The complexity of sustainable building maintenance environment requires managers to define and implement appropriate quality benchmark system suitable for this function. Lean Six Sigma (LSS) is one of the most effective process improvement and optimization philosophy that maintenance organisations can implement in their environment. However, literature review has shown that 90% of failures in LSS implementations are due to lack of readiness to change, the unawareness of the required benchmark organisation capabilities, and improper control of priorities. The contribution of the current research approach is in developing a hybrid Knowledge-Based (KB)/GAP/AHP System, consisting of three stages (Planning, Designing and Implementation) and containing over 2500 KB rules. The KB System can assist the decision-makers in identifying the obstacles behind the organisation readiness to change into a benchmark LSS maintenance environment. Thus the KB System will be used to achieve benchmark standards by determining the gap existing between the current environment and the benchmark goal, and then suggest a detailed plan to overcome these hurdles in a prioritised and structured manner, thus achieving cost benefits. To ensure its consistency and reliability, the KB System was validated in three Oman-based maintenance organisations, and one published case study for a UK-based organisation. The results from the validation were positive with the System output suggesting list of top priorities and action plans for achieving benchmark LSS standards for these organisations. The research concludes that the developed KB System is a consistent and reliable methodology for assisting decision-makers in designing, planning, and implementing LSS for benchmark sustainable building maintenance.

The complexity of sustainable building maintenance environment requires managers to define and implement appropriate quality benchmark system suitable for this function. Lean Six Sigma (LSS) is one of the most effective process improvement and optimization philosophy that maintenance organisations can implement in their environment. However, literature review has shown that 90% of failures in LSS implementations are due to lack of readiness to change, the unawareness of the required benchmark organisation capabilities, and improper control of priorities. The contribution of the current research approach is in developing a hybrid Knowledge-Based (KB)/GAP/AHP System, consisting of three stages (Planning, Designing and Implementation) and containing over 2500 KB rules. The KB System can assist the decision-makers in identifying the obstacles behind the organisation readiness to change into a benchmark LSS maintenance environment. Thus the KB System will be used to achieve benchmark standards by determining the gap existing between the current environment and the benchmark goal, and then suggest a detailed plan to overcome these hurdles in a prioritised and structured manner, thus achieving cost benefits. To ensure its consistency and reliability, the KB System was validated in three Oman-based maintenance organisations, and one published case study for a UK-based organisation. The results from the validation were positive with the System output suggesting list of top priorities and action plans for achieving benchmark LSS standards for these organisations. The research concludes that the developed KB System is a consistent and reliable methodology for assisting decision-makers in designing, planning, and implementing LSS for benchmark sustainable building maintenance.

The dependency of maintenance as a manufacturing logistic function has made the considerations of maintenance decisions complex in nature. The importance of maintenance has escalated significantly by the increasing of automation in manufacturing processes. This condition switches the traditional maintenance perspective of “fire-fighter” into the business competitive driver. As a consequence, maintenance needs to consider other related aspects of decision making to achieve competitive advantage. This research aims to develop a hybrid Knowledge-Based (KB) System/GAP/AHP methodology to support the integration of maintenance decision with business and manufacturing perspectives. It constructs over 2000 KB rules on Strategic Stage (business and manufacturing aspects) and Maintenance Operations Stage (maintenance aspects). Each aspect contains KB rules attached with GAP analysis to assess the gap between current and prerequisite condition. AHP analysis is then deployed to compare those aspects structurally in a pair-wise manner to identify the critical ones to be rectified. This hybrid KB system is useful in reviewing the existing maintenance system performance and provides reasonable recommendations to improve maintenance performance with respect to business and manufacturing perspectives. Eventually, it indicates the roadmap from the current state to the benchmark goals for the maintenance system. This novel methodology of KBS/GAP/AHP to support maintenance decision is developed for a particular application in the automotive environment. The validation is conducted in two automotive companies in Indonesia and one published case study in an automotive company. The result confirms that the developed KB system can provide the valid, reasonable and consistent result to propose structured recommendation for maintenance improvement priority.