What is Failure in Operations? 

Failure in operations occurs when the state or condition of a steep in operations does not meet a desired or intended objective.

What are the Types of Operational Failure?

• Design failure:Operations may look fine on paper but cannot cope with real circumstances
• Facilities failure: All facilities (machines, equipment, buildings, fittings) are liable to breakdown.
• People failure: Errors and violations individuals
• Supplier failure:A supplier failed to Deliver, Deliver on time, Deliver quality goods and services, can lead to failure within an operation.
• Customer failure: Customer failure can result when customers misuse products and services

What are the Techniques for Measuring Failure?

There are three main ways of measuring failure:

• Failure rates – how often a failure occurs
• Reliability – the chances of failure occurring
• Availability – the amount of available useful operating time

What are the Methods of Detecting Failure? 

The Mechanisms used to detect failure include:

• In process checks – employees check that the process is acceptable during the process.
• Machine diagnostic check – a machine is put through a prescribed sequence of activities to expose any failures or potential failures.
• Point-of-departure interviews – at the end of a service, staff may check that the service has been satisfactory.
• Focus group – groups of customers are brought together to some aspects of a product or service.
• Questionnaires – these can be used to ask for opinions about products or services.

What is Failure Analysis?

Analysis of failure arises in numerous situations: 

• Accident investigation
• Product liability
• Complaint analysis
• Critical incident analysis

What is Failure mode and effect analysis (FMEA)?

Used to identify failure before it happens so proactive measures can be taken. For each possible cause of failure the following type questions are asked:

1. What is the likelihood a failure will occur?
2. What would the consequence of the failure be?
3. How likely is such a failure to be detected before it affects the customer?

Risk priority number (RPN) calculated based on these questions and Corrective action taken based on RPN.

What is a Fault-tree analysis?

This is a logical procedure that starts with a failure or potential failure and works backwards to identify all the possible causes and therefore the origins of that failure. 

It‟s Made up of branches connected AND nodes and OR nodes. 

Branches below AND node all need to occur for the event above the node to occur. Only one of the branches below an OR node needs to occur for the event above the node to occur. 

How to Reduce Operational Failures? 

Numerous approaches reduce the likelihood of operational failure. 

• Designing out fail points - Identifying and then controlling process, product and service characteristics to try to prevent failures. Use of process maps to detect potential fail points in operations.
• Redundancy - Building up redundancy to an operation means having back-up systems in case of failure.Increases the reliability of a component. 
• Fail-safeing - Called poka-yoke in Japan. It is Based on the principle that human mistakes are to some extent inevitable. The objective is to prevent them from becoming a defect. Poka-yokes are simple (preferably inexpensive) devices of systems which are incorporated into a process to prevent inadvertent operator mistakes resulting in a defect.
• Maintenance - Maintenance is the method used organizations to avoid failure taking care of their physical activities. It is Important to organizations whose physical activities play a central role in creating their goods and service.