Multi-criteria weighted decision making for operational maintenance processes

This paper proposes an approach towards multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) for operational maintenance processes. It focuses on decision alternative identification and evaluation for short time horizons, thereby addressing problems that need to be resolved in hours or a few days at maximum. This addresses a gap in literature, where MCDM methods are predominantly proposed for strategic maintenance decision making. The proposed approach addresses two distinct steps of decision making: 1) identification of decision alternatives and 2) evaluation of decision alternatives. For identification of decision options, the Boolean Decision Tree (BDT) method is selected to accommodate for the qualitative and discrete operational factors that determine the available, feasible decision alternatives in operational maintenance processes. The feasible alternatives are subsequently evaluated using the weighted sum method (WSM). The approach is applied to a Boeing 777 outboard flap damage case, using real maintenance and operational data. A decision tool has been developed and verified, showing the capability of the approach to systematically identify and evaluate operational maintenance decision making problems in a few minutes. The results suggest that the proposed approach could save in excess of 50% on decision process time, with added benefits in full identification of the available set of decision alternatives at problem onset. In addition, sensitivity analysis on the basis of a global evaluation of the weight space is provided to investigate the impact of weight settings on the decision outcomes.