CMMS & AIP: A Profitable Pairing for Enhanced Asset Management

Managing physical assets effectively is a key challenge for today’s facilities, operations, and finance leaders. To meet these challenges head-on, many organizations are looking to combine the power of their computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS) with Asset Investment Planning (AIP).  

Together, these systems work in unison to streamline asset management, improve decision-making, and ensure organizations maximize their resources. Let’s explore how integrating CMMS with AIP can transform how you manage your physical assets. 

What is a CMMS?

First, what is a CMMS? A CMMS is software designed to support maintenance and operations teams by making asset management more efficient, structured, and proactive. The software can help automate essential tasks like tracking work orders, scheduling preventative maintenance, and aligning maintenance plans with inventory management. By integrating these functions, CMMS can ensure smoother workflows, reduce downtime, and lower operational costs. 

CMMS can also help organizations move beyond reactive maintenance practices, where maintenance is only performed after an asset breaks down. Instead, it supports preventative and predictive maintenance strategies, which not only improve asset reliability, but also extend asset lifecycles. For organizations operating across multiple facilities, a robust CMMS can centralize asset data, creating a clear view of your entire asset portfolio.  

Laying the foundation with a Facilities Condition Assessment

Ideally, before utilizing a CMMS however, organizations should begin documenting asset data through a Facilities Condition Assessment (FCA). These assessments can be performed either internally or with the help of an outside engineering firm.  

An FCA documents each of your physical assets, and provides a comprehensive evaluation of each asset’s condition, risk of failure, and associated costs. This allows you to prioritize investments based on each asset’s importance to operations, risk to safety, and overall cost-effectiveness. 

While an FCA provides an initial understanding of your assets, it’s the ongoing monitoring through CMMS that keeps asset data fresh. Every work order and maintenance task logged into the CMMS updates the asset's condition, ensuring real-time insights. Because of this, if an FCA is too costly or time-consuming for your organization to perform, CMMS data can still serve as your primary information source. 

What is AIP?

While CMMS focuses on the operational aspects of asset management, asset investment planning brings a strategic layer by providing long-term capital planning insights. AIP uses data gathered from various sources, including CMMS and FCA, to create a proactive, data-driven investment strategy for assets. This strategy allows organizations to make informed decisions about where to allocate capital, which assets to prioritize, and how to optimize their budget for maximum impact. 

With AIP, organizations move away from reactive, emergency-driven spending and instead adopt a forward-looking approach. This means having a clear understanding of when an asset will need replacement, repair, or maintenance, allowing finance leaders to plan for future costs and avoid budget surprises.

How Brightly combines the power of AIP and CMMS 

Brightly’s CMMS platform allows organizations to optimize asset maintenance and operations by automating workflows, tracking asset health, and providing real-time insights. By integrating with Brightly’s AIP tools like Origin™ and Predictor™, organizations gain access to strategic decision-making capabilities. 

Origin was designed to leverage existing CMMS data to give you real-time asset health updates, so you always know precisely where in your asset portfolio to focus your maintenance budget.

Predictor gives businesses the world-class capital planning software needed to model various funding scenarios, use data analytics to prove funding, and improve strategic asset management. 

With Brightly in your AIP and CMMS corner, you can tackle your most ambitious projects yet. Learn more about the basics of AIP here or click here to learn more about how your organization can properly prepare for a facilities condition assessment.