have a system administration
function, the organization should have a person or group dedicated
to maintaining the training materials and training environment.
For larger organizations, training materials could be divided
by business area, with a designated “Lead” in each
responsible for maintaining the materials and information.
Assuming now that the training materials exist and are being
maintained, making them repeatable is the next step.
Having your training material in a repeatable capacity helps
ensure that it can be delivered or used when acquiring new
staff, when people change positions or receive promotions,
or when conducting periodic re-training as a knowledge and
process “refresher.” It is also important to have
the training materials available so that people know where
to locate and access the material, and are given time in their
work schedule to spend with the material.
Finally, is the training program enforced? Enforcing
can be as simple as tracking when training has been scheduled
and ensuring that all people assigned have attended. Other
ways to help enforce training, as mentioned above in measurable,
are to consider assessing if the trainees are learning the
material necessary to perform their job duties using tools
like “pre” and “post” tests, or requiring
participants to demonstrate system functionality. Organizations
should also update their Learning Management System (LMS) for
employees’ completion
of the Maximo training, in order to monitor compliance with
the training plan.
These training best practices are just some of the
key considerations to help model a training program for the
betterment of both your work force and organization overall.
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Approaching the Development of a Robust Training Program
While we’ve discussed considerations and best
practices for a training program, let’s now discuss
how to approach the development of a training program
that is suitable for your organization.
To develop an appropriate training program, you must
first evaluate and understand both your deployed system
and the size and structure of your organization. How
your system is deployed and its stability is an optimal
starting point. If you already have a fully deployed
system and expect minimal on-going or near-term configuration
or changes (i.e. upgrades, etc.), development or investment
in a more robust training program may be warranted. If
you have a large or diverse organization, but Maximo
is deployed using a corporate standard (i.e. all Sites
or Business Units using common configuration, business
processes, etc.), this would also justify a more robust
training solution. Another factor in assessing your system
is determining your level of configuration or customization
from out-of-the-box. Fewer changes reduce the need for
custom or customized training materials, allowing for
usage of standardized training materials based on a standard
out-of-the-box system. Similarly, complex or very specific
business processes may require more complex training
materials.
Next, consider the composition, size, geography, and
employee turnover of your organization. These factors
will drive different requirements for what types of training
materials are best suited, as well as how to deploy and
deliver the training.
Finally, review all of the available training options
and determine, based on the above, which option(s) are
best suited for your organization and training needs.
 Success Tip: Provide users with generic overview Maximo
training material prior to detailed training sessions
to enable them to become familiar with the overall scope
of Maximo, including modules and general navigation.
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Training Delivery Options Explored
With the rapid evolution of technology and ease of access
and use of these technologies, there are many options
now available for the effective delivery of Maximo training
to your organization. The following are some of the primary
Maximo training delivery options.
- Static online: Self-paced training materials comprised
of non-interactive, and typically standardized, material
that trainees can browse or review at their own pace,
such as Big Data University by IBM.
- Instructor-led in-person: A one-to-many approach able
to support larger groups, with maximum focus on individual
trainees in a dynamic, interactive environment using
either standardized or customized training materials.
This alternative may also incorporate the “train
the trainer” approach, whereby “super users” are
initially trained and lead subsequent training sessions
on their own.
- Instructor-led online: A one-to-many approach suitable
for smaller groups, with greater flexibility to schedule
in smaller increments, minimizing impact to regular work
days and eliminating travel and expenses.
- Computer-Based Training (CBT): CBT uses delivery methods
such as Web-enabled Captivate interactive, hands-on modules
consisting of either standardized or customized materials.
This self-paced approach requires more significant development
time, but is highly repeatable, with enhanced options
for pre and post-tests, role and business process based,
and engaging for trainees.
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Training Direction: Customized vs. Standardized
 Another directional consideration for your training and training
materials is to determine whether to invest in the development
of customized, or leverage standardized. To make this determination,
you should ensure an understanding of the primary differences,
and evaluate which approach best suites your company profile,
and needs, including the pros and cons of each.
Standardized training and materials are based on out-of-the-box,
or default/generic configurations, screens, etc., and use more
typical or average business processes and sample IBM “demo” data.
By leveraging standardized training and materials, you can
greatly reduce development cost and time, and increase your
training delivery options.
By contrast, customized training materials require a higher
cost to develop and maintain. For example, customized training
material incorporates your specific screens and configurations,
includes examples with your data, and is typically based on
your specific business processes. This approach is best-suited
for clients with complex business processes, higher system
tailoring, and configuration specific to their functional requirements,
industry, or deployment (such as when integrated with other
systems, possessing automation and utilization of Maximo Workflow,
etc.).
Success Tip: Leverage the knowledge of the Maximo functional
consultants during the development of the customized training
curriculum to ensure the training content is aligned with the
configured Maximo system. |
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Developing an Effective Training Plan
 Development
of an effective training plan is a key step towards the success
of all training delivery. While every training plan should
detail training topics and sessions, and include good time
planning and management (including allowances for regular breaks),
there are a number of training best practices which should
be considered:
- Determine the optimal target class sizes, including expected
attendance for each course and session assignments. Our experience
has shown that instructor-led classes should be no larger
than 8 to 10 participants (dependent on training scope).
- Design the training using a modularized topic approach
and breakdown, by the workforce to be trained, based on the
various functional roles and job duties.
- Consider options for multiple, or repeat sessions of key
sessions to allow for anyone missing a session or to split
the workforce (whether for class size or to minimize impact
to daily regular work functions), and/or allowing for repeat
attendance.
- Include organization “super users” in key training
sessions to address questions which may arise regarding business
processes and system scope.
- Include planning for hands-on workshops and open Q&A.
- Ad-hoc solutions conceptual instruction or demonstration
options to assess additional topics or system features and
functionality, or explore solutions to real-world business
functional requirements.
Success Tip: Schedule
instructor-led training sessions around the participants’ work
schedules, to the extent possible, to make attendance more
convenient. Keep in mind
that the pace
of learning and adoption of the material will vary among the
participants.
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Bonus: Some Hidden
Benefits of Training
During the delivery of Maximo training programs, it is common
to experience additional benefits, including:
- Validation of security groups and user permissions.
- Capture of unforeseen gaps in functionality which were
missed during design workshops.
- Opportunities to identify potential business process
improvements.
- Opportunities to identify system configuration and deployment
enhancements, such as Workflow and automation.
- Identification of ways to leverage the configured Maximo
system to address specific needs.
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Summary
The cost of administering training during a Maximo implementation
and maintaining this training program over the life of the
system often conflict with the organization’s project
budget. Project sponsors should view training as an investment
in people and an opportunity to optimize the software investment.
Designing the training program at the inception of the Maximo
project will ensure the training program is tailored to the
organization’s environment. Taking this approach to
training will reduce the risk that the Maximo implementation
fails to meet its objectives, while enhancing end users’ acceptance
of this new tool.
Contact
our Business Solutions Team today to discover
how we can help you achieve a world-class training program!
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In Our Next Issue
Maximo Assessments – a Key to Unlocking your Maximo
Roadmap
 Whether
you are looking at upgrading your current Maximo system or
considering a new Maximo implementation, a properly executed Maximo
Assessment can be a key to unlocking your Maximo
roadmap. An Assessment can be a value-add for your maintenance
organization by tailoring to address the any of the following:
- Developing a more accurate planning, budgeting, and scope
for new implementation or upgrade projects or support needs.
- Performing a technical System Health Check.
- Performing a System Utilization Review (best practices,
business process, configuration, automation, etc.).
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