Segmentación de Mercado

The water management plans of both organizations frame the AM deployment as a strategy that should lead to a more effective and efficient management of assets. Both organizations have strategic documents that are approved by the decision makers and that describe the AM deployment strategies in more detail. The three key premises of these strategies are:

1. The organizations ultimately aim to deploy AM for both the water system and wastewater treatment chain. However, the attention that is paid two these two asset systems is not evenly distributed. Just like many other regional water authorities, the efforts are predominantly focused on the wastewater treatment chain and the pumping stations of the water system in this). Quick wins can be achieved sooner within the wastewater treatment chain. This is because of the favorable asset characteristics and the fact that there is already more experience with some elements of AM.

2. In line with this study, the two deployment strategies frame AM as an interdisciplinary and holistic concept that covers multiple organizational levels and functional groups. Looking to the strategical documents however, there are differences between the two authorities. Zuiderzeeland only included the deployment of AM as a strategy within its programs that focus on the water system and the wastewater treatment chain. To point out that the AM deployment is an organization-wide change, Vechtstromen has also included it within the more general program: governance and organizing (see Section 4.2.2).

3. The organizations stress out that deployment of AM is not a goal in itself, but just a means to improve the management of physical assets. There is no need to fully deploy AM as many principles of AM are already adopted by the organizations. Besides, the existing Condition SP1-OF, sub-condition 1: the objectives and strategies are clear,

operations are have proven to be successful over a long time and are tailored to the water management tasks. Because of this, the authorities are aiming to embed AM within their existing operations and follow an iterative (i.e. small consecutive steps that are constantly evaluated) and problem-based (i.e. only conduct steps that directly fulfill the existing needs) approach in this. This growth process should also help to prevent that the organizations get lost in the complexities and the holistic characteristics of AM.

Several interviewees indicated that these deployment strategies need some further clarification. Their first and main argument is there is still some lack of clarity about what AM is. Moreover, especially within Vechtstromen, the interviewees pointed out that the existing vision on AM should be more clarified and translated into more SMART formulated objectives. According to them, this would give employees a clearer point on the horizon. Besides, it would clarify what organizational changes are expected, clarify what period and resources are needed, and provide a reference point for the iterative short-term step. Besides, as stated by

an interviewee: “It would help to formulate some milestones in the change process as a AM deployment without objectives is too noncommittal”. However, this point of view was also criticized by some other interviewees. According to them, the organization should deliberately leave some room for further elaboration. The final outcomes of the AM deployment are currently not known and should be figured out during the iterative approach.

There is a consensus within both organizations about the fact that AM can help to improve the existing operations. Nonetheless, this consensus has its limitations. Within both organizations, the knowledge about AM is mainly in the hands of a few experts that also took the lead in the initiation of the AM deployment. The other employees and decision makers however have often heard from AM, they often do not have a good understanding about what AM exactly is. AM is container concept (in Dutch: “container begrip”) as it has multiple different meanings amongst employees. The definition that is followed by this research deviates from the perceptions that many employees have. Many employees still perceive AM as a measure for tactical and operational planning to reduce the costs of operations and maintenance. As such, AM is not perceived as a holistic and interdisciplinary concept that helps to create more value with the assets. Besides this, there is currently no shared understanding about how AM compares to the existing organization and the desired AM maturity level. As such, there is a lack of clarity about which organizational changes are needed and how much time and resources this requires. This lack of a shared understanding is one of the reasons why the AM deployments are currently slowed down. Within both organizations, it is not possible to accelerate the change process because some people would become anxious and drop out. However, there are differences between the waste water treatment chain and the water system. Those responsible for managing the wastewater treatment chain generally have more knowledge about and experience with the principles of AM. This is because they are more accustomed with some elements of AM. Moreover, for many employees, the way of thinking of AM also seems to be less logical and clear for the assets within the water system. As stated by an interviewee: “It is simply more difficult for employees to perceive the water system’s

partially natural elements (e.g. the natural streams) as part of the organization’s assets that

create value and that can be managed with a scientific, commercial and data-driven approach. Based on this above line of reasoning, several interviewees concluded that the past decision to start deploying AM was not perfectly well considered. The decision makers had a limited knowledge about AM could not well oversee the consequences of the decision. Interviewees this illustrated with statements like: “the required change process has been underestimated”; “the decision to deploy AM might have been too rash” and “the decision makers did not

exactly know what they agreed upon”. These statements somewhat indicate that the decision to deploy AM was strongly driven by the desire to deploy AM. However, it seems that it was not per se based on a good and shared understanding about the impact of the AM deployment. The above description exaggerates the situations and mainly refers to past. Nonetheless, it demonstrates that this sub-condition was and is still not fully present within the two authorities.

Condition SP1-OF, sub-condition 2: the consequences of the formulated objectives and strategies (on the internal organization) are known

As stated, both organizations are following an iterative approach for which the ultimate objective is not yet clearly specified. As such, there are also no short-term objectives that are explicitly derived from the long-term objectives. Nevertheless, the next sub-condition will demonstrate that the two organizations do they already execute several initiatives. However, it is not always explicitly clear to what extent these contributes to the long-term objectives.