Resilient Maintenance Operator: Technology and Skills for Evolution

Abstract

The evolution towards smart manufacturing is leading to opportunities and challenges resulting from rapidly changing production demands, frequent changeovers, and short time to market of new products. In this context, the role of maintenance has become increasingly complex and critical. This paper focuses on the changing role in light of advanced technologies and skills that are essential for modern maintenance practices to become a resilient maintenance operator. The integration of advanced technologies is explored, including Computerized Maintenance Management Systems, Artificial Intelligence, Digital Twins, Mixed Reality, and chatbots. In addition, the importance of skills is emphasized in a broad range consisting of technical proficiency, problem-solving abilities, project management expertise, adaptability, teamwork, communication, and the digital skills to adopt advanced technologies to optimize maintenance processes and drive continuous improvement. The discussion highlights how technologies and skills not only enhance operational efficiency, but also support the development of resilient maintenance strategies capable of coping with dynamic production environments. By examining the impact of technologies and the necessary skills for maintenance professionals by multiple research queries and literature review, this paper provides a conceptual framework for the resilient maintenance operator with the identified skills paired with the key technologies, the framework focuses on the changing role in light of advanced technologies and skills that are essential to become a resilient maintenance operator within modern maintenance practices