Asset management

Asset management, broadly defined, refers to any system whereby things that are of value to an entity or group are monitored and maintained. It may apply to both tangible assets and to intangible concepts such as intellectual property and goodwill.

Asset management is a systematic process of operating , maintaining, and upgrading assets cost-effectively, (American Associate of State Highway and Transportation Officials)

Alternative views of asset management in the engineering environment are:

• The practice of managing assets so that the greatest return is achieved (this concept is particularly useful for productive assets such as plant and equipment)
• the process by which built systems of facilities are monitored and maintained, with the objective of providing the best possible service to users (appropriate for public infrastructure assets)

Historical background of asset management

Civilization has always relied on its technological assets to support key functions like transport, public health, business and commerce.

There is a clear link between the provision and sophistication of technological assets and our modern lifestyle. Romans built a strong empire through their construction of roads, aqueducts and other assets. Similar stories are found when examining Asia, Africa, Europe and America.

Financial asset management

• Investment management: the sector of the financial services industry that manages collective investment schemes and segregated client accounts.
• Global assets under management
• List of asset management firms

Enterprise asset management

Enterprise asset management is the business processes and enabling information systems that support management of an organization's assets, both physical (such as buildings, equipment, infrastructure etc.) and non-physical such as:

• Physical asset management: the practice of managing the whole life cycle (design, construction, commissioning, operating, maintaining, repairing, modifying, replacing and decommissioning/disposal) of physical and infrastructure assets such as structures, production and service plant, power, water and waste treatment facilities, distribution networks, transport systems, buildings and other physical assets. Infrastructure asset management expands on this theme in relation primarily to public sector, utilities, property and transport systems.
• Fixed assets management: an accounting process that seeks to track fixed assets for the purposes of financial accounting.
• IT asset management: the set of business practices that join financial, contractual and inventory functions to support life cycle management and strategic decision making for the IT environment. This is also one of the processes defined within IT service management.
• Digital asset management: a form of electronic media content management that includes digital assets.

Public asset management

Public asset management expands the definition of Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) by incorporating the management of all things which are of value to a municipal jurisdiction and its citizens' expectations.

An EAM requires an asset registry (inventory of assets and their attributes) combined with a Computerized Maintenance Management System. All public assets are interconnected and share proximity, and this connectivity is possible through the use of GIS.

GIS-centric public asset management standardizes data and allows interoperability, providing users the capability to reuse, coordinate, and share information in an efficient and effective manner by making the GIS geo-database the asset registry. A GIS-centric public asset management which standardizes data and allows interoperability, providing users the capability to reuse, coordinate, and share information in an efficient and effective manner.

In the United States the defacto GIS standard is the Esri GIS for utilities and municipalities. An Esri GIS platform combined with the overall public asset management umbrella of both physical “hard” assets and “soft” assets helps remove the traditional silos of structured municipal functions. While the hard assets are the typical physical assets or infrastructure assets, the soft assets of a municipality includes permits, license, code enforcement, right-of-ways and other land-focused work activities.

This definition of “public asset management” was coined and defined by Brian L. Haslam, President and CEO of a leading international GIS-centric Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS) company which software is certified by the National Association of GIS-Centric Solutions (NAGCS). GIS-centric public asset management is a system design approach for managing public assets that leverages the investment local governments continue to make in GIS and provides a common framework for sharing useful data from disparate systems. Permits, licenses, code enforcement, right-of-way, and other land-focused work activities are examples of land-focused public assets managed by local government. These public assets occupy location just as in-the-ground or above-ground public assets do.

Land-use development and planning is another area which is interconnected to other local government assets and work activities. Public Asset Management is the term that encompasses this subset of land-focused asset management, considering the importance that public assets affect other public assets and work activities and are important sources of revenue and are various points of citizen interaction.

See also

• American Water Works Association (AWWA)
• National Association of GIS-Centric Solutions (NAGCS)

References

• Baird, G. "Defining Public Asset Management for Municipal Water Utilities". Journal American Water Works Association May 2011, 103:5:30, wwww.awwa.org
• ESRI (pending publication) GIS-Centric Public Asset Management, 2011 by Brian L. Haslam