Overnight Aircraft Maintenance
Aircraft line maintenance reduces out of service aircraft by 43%
“I can’t begin to tell you how happy I am with the results, it’s a good story. These numbers are for real. I can attest to that because the RLG coaches and I lived through every painful minute and helped make the results possible.”
—Maintenance and Engineering Station Manager
Context/Challenge
One metric that is very important to aircraft line maintenance crews is “aircraft out of service at 0700 hours.” This airline engaged with RLG at one of their North American bases to improve this metric, while reducing flight delays and overtime. They aimed to engage their workforce while improving communication and accountability.
Approach
- Improved worker engagement through deliberate practices and leadership development.
- Enabled focus on KPIs and the enablers of high performance daily at work fronts across the base, 3 shifts per day.
- Implemented RLG’s Operating Rhythm™, making performance visible and helping create a one team culture. Business reviews, crew talks, performance metrics boards, one pager reports and more boosted engagement, communication and coordination.
- Performance improvement tools and teams focused on key challenge areas.
Result
This overnight maintenance improvement program accomplished its anticipated results:
- Achieved a 60% reduction in turn time for 737 engine changes and a 28% reduction in monthly flight delays.
- Reduced overtime by $2 million versus the prior year by improved work processes, shift-to-shift consistency and crew turnovers.
- $30 million impact at this airport base, representing an ROI of 22:1.
- Following this success, the client deployed RLG teams at other airport bases for similar projects.
- This subsequent 18-month full circle performance improvement project which yielded a 5:1 ROI was awarded the Business Transformation and Operational Excellence Summit award for Achievement of Operational Excellence in Airlines and Transportation.
- American Airlines Tech Ops leadership engaged RLG to transform their Line Maintenance leadership practices in three key hubs – Dallas, Miami and Chicago. The team of six RLG Coaches focused on Leadership coaching, building a new Operating Rhythm™, and teaching structured problem-solving tools.
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