How can you ensure your automation project aligns with the organization's strategy?

2 Define your desired state

Once you have assessed your current state, you need to define your desired state. This means articulating your vision, mission, and values for your plant, and how automation can help you achieve them. You also need to align your automation project with your organization's strategy, goals, and priorities, and ensure that they are consistent and compatible. By doing this, you will be able to establish the criteria, metrics, and targets for measuring the success of your automation project, as well as the milestones, deliverables, and timelines for implementing it.

3 Choose your automation solutions

After you have defined your desired state, you need to choose your automation solutions. This means selecting the technologies, tools, and methods that best suit your plant's needs, capabilities, and budget. You also need to consider the integration, compatibility, and scalability of your automation solutions, and how they will affect your plant's operations, maintenance, and safety. By doing this, you will be able to optimize the functionality, reliability, and efficiency of your automation project, as well as the return on investment and value proposition.

4 Manage your automation project

When you have chosen your automation solutions, you need to manage your automation project. This means planning, organizing, executing, monitoring, and controlling the activities, resources, and stakeholders involved in your automation project. You also need to communicate, collaborate, and coordinate with your team, vendors, contractors, and customers, and ensure that they are informed, engaged, and satisfied. By doing this, you will be able to deliver your automation project on time, on budget, and on quality, as well as manage the changes, issues, and risks that may arise.

5 Evaluate your automation project

After you have completed your automation project, you need to evaluate your automation project. This means reviewing the results, outcomes, and impacts of your automation project, and comparing them with the criteria, metrics, and targets that you set. You also need to collect feedback, lessons learned, and best practices from your automation project, and use them to improve your future projects. By doing this, you will be able to assess the performance, effectiveness, and sustainability of your automation project, as well as the alignment with your organization's strategy.

6 Celebrate your automation project

Finally, you need to celebrate your automation project. This means recognizing, rewarding, and thanking your team, vendors, contractors, and customers for their contributions, efforts, and achievements. You also need to share, showcase, and promote your automation project, and highlight the benefits, value, and success that it brought to your plant and your organization. By doing this, you will be able to foster a culture of innovation, excellence, and continuous improvement in your plant, and inspire more automation projects in the future.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?