04. FVI Expert Breakfast

Topic: Controlling vs. Maintenance – How we end the "Babylonian confusion of languages" and make values visible.

Guest was Prof. Dr. Steinhübel (Institute for Controlling), who, together with Marcel Hahn, Jens Reißenweber, and the community, illuminated probably the oldest conflict in the industry: Technicians (scientists) meet business people (humanities scholars). The central insights:

• Term hygiene as a basis: Before discussing, terms must be clarified. What the technician sees as a "necessary investment," the controller often only sees as an "expense." If we don't speak the same language, budgets fail not because of necessity, but because of definition.
• The cost of maintenance: We need to stop complaining about "costs" and start talking about "prices" and "performance." Maintenance has products (e.g., availability, compliance, substance preservation). The question should not be "What does maintenance cost?" but "What would the price be if we had to purchase this service externally?" or "What does it cost us if we don't have this service?"
• Opportunity costs are the real lever: Bernhard Heindel and Prof. Dr. Steinhübel agreed: The most important metric is not the maintenance budget, but the sum of maintenance costs PLUS the lost profits (opportunity costs) during downtime.

*Anecdote from practice:* A participant reported a controller who calculated a machine downtime at €19/hour (pure machine costs), while the actual production loss ran into thousands. Calculating like this saves the operation to death.

• Substance preservation as a silent balance sheet reserve: Machines are depreciated in accounting (value = 0). Technically, they often run for another 10 years. This difference is a massive value creation of maintenance ("substance preservation") that appears in hardly any balance sheet.
• Compliance instead of repair: Similar to quality management, we should distinguish between "compliance costs" (investment to keep everything running) and "non-compliance costs" (firefighting during failure). The goal is to shift the budget from error correction to prevention.

Classification: Data is the currency of argumentation

This discussion shows: Maintenance often loses the budget battle not because it does poor work, but because it lacks data to prove its value. A gut feeling ("We need this, or it will blow up") doesn't convince a CFO.

Here, ADAM becomes an indispensable interpreter for operational intelligence:

• Facts instead of fiction: To calculate opportunity costs, I need exact data: When did the machine stop? Why did it stop? How long did the reaction take? ADAM provides this data basis automatically and unadulterated. Without this history, any ROI calculation is just a guess.
• From cost factor to asset manager: If we (as discussed in the call) want to prove "substance preservation," we need a complete "life record" of the asset. ADAM documents every maintenance and every part replacement. This is the proof that the depreciated machine is not a scrap heap, but a well-maintained asset.
• Transparency creates budget: A controller cuts budgets he doesn't understand ("Black Box"). ADAM makes maintenance a "Glass Box." When management sees that a €10,000 investment in ADAM concretely prevented €50,000 in opportunity costs (downtime), the budget is no longer a discussion, but a logical consequence.

Conclusion: Those who want to speak the language of money need the vocabulary of data. ADAM provides the dictionary with which maintainers can finally reach eye level with controlling.