Assessing maintenance management IT on the basis of IT maturity

Research shows that investments in IT have a positive correlation to company profitability and competitiveness. This is the case also for maintenance management IT (MMIT), i.e. applications used for maintenance management purposes such as computerised maintenance management systems (CMMS) and maintenance management or asset management modules in enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. Although, models and methods for evaluating maintenance IT needs and IT systems are not well developed. This paper shows how the IT maturity of the maintenance organisation could be considered in the IT procurement process. If we are able to define functionality for different levels of IT maturity, the assessment and selection of the relatively best IT application for the maintenance organisation would be supported. A model describing three phases of IT maturity within maintenance (IT beginners, medium IT users and IT mature organisations) forms the theoretical basis. The applicability of the approach is tested by evaluating 24 CMMS and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems.The original pulication is available at www.springerlink.com.