2024 State of Maintenance Report Reveals Industry Highlights and Challenges for the Year Ahead

2024 State of Maintenance Report Reveals Industry Highlights and Challenges for the Year Ahead

UpKeep has released its 2024 State of Maintenance report based on feedback from maintenance and reliability executives and professionals from around the world. The survey was based on responses from mostly U.S.-based small- to mid-sized companies, with 72 percent of respondents representing businesses with fewer than 1,000 employees. Nearly half of participants were either maintenance managers or supervisors, and 40 percent of respondents worked at companies with up to $100 million in annual revenue. Industries spanned manufacturing, oil and gas, food and beverage, facilities management and more.

Here are key findings from this year’s report:

75% of respondents maintained or expanded maintenance budgets.

More than 75 percent of participants reported that they either maintained or increased their maintenance budgets in 2023 over the previous year, indicating a positive outlook for the industry overall. This trend was consistent across companies of different sizes. As these companies look toward 2024, respondents expect those increases to continue into the new year.

Wage pressures as well as current economic conditions have contributed to the need for increased budgets. Many companies may be rethinking compensation, benefits, and bonuses in light of the ongoing labor shortages and retention challenges. About 71 percent of respondents have noted salary growth this year.

65% use CMMS to track maintenance activities with many still reliant on manual systems. 

Those participants who indicated their organizations use CMMS solutions said visibility into completed work, reduced unplanned downtime and better team communications topped their lists of benefits. Surprisingly, 27 percent of respondents are still using pen and paper or spreadsheet-based systems to track maintenance activities.

These findings were nearly identical to those reported in UpKeep’s 2021 State of Maintenance report, indicating that very few companies have adopted new technologies during the last two years.

Shift from reactive maintenance to proactive activities continues.

About 38 percent of participants indicated that more than half of their maintenance activities are planned, with 15 percent reporting that nearly all of their maintenance is planned. Planned maintenance can reduce equipment breakdowns and associated costs, extend asset life cycles, and decrease overall downtime.

About half of respondents say recruiting new talent is difficult.

Although 48 percent of survey participants noted that attracting the younger generation to the maintenance field is difficult or very difficult, a significant 38 percent find it neither particularly difficult nor easy.

Many businesses are finding that apprenticeships that provide hands-on training and personal mentorship programs are most successful in both recruiting new professionals and retaining younger staff.

80% report successful knowledge transfer within companies.

With about half the survey respondents at the supervisor or manager level, it is noteworthy that knowledge transfer was reported as fairly successful in this demographic. It is significantly different from the findings reported in UpKeep’s 2023 State of Community report where only one in five respondents reported effective knowledge transfer.

Unplanned maintenance and staffing concerns top challenges for companies.

Although unplanned equipment breakdowns still topped the 2023 list as the biggest challenge, indicating a need to continue finding ways to reduce downtime and productivity losses, several issues revolving around labor issues followed closely behind.

In 2023, 29 percent of respondents cited a reduction of staff as one of the top concerns. For the upcoming year, 34 percent are more worried about staff retention and 38 percent are concerned about team productivity issues. However, at the same time, nearly 75 percent of respondents said they have been at least somewhat effective at retaining employees in 2023.

60% of respondents are seeing their organizations hire more contractors vs. full-time staff.

The most common reasons for this shift included dealing with labor shortages, seeking specialized skills for specific projects, and facing an increased focus on cost-effectiveness.

As an industry, the future of maintenance and reliability looks bright. Increased budgets and salaries indicate that companies are continuing to value contributions made by maintenance professionals. Moving into 2024, the top challenges will continue to be reducing downtime and unplanned maintenance to boost overall productivity as well as attracting and retaining the best and the brightest. By facing these challenges with proven technology such as CMMS systems and initiatives such as apprenticeship programs, companies can successfully capitalize on the opportunities that await in 2024. Download the full report HERE.