Journal of Public Works & Infrastructure
Why asset management should be a
corporate function
Ralph Godau
Received (in revised form): 24th February, 2008
Brimbank Cify Council, Alexandra Avenue, Sunshine, Victoria 3020. Australia
Tel: +61 3 9249 4780; E-mail: ralphg@brimbank.vic.gov.au
Ralph Godau graduated from RMIT Uni-
versity in Civil Engineering (1976) and
continued his education by completing
postgraduate studies in Business Admin-
istration (1984), a master's degree in Sys-
tems Engineering (1995) and a graduate
certificate of tertiary teaching and learn-
ing (1997). Ralph completed his PhD in
Infrastructure Management at RMIT Uni-
versity in 2003 and has received the 2004
RMIT Research Award for this v\/ork.
Ralph has been actively involved in facili-
tating learning at RMIT University for
over 12 years and is currently a sessional
lecturer in Engineering Management.
Ralph worked for a gas distribution com-
pany for 21 years and was involved in
many facets of the organisation, including
asset management, information technol-
ogy, systems engineering, project man-
agement and day labour management. He
also worked for three and half years with
the Office of Gas Safety, a regulatory
body responsible for assuring that safety
and asset management systems are in
place to adequately meet community
needs. Since 2003, Ralph has been Man-
ager. Asset Services at the City of Brim-
bank, where he focuses on the strategic
development of asset management that
supports the delivery of services to the
current and future generations of the
Brimbank community.
Volume 1 Nu.
ABSTRACT
Most councils develop asset management cap-
ability ivithin their technical ranks, usually
within engineering services. This isolates asset
management as a technical function rather than
a broader concept that embraces the development
oJ relationships between those who deliver ser-
vices, those who maintain and develop infra-
structure to support the delivery of those
services, and those who plan for future service
provision. Few councils position asset manage-
ment as a corporate function; however, in 2003,
Brimhank Gity Gonncil, the second largest
metropolitan council in Melbourne, Australia,
did just that. Four years into a five-year pro-
gramme, Brimhank Gity Gouncil has imple-
mented an improved population and service
forecasting process, an improved service delivery
assessment regime and an imegrated customer
and asset management injoiinatioii .•system;
developed asset management plans covering
roads, open spaces, facilities and drainage; and
undertaken numerous data and condition surveys
and improvement projects. This paper, which is
based on a presentation given at the 2007 Inter-
national Public Works Gonference (Institute of
Public Works Engineering) in Gairns, Austra-
lia, provides a case study of Brimbank City
Gouncit's asset management journey, its
achievements, its handling of emergent issues,
the significance of organisational learning to Journal of Public Works 8
Intrasiructure
allow continuous improvement, and the value of Vol 1. No. 2. 2008, pp. 171-184
• Henry Stewart Publications.
a corporate approach championed hy the GBO. 17S5-0955
Why asset management should be a corporate function
Keywords: asset management,
local government, corporate func-
tion, levels of service
INTRODUCTION
Brimbank City Council services over
175,000 residents and is the second largest
metropolitan council in Melbourne, Aus-
tralia (see Figure 1). it is a council con-
fronted by numerous legacy issues
associated with the quality and type of its
asset base and its flexibility in supporting
future service needs. Legacy issues were
associated with the carry-over of debt after
amalgamation (the combination of Sun-
shine and Keilor City Councils) that influ-
enced the lack of investment in tlie
rehabilitation and renewal of all classes of
assets. Despite these problems, it has some
Figure 1: Location of Brimbank
Bass Strait
of the Icaditig best practice service delivery
programmes and state-of-the-art facilities.
hi 2003, Brimbank City Council's CEO,
Marilyn Duncan, accepted the challenge of
adopting a corporate approach to asset
management. Consequently, asset manage-
ment has since been viewed as a catalyst
for change across all areas of council activ-
ity.
The concept of there being a direct rela-
tionship between the provision and main-
tenance of assets and the delivery of
services was new to many council employ-
ees. The importance of having this concept
embedded in the ways in which people
think and work was acknowledged by
management and championed by the
CEO, who believed that the focus must be
on providing improved services to the
counnunity. This encompasses the organi- INTEGRATING ASSET MANAGEMENT
sation as a whole, and tbereiore requires a Table 1 provides examples of bow asset
holistic approach to the implementation management must be considered in the
and application of asset management. planning, service delivery and provision of
This paper explores Brimbank's asset asset services. The activities cannot be con-
management journey to date (see Figure 2). sidered in isolation, as a change in any of

Table 1: Asset management perspective in providing community services

function Asset management issues

Social phinniiiy (strategic focus) What type of service delivery and level ot service is
— Principally designed to support growth needed now and into the future? And by whom?
— Optimising private sector investment What facilities" options arc available to support the
— Gaining community support various types of service delivery? What arc the
Service delivery (operational focus) current and projected service levels? What are the
— Principally designed to support existing community's priorities?
Community services How well is the existing facility supporting a
specific service delivery and level of service? What
is the current capability of the facility, and how
well docs it support future service delivery and
level of service options? Is this in line with best
value (eg have comparative studies or
benchmarking been undertaken)? Docs chis meet
current community expectations?
Asset services (nssct/facility focus) How efficient and effective is the provision of asset
services (undertaking capital works, maintenance
programmes, emergency response) required to
support a specific service delivery and level of
service? Is this in line with best value?

Figure 2: Brimbank City Council asset management journey

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Why asset management should be a corporate function
them, will impact on the other. From a
planning perspective, an increase in levels
of service may result in the need for
greater capacity in service dehvery and
result in the need for more facilities and
therefore increase the council's repair/
maintenance requirements. Every time a
new facility is constructed, it comes with a
lifetime of costs that the council must
fund. The concept of financial sustainabii-
ity becomes an issue and asset management
is the tool which can be used to demon-
strate it.
This is fiirther complicated by the politi-
cal scene, where the agendas of councillors,
lobby groups and residents will influence
the planning process, often resulting in less
than optimal outcomes. For example, when
faced with decisions to construct or extend
facilities that will benefit only a small part
of the community at the expense of other
initiatives, asset management data must
provide the means to inform the commu-
nity about the consequences of such deci-
sions.
PREPARATORY STAGE
Early initiatives involved examining the
existing documentation and the work
already in progress at other councils. An
asset management audit was conducted by
consultants in 2002, and a strategic asset
management implementation plan was
developed the following year. The emphasis
and staging of the recommendations were
reviewed and realigned to match the imple-
mentation programme needed by Brim-
bank City Council.
Research into the application of asset
management by other councils identified
very little change since the findings
reported by Godau in 2003,' and it was
acknowledged that the writings covering
local goverinncnt asset management did
not refiect what was actually happening on
the ground. Due to the lack of progress in
this area, the Municipal Association of Vic-
toria (MAV) established the Asset Manage-
ment Step i*rogram in 2002. This provides
councils with a framework of best practice,
allowing councils to as.sess their current
asset management performance in a range
of areas. Brimbank joined the Step Pro-
gram in 2003. joining 78 other councils in
Victoria. The Step Program is now being
exported to other states, with councils in
Western Australia, Tasmania, New South
Wales and Queensland joining the initia-
tive."
Benchmarking of councils in Victoria
was undertaken and aligned with the key
recommendations from the 2003 strategic
asset management implementation plan.
These were:
• development of policies, strategies, and
asset management plans;
• implementation of asset management
information systems;
• asset data collection and condition
surveys;
• asset management analysis and
modelling.
Feedback from other councils clearly high-
lighted that a lack of corporate support
was a barrier to the implementation of
asset management.
ESTABLISHING THE CORPORATE
ASSET MANAGEMENT FUNCTION
Brimbank's CEC^ and executive manage-
ment team believed that by adopting an
enterprise asset management approach to
all levels of the organisation they could
transform the council from a reactive
organisation to one that could operate
proactively and more strategically. This
involved embracing a five-year asset man-
agement improvement programme sup-
ported and driven from the top down.
Brimbank wanted integration of service
planning, service delivery assessment and
asset management, through involvement
across the whole organisation to develop
and implement asset management practices,
policies, strategies and asset management
plans.
In early 2004, Brimbank City Council
underwent a restructure and took the
opportunity to form asset services as a
corporate function by integrating the
key functions of asset, spatial and demo-
graphic iuformation management and
strategic asset management. In an internal
document, asset services was scoped as:
'providing a range of asset, geographical
(GIS) and demographic information,
and asset management services to
support both strategic and operational
decision making across all departments
to improve evidence based planning and
operational performance'.
ACCOUNTING FOR AND REPORTING
ON ASSET MANAGEMENT
The executive management team estab-
lished the asset management steering com-
mittee (AMSC), which required the full
participation of the executive team, man-
ager, asset services and, when required,
key experts from various departments
including information technology and
engineering. Table 2 represents how the
role and accountabilities associated with
asset management were aligned with who
was providing the service planning, asset
management planning, technical support,
maintenance and other support tunctions
(eg fmance, information technology etc).
In the earlier stages, the focus of the
AMSC was on the implementation and
management of the asset management
improvement programme.

Table 2,: Asset management roles and accountabilities

Human Eiigiiiccrini; Business and City Development Corporate

Services and Operations Community and Statutory Services
Relations Services

Roads (SM) SD (SM) AM

SD SM SD SD
TS *
MP
Facilities (SM) (SM) (SM) (SM)
(MF) MP SD SD SM
AM *
AD
Stormwater SD SD (SM) AM
SM SD SD
TS*
MP
Open Space (SM) SD (SM) AM
SM SD SD
TS*
MP

* Acknowledges chc Division that is accountable for the development of AMFs.

SM = Primary Service Manager; AM = Assset Manager; TS = Technical Support; Ml'= Maintenance Provider;
SD = Support Division.
Why asset management should be a corporate function
In addition to the internal reporting
requirements, the council also had to
eomply with external asset management
auditing and reporting requirements from
its insurers, state and federal government
departments (Auditor General, Depart-
ment tor Victorian Communities etc) and
the MAV, which has an industry self-regu-
lation function.
ESTABLISHING A CONCURRENT
PROGRAMME TO BUILD ASSET
MANAGEMENT CAPABILITY
Based on the 2003 strategic asset manage-
ment implementation plan, AMSC pur-
sued the implementation of the asset
management improvement projects/pro-
gramme based on an organisational devel-
opment and leaming framework to
empower staff to take responsibility for
asset management, enabling a cultural
change that focuses on delivering
improved services in a sustainable way to
the community. Over 20 asset manage-
ment improvement projects/programmes
were identified, initially involving service
forecasting, assessment of service delivery,
data and condition assessment surveys and
hfecyele modelling etc. Strategic partner-
ships were ftirmed with other councils.
Local Government Professional, the Com-
monwealth Scientific ik Industrial
Research Organisation, Swinburne Uni-
versity and RMIT University to undertake
research iu areas where little analysis has
been carried out (eg stormwater) on coun-
cil assets.
To move forward, the AMSC needed to
take a more holistic approach, where the
development of asset management pians,
data collection and condition surveys, ten-
dering and implementing an asset manage-
ment information system, and forecastifig
etc needed to run concurrently {rather
than sequentially) in order for timely and
accurate outputs to benefit and feed into
furtiier stages of these projects.
Timeliness is one of the critical factors
associated with the management of this
type of programme as the key outcomes
must feed into the analysis phase prior to
the budget process if they are going to be
considered in the next fmancial year. The
consequence of missing this phase is that
this information cannot be considered until
the following budget year.
DEVELOPMENT OF ASSET
MANAGEMENT PLANS
The development of first-generation asset
management plans (AMPs) was completed
in parallel to tbe tendering process for an
asset management information system. The
goal was to develop organisational learning
through the participation of key service
planning/delivery staff who were taken out
of their daily routine for a four-week
period to produce the AMPs aud to coor-
dinate the gathering and interpretation of
the relevant data.
Brimbank created four categories of
assets, each with its own AMP:
• roads (RAMP);
• stormwater (SAMP);
• facilities (FAMP);
• open space (OSAMP).
During the development of the AMPs,
emphasis was placed on what was actually
delivered at the time, particularly in terms
of the technical levels of service (eg
response times). For the RAMP, this was
of particular importance due to the intro-
duction of the Road Management Act
2004.
The template aud source document tliat
assisted in the development of the AMPs
was the 'International hifrastructure Man-
agement Manual", produced by the Insti-
tute of Public Works Engineering
Austraha and the Association of Local
Government Engineering NZ."
Based on the resources available, the
majority of technical levels of service were
found to be ambitious and significant
reviews were required to determine what
the council could actually deliver. The lack
of accountability was evident and the need
for improved information systems became
a high priority.
Second-generation AMPs have been
completed for roads and open space.
Improvements to the AMPs for open space
and facihties will be heavily dependent on
the new initiative for 2(X)H to develop the
council's community plan, which is a 20-
year vision. The aim of this initiative is to
determine the top ten key projects the
community believes will underpin the
i-oniicil's sustainability and wellbeing into
the future. This in turn will provide strate-
gic input into the planning and budget
process.
EMERGING NEED TO HANDLE
DEMOGRAPHICS TO IMPROVE LONG-
TERM FORECASTS
Basic service planning data across all areas
highlighted the inconsistencies in forecasts
and the inactivity in this area over the past
few years. With the formation of the asset
services unit, the forecast data were
updated in 2005 and projected out to
2030. Key planners within the council
were engaged to assist in the formulation
of assumptions underpinning the projec-
tions.
EMERGING NEED TO IMPROVE
SERVICE PLANNING AND DELIVERY
ASSESSMENTS
It became evident that a better understand-
ing of how service needs change over time
and how well the services are delivered
through existing infrastructure was the key
to well-developed AMPs. To address this
issue, the human services department
implemented two software tools: e-Social
Planning and Logometrix.
Issues arising from the implementation
and use of these products included the dif-
ficulty in finding researchers who were
able to deal with the complex range of ser-
vices and deriving service ratios, service
performance measures and translating
demographic trends and understanding
community requirements to improve
social planning and service delivery out-
comes.
The appointment of a new general man-
ager for the human services department in
late 2007 saw a number of new initiatives
being developed, including work towards
a community plan involving community
participation that will establish a collective
vision of what the commtinity and council
want to see addressed. i
EMERGING NEED TO INCORPORATE
RISK MANAGEMENT IN AMPS
In Victoria, councils are regularly audited
by insurers to ascertain how well they are
niinimisitig and addressing risks. A major
shift in the auditing scope now incorpo-
rates adherence to asset management prin-
ciples.
The asset services group partners with
the risk management service unit to under-
take annual reviews and develop a risk reg-
ister associated with each AMP. The
register includes the actions needed to
reduce the risk liability of the council.
It is difÎR'ult to relate risk-based actions
to those required to address service plan-
ning, service delivery and asset-based
needs. The risks are not exclusive and must
be considered in a holistic manner.
Risks are addressed at three levels as part
of:
• the asset management planning process,
where different long-term scenarios are
developed to identify the resultant
differing risk profiles;
• the capital works business case process,
where risks are included as part of the
justification: and
Why asset management should be a corporate function
• operations, where response times and
interventions are within acceptable
community levels.
EMERGING NEED TO FILL
ORGANISATIONAL GAPS: THE OPEN
SPACE PLANNER & PROPERTY
MANAGER
The ability for a council to deal with any
particular issue with existing resourcing is
highlighted when attempting to fill in the
gaps in the AMPs. Two areas that lacked
the resourcing were open space planning
and facilities/property management.
REVISITING THE WAY DATA
COLLECTION AND CONDITION
SURVEYS ARE CONDUCTED
One of the most difficult areas to address
has been that ot data collection and condi-
tion surveys. The inconsistent and often
duplicated data collection activities, lack of
data spécifications, data allowed to go out
of date, poor data quality practices, inabil-
ity to analyse data, reliance on consultants
to do the analysis etc required considerable
improvement.
An early project was the collection of
data on 70,000 street trees in 2003/04. The
asset management information system had
not yet been purchased and not much
thought had gone into how to analyse the
data once collected. With the involvement
oí park services, risk management and asset
services, a realistic data specification was
developed. Once the data were collected,
the main problems were deciding who
would analyse the data and how was it
going to be kept up to date. The asset ser-
vices group provided limited analysis, iden-
tifying high-risk trees for follow-up action.
The data have since been imported into
the asset management information system,
and the asset services group is working with
park services to ensure their ongoing
upkeep.
Data collection and condition surveys are
also being addressed in the areas of roads.
stormwater, facilities and open space assets
(refer to Table 3 which quantifies the range
of assets Brimbank City Council is responsi-
ble for).
IMPLEMENTATION OF A CUSTOMER
AND ASSET MANAGEMENT
INFORMATION SYSTEM
In partnersliip with the IT unit, an internal
audit was carried out in 2003 to identity
and report on the asset data systems and
sources currently held within the council.
The audit resulted in the identification
of over 60 spreadsheets and databases of
varying quality, level of duplication and
currency, lack of accessibility, and as such,
not used in any real form of analysis or
decision making. It was apparent that an
intormation management framework had
not been developed tor the council.
The data model given in Figure 3 was
developed in conjunction with IT to ex-
plore the concept of an enterprise approach
which maximises integration rather than
interfacing.
In late 2003, Brimbank City Council
tendered for a customer and asset manage-
ment information system and selected the
Confirm Enterprise software solution
(from Southbank Systems, now owned by
Pitney Bowes Maplnfo) in late 2004. The
Table 3: Asset register in Confirm comprises
(as at December 2007)
Buildings 251
Bridges & culverts 41
Conservation zones 97
Land titles 2562
Footpath segments 12,366
Maintenance assets 1116
Playgrounds 178
Sportsgrounds 65
Trees 87,354
Traffic signals 137
Park & sporting assets 18.000
Figure 3: Data model
tender included the need to undertake
business process workshops and reviews,
develop data transfer and configuration
specifications, import data and configure
the software, and provide onsite training
(train-the-trainer techniques) and other
support functions (eg installation, testing
etc). The basis for selection was price, user
acceptance, and compliance with the
tender specification, feedback from refer-
ence sites, vendor expertise and experience.
Brimbank City Council went "live' to
all statf with Confirm Enterprise in Octo-
ber 2006. The arrangement was based on a
site licence, moving away from the tradi-
tional pay per module/person cost model,
which often limits user access and rollout
across the organisation.
The 'going live' date was postponed
twice due to a lack of readiness caused by
conflicting priorities and a lack of resources
to ensure full operational functionality.
The CEO set the 'drop dead' date, which
sent a clear message that staif priorities had
to be rearranged to ensure that the new-
live date was achieved successfully.
Over three months, intensive training of
20 expert users was conducted, as well as a
month of testing the customer request
system and site/asset registers. Ongoing
training to service unit champions in the
customer request system was offered. In
order to go live with everything at the
same time, the maintenance and condition
survey modules were activated without a
standard testing phase. This was incorpo-
rated in the operational phase of the first
few months and created a lot pressure for
the engineering and operational statf in the
early stages. To offset this, the Confirm
consultants worked full-time with the
engineering and operational staff in the
first two weeks and then returned twice in
the next six months to review and assist
with further development.
To date, over 50,000 maintenance jobs
have been created in Confirm Enterprise,
with only 3,000 Jobs outstanding. In addi-
tion, 156,000 defects (faults found on
assets) have been logged or imported into
Confirm Enterprise as a result of field con-
dition surveys etc.
Why asset management should be a corporate tunction
ADAPTING TO CONFIRM ENTERPRISE'S
CONCEPT OF SITES AND HOW IT
FLOWS TO 'EVERYTHING'
The de\-ek)pment of the site register was
one oí the most importan t tasks in this
implementation. 'Sites' are geographic
areas (streets, access ways, parks, standalone
facilities and car parks etc) associated with
site-specific services and features (assets),
see Figure 4.
The use of sites ties everything together
— where a problem is occurring, where
work needs to be done, what service is being
delivered from that site, who is responsible
for that site etc. Following are some exam-
ples of issues that were addressed:
Figure 4: Site P0070 — Glenmaggie Reserve
"Sites' relate to areas of responsibility
and accountability. For example, even
though tree reserves are maintained by
park services, they are in existence to
deny vehicular access by landowners to
the road reserve, so the responsibility
for these reserves lies with the
engineering unit and is to be addressed
within the RAMF.
Naming of 'sites' was the most inter-
esting challenge as most sites had more
than one way to be referenced. It
became apparent that a naming conven-
tion policy had to be established that
insisted on only one name per site with
no aliases.
• A number ot 'sites' had nuiltiple
services emanating from them aud it
was difficult to ascertain how to address
responsibihty for these sites based on
the primary service.
• Work was being carried out on 'sites"
not owned by Brimbank. for example,
VicTrack land.
• Spatially mapping these "sites' also
highlighted areas that were owned by
lirimbank but were not being
maintained.
EMERGING NEED FOR THE CUSTOMER
REQUEST MODULE
Eighty per cent ot requests made by tlie
public to the council related in one way or
another to infrastructure. These included
tailing branches, potholes in roads, trip
hazards on footpaths, broken park seats
etc, and a reliable system is needed to trace
the request from the initial call to when
the job is completed.
During the scoping for an asset manage-
ment information system, the importance
of the relationship between customer
requests and asset management outcomes
was recognised. As Brimbank's existing
customer request and work issuing system
was becoming outdated and was residing
on an IT piattorm that was no longer
required, the scoping of a customer request
system was included in the specifications
for the new asset information system.
The customer services group was heav-
ily involved in the evaluation of the custo-
mer request module within Confirm
Enterprise and tlilly supported the adop-
tion of this to replace the existing customer
request system. An example customer
enquiry screen is shown in Figure 5.
One of the immediate benefits of intro-
ducing the integrated eustomer request
system was the need to review existing ser-
vice/subject categories that made up the
customer service profile — the previous
system had over I .(HK) service/subjects.
These were reduced to 230. One of the
key business rules developed was to elim-
inate the heavily-used 'miscellaneous'
service/subject category, which put pres-
sure on the customer service otficers
(CSOs) to define which service was being
requested.
The concept of allocatuig issues/requests
to 'sites' and the requirement to allocate a
'service/subject' was a significant change,
but the benefits (if integration Iiave become
self-evident. An example is the CSO's abil-
ity to allocate the street tree feature (the
asset) to a street tree related customer
request. CSOs can ask the resident which
street tree they are referring to, locate it on
the geographical information system (GIS)
and cross-reference it in Confirm Enter-
prise. This saves time in the operations
centre when the customer request is for-
warded to the action otficer (inspector).
Smce October 2006, some 58,000 'custo-
mer' requests have been logged in Con-
firm, of which 43,000 were from the
public or councillors.
EMERGING NEED TO INTEGRATE
CONFIRM ENTERPRISE WITH THE
REPLACEMENT CORPORATE SYSTEMS
Reterring to the data model in Figure 3,
information needed to be linked to pro-
vide a more effective process for managing
assets, handling customer requests, deter-
mining the spatial context, accessing his-
torical information, obtaining property
details etc. The linking of information pro-
vides a seamless way to assist the everyday
decision making and information needs of
staff^is they carry out their duties.
Brimbank has rolled out Trim (an enter-
prise document management system) to
more than half the service units, and the
ability to track intormation about a prop-
erty, wherever it is located, is seen as a
high priority. So whether in Confirm
Enterprise, Exponare (the GIS platform) or
Authority (the rates/property database) the
Why asset management should be a corporate function

Figure 5: Customer enquiry screen from Confirm Enterprise

311 Customer Enquiry

1 of 1 Close

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Effect. 10/01/2008 08:58:58 FollowÍ Up|1 Working Day ZJ by 111/01/2008 08:58:58

Action m

concept of gaining access to Trim records
is becoming a reality. Brimbank worked
with Pitney Bowes Maplnfo to facilitate
the link between Exponare and Trim —
this was completed at the end of 2007.
Work on the Confirm and Trim hnk is
plainied for 2008/09.
Pitney Bowes Maplnfo has been
engaged to develop the integration with
Exponare and this work was expected to
be completed by early 2008. This has been
delayed owing to technical ditficulties and
has been broken up into two stages (to
meet urgent functional requirements). The
first stage was completed by July 2{)(}8 and
it is expected that the second stage w^ill be
completed by October 2008.
REAL ASSET MANAGEMENT HAS ONLY
JUST BEGUN...
The following are some examples of what
is happening now.
Data capture
Introducing an asset management informa-
tion system such as Confirm Enterprise cre-
ates considerable pressure for the capture of
field data in an accurate and timely manner.
Brimbank has trialled six IPaqs (mobile
computers) utilising Confirni's mobile
applications with varying success (issues
with speed, mapping/GPS, memory etc). It
is clear that the greatest challenge is to
adopt this technology to deal with the mas-
sive increases in data and to avoid adininis-
tration meltdown due to manual proces-
sing. New mobile models have been evalu-
ated and the purchase of two field-specific
mobile handhelds is in progress. As part of
the forward planning process, a three-year
mobile application programme business
case is currently being prepared tor submis-
sion to the 2008/09 budget. Improvement
projects have started converting paper-
based processes so they are electronically
embedded with the Confirm Enterprise
software, involving collaboration between
engineering and operations staff.
Forward planning
A review of the annual capital works pro-
cess is currently underway to take into
account the long-term asset management
position and service planning needs. The
direction envisaged by the current CEO,
Nick Foa, leads to the existing one-year
capital works programme being developed
into an approved three-year rolling pro-
gramme by the 2009/10 financial year.
internal relationships
There has been a significant improvement
in the relationship between operations and
customer services through regtilar consul-
tation and constructive feedback.
Valuation and reconciliation
The first round of asset valuation is
planned for 2007/08. This will be done
within Confirm Enterprise (for buildings,
land, footpaths and roads) and reconciled
with existing registers held by the finance
unit. The realignment of account numbers
(f>om service unit groupings) to suit activ-
ity-based costing is planned to provide
better information on where money is
being spent. This project is subject to the
decision on the future of the existing finan-
cial system, which is expected in 2008/09.
Data extraction
Extracting data tt) analyse and measure
pcrtormance against the conncirs service
commitments will be refined.
Data quality
Improvement ot existing records is a prior-
ity as those who rely on this information
are now keen to keep it up to date.
BENEFITS OF APPLYING A CORPORATE
APPROACH TO ASSET MANAGEMENT
The benefits are evident from;
• the rapid improvement of the MAV
'Step' Program asset management
balanced scorecard from an average 'D'
rating to one of As and Bs;
• a reduction in risk through improved
management of assets;
• improved service delivery through
improved asset management planning
and analysis; and
• changes in financial strategies to address
the issue of asset liabihties.
Brimbank could only have achieved this
outcome in the short timefranie because
the transition of asset management to a
corporate function was championed and
supported by both the previous and cur-
rent CEOs. The council was fortunate that
the current CEO is also an advocate for
asset management and is keen to raise the
bar in terms of improving the quality of
decision making within the council.
It is important to acknowledge the
importance of having a high-level cham-
pion who provided the leadership and
commitment. This became particularly
relevant as most of the issues were about
(1) developing capability and (2) change
management, which needed to be driven
tVom the top down.
The success to date is also due to the
commitment of staff who acknowledged
and took on the ehallcngc they were
otfered. They came from asset services,
finance, GIS, IT, human services, engineer-
Why asset management should be a corporate function
ing and operations, customer service and
risk management to name just a few.
These champions provided the bottom-up
perspective that is so important in provid-
ing the building blocks to embed asset
management in the organisation.
CONCLUSION
Brimbank City Council's asset manage-
ment journey is about building organisa-
tional capacity to ensure it is able to meet
and sustain the needs and expectations of
the community. This case study highlights
that it takes time and effort to enable the
organisation to develop competence in the
application of asset management and inte-
grate it into the way the council conducts
business. This cannot be done successfully
without the support of the CEO.
By sharing Brimbank City Council's
endeavours, it is hoped that others may
learn and benefit from the council's experi-
ences, and that feedback might be obtained
from those who have travelled further into
the asset management journey. It is impor-
tant for any organisation to undertake a
self-assessment of its current asset manage-
ment capability and commitments to a
long-term programme of organisational
development and learning.
REFERENCES
(1) Godau, R. (2003) "Key relationships per-
ceived by decision makers in the technical
management of infrastructure: grounded
theoretical models', unpublished FhD
thesis, RMÍT University.
(2) Municipal Association of Victoria (2{)()5)
'The final step', available at: http://
www.mav.asn.au/bulletins.nsf/name/536/
SFile/()306.pdf?OpcnEIement (accessed
2nth February, 2008).
(3) Institute of Public Works Engineering
Australia and Association of Local Govem-
ment Engineering NZ (2002) 'International
Infrastructure Management Manual';
revised edition available .it: http://www.
ipwea.org.au/up]oad/nMM_iirticie_2()()6.
pdf (accessed 20 February, 2(K)8).
(4) Brimbank City Council, 'Demographies',
available at: http://www.brimbank.vic.gov
.au/Page/page.asp?Page_ld — 379&'h = 0
(accessed 20th February, 2008).