Eleco Asset Management Warns of Growing “Knowledge Drain” in Industrial Maintenance

As experienced maintenance professionals continue to retire or leave the workforce, industrial organizations are facing a growing but often overlooked operational threat: the loss of critical institutional maintenance knowledge. 

According to Donal Bourke, Managing Director of Eleco Asset Management, many companies remain dangerously reliant on undocumented expertise that exists only in the minds of veteran technicians. The issue is explored in a new thought leadership article by Bourke, titled “What Happens When Maintenance Knowledge Walks Out the Door.” 

The article argues that organizations frequently underestimate how much operational continuity depends on informal maintenance knowledge, such as understanding asset quirks, recurring equipment behaviors, seasonal performance variations, and practical troubleshooting techniques that are rarely captured in manuals or standard operating procedures.

“When experienced maintenance personnel leave, organizations often don’t experience an immediate breakdown,” said Bourke. “Instead, they see a gradual decline in efficiency and consistency: longer downtimes, more reactive maintenance, repeated troubleshooting, and the loss of hard-earned operational insight.”

According to the article, the consequences can include increased unplanned downtime, shorter equipment life, reduced preventive maintenance effectiveness, and heightened safety risks. New employees may possess the necessary technical credentials but still lack the operational context required to maintain complex assets efficiently.

The article also challenges the assumption that traditional documentation alone is enough to preserve maintenance knowledge. Static manuals and checklists often fail to capture evolving operational conditions, real-world adjustments, and asset-specific insights developed over years of hands-on experience.

Instead, Bourke points to modern Computerized Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS) as a critical tool for converting individual expertise into long-term organizational intelligence. A properly implemented CMMS, such as the company's Pemac software, can centralize asset histories, preventive maintenance schedules, procedural notes, and recurring issue tracking in a structured and continuously updated system.

“Maintenance knowledge is dynamic,” Bourke explained. “It changes with equipment age, operating conditions, environmental factors, and production demands. Organizations need systems that preserve not only what was done, but why decisions were made and how assets behave over time.”

The article notes that organizations that successfully institutionalize maintenance knowledge through CMMS platforms can improve onboarding, strengthen collaboration, enhance decision-making, and reduce dependence on any single employee. Rather than diminishing the value of experienced technicians, the process amplifies their contribution by transforming personal expertise into a lasting organizational asset.

Bourke also emphasized that technology alone is not enough. Effective knowledge retention requires cultural change, leadership support, and a commitment to making knowledge sharing part of everyday maintenance operations.

“At some point, every organization faces the same question: what happens when your most experienced maintenance professional is no longer there?” Bourke said. “If critical knowledge exists only in conversations, habits, or memory, then the operational risk already exists; it’s simply waiting to surface.”

The full article, “What Happens When Maintenance Knowledge Walks Out the Door,” can be accessed by clicking here.