Industry 4.0 is technical progress, but how about the people involved in this? We’ve all welcomed Industry 4.0, the version of the future that will mean a better life. 4.0 is already here. Some companies have embraced it wholeheartedly, while others may be dragging their feet and some raving about knowledge management benefits.
Knowledge scope
But what about the people who have to maintain both 4.0 and 1.0 as well as aging 0.1 assets? Is it reasonable to expect your service department to handle all three? Shouldn’t you be able to demand their knowledge to span across more than three decades? Still, you would never put an individual employee in charge of everything.
These questions are unsettling, especially if you are asking an employee who is (should be) in charge of the uptime in your business. What you are, in fact, asking is whether they are capable of maintaining undisturbed production. That in itself is a silly question, seeing as the people you are quizzing have been doing just that for many years. So why doubt them?
Prioritizing
In the back of your mind, you know these issues need tackling. Change and innovation are your responsibility, but often, the day-to-day doldrums of running a business can push emerging problems like this into the background. When solutions appear out of reach, you are even more tempted to bury your head in the sand.
Global approach
But stop thinking local for a minute! Instead, remember that knowledge sharing is the key, and knowledge management benefits are real. What’s more, there is someone out there somewhere with the answers to all your questions.
The knowledge and expertise you require don’t need to be present in your organization. Find and purchase this information and provide your staff with the tools to get the information. You will soon discover that it is much more cost-efficient to find expertise online, rather than try to foster it within your organization.
Final thoughts
Up until now, almost no specialized knowledge-supply platforms existed. SupportPoints stepped into this breach and can supply you with the industrial IT knowledge you need. With almost 3500 experts worldwide, we provide almost instant support if you have malfunctioning PLCs. Because of time differences, you can get 24/7 support in your own language. We also support bus systems and obsolete PLC’s.
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