Let's get back to basics 💪

Hi!

“May you live in interesting times” goes the (apocryphal) Chinese curse. 

That phrase has certainly come to mind once or twice while reading the news over the past few weeks.

But as everyone reading this newsletter knows, there’s very little we can do to control the economy or political scene. 

So this first tip is dedicated to what we can control: training and a relentless focus on fundamentals: 

1. How to incorporate facilities management into your training program

If you’re a dedicated reader of UPTIME, you already care about facilities management and controlling your R&M costs. 

You’re a convert – we don’t need to sell you on how important a good R&M program is to keeping your stores running to their utmost potential.

But how do you instill a sense of ownership in your store employees – the folks who interact with the equipment day in and day out?

We’ve talked last month about the importance of checklists, which are a vital part of any R&M toolkit. Store managers can use a “Moments of Truth” checklist to walk through their store with a fresh set of eyes, logging lingering issues that can be fixed during their downtime or compiled into a punch list for a productive appointment with a handyman.

Checklists can also be included as part of a training program for new staff. We’re big believers in involving all staff in facilities management – incorporating on day one a comprehensive debrief of the equipment the staff will be utilizing.

Incorporating maintenance in an employee’s onboarding increases his or her feeling of ownership over the equipment. And employees who have been trained to quickly spot a malfunctioning piece of equipment can save you a tremendous amount of time and money in the long run.

And where do checklists come in? New employees are being hit with a firehose of information during their onboarding. At first, they’ll undoubtedly be focused on fulfilling the basics of their jobs. But some of the R&M information will stick, and the training will provide a baseline familiarity with equipment that can be reinforced by checklists.

Mental Health Break

USA Today polled its readers to compile a list of the best fast food restaurants for 2024. It’s worth a read – some of the results are pretty unexpected. 

(Spoiler alert: true Cincinnatians should be pleased with the pick for best regional chain.)

2. Calculate the true opportunity cost of downtime

There’s a story about Elon Musk and a SpaceX launch:

In its early days, SpaceX managed to establish itself in the brutally hard aerospace industry partly by being a low-cost provider. In Ashlee Vance’s 2015 biography, Musk said that he wanted to build the “Southwest Airlines of Space.” To accomplish this, he required his team to be extremely cost conscious – any expenditures over $10,000 had to be approved by Musk.

So when it came time to launch a Falcon 9 rocket – which was carrying an important communications satellite – the company was still very much in an economical frame of mind. Every dollar counted. So when the launch team in Cape Canaveral, Florida realized that a helium valve for the rocket was actually in Los Angeles, Musk did something very unexpected: he rented a private jet to fly the single part to Florida.

Musk calculated that the exorbitant cost of renting a private jet to carry a single part across the country actually was less than the cost of delaying the launch by a day. Or in other words: The opportunity cost of a delay was higher than renting the jet.

It’s a great story, and one that factors into the tradeoff between quickly repairing a piece of restaurant equipment or letting it sit unrepaired. 

What’s the total value of lost sales from a down fryer, or worse still, a broken AC unit? What’s the expected lifetime value of a customer or two who has a bad experience and doesn’t return? You may find that the opportunity cost is higher than you expect.

When time represents money, maximizing your facility uptime starts to seem even more important!

Thanks for reading UPTIME #6!

We’ll be back next month with more tips and details on what’s new at Prefix.

Have something you’d like to see covered in a future newsletter? Shoot us a reply!

All the best,
Jared