Few pioneering companies have used these aspirational initiatives to expand their industrial monitoring approach beyond compliance-mindset to achieve competitive-superiority. This shift transforms monitoring from a reactive, risk-averse process into a proactive, strategic advantage.
Compliance Mindset: Limiting Potential to Risk Mitigation
Industrial monitoring traditionally focuses on meeting compliance requirements and investigating “what went wrong?” after alarm-level detections. Budgets are allocated primarily for instrumentation, monitoring frequencies, and reporting methods designed to stay within regulations. While this compliance mindset ensures regulatory adherence, it often locks sites into a reactive culture and maintains the status quo. Operations teams address failures only when exceptions arise, limiting the potential for improvement and systemized efficiencies. It’s important to recognize that most operators and regulators ultimately want the same thing: safe and environmentally sound facilities. Both typically share a strong desire to minimize emissions by keeping containment and promptly addressing any issues.
In the context of industrial monitoring, a compliance mindset limits industrial companies’ opportunities to leapfrog to competitive superiority.
Competitive Superiority: Shifting the Paradigm to Early Detection
Competitive superiority means staying ahead of the competition through continuous improvement and operational excellence. For industrial monitoring, this requires a paradigm shift from “what went wrong?” to “what is starting to go wrong?”.
By focusing on early detection of operational anomalies, process industries can:
- Minimize unexpected downtime and exceptions
- Improve safety and environmental performance
- Enhance workforce productivity
- Sustain operational excellence and agility
This proactive approach needs to be systemized and supported by executive sponsorship and widespread adoption across the decision chain.
Case Study: A US Refinery’s Transformation
A large US refinery successfully implemented this paradigm shift by rethinking emissions monitoring, corrosion monitoring, and other critical monitoring aspects.
Highlights of their approach:
- Adopted advanced monitoring technologies for early anomaly detection
- Secured executive sponsorship for funding and cultural change
- Integrated field operations with management through regular reviews
- Ensured management support with permission to fail during the paradigm shift to early anomaly detection. This is critical as site personnel learn to troubleshoot “what is starting to go wrong?” as opposed to troubleshooting “what went wrong?”
- Established a feedback loop to continuously improve monitoring practices for boots-on-the-ground personnel
This transformation resulted in improved compliance efficiency, operational safety, and productivity—moving the site beyond mere compliance to competitive superiority.
Industry Best Practices: From Compliance to Competitive Advantage
Industrial operators such as refineries, petrochemical and chemical companies are impacted by globally connected markets, growing community interest, and changing global compliance requirements. In response, industrial monitoring needs a paradigm shift to get ahead of operational anomalies through early detection and minimize expensive corrective actions. This paradigm shift can be systemized for efficient compliance, enhanced people productivity, safety, sustained operational efficiency, and agility. Such holistic benefits require executive vision, sponsorship, regular management reviews, funding, and positive reinforcement for rapid adoption. Some industrial companies have already transformed their industrial monitoring beyond compliance-mindset to competitive-superiority.
In Summary
Industrial monitoring is no longer just about compliance—it is a strategic tool for competitive advantage. Companies that shift their mindset and practices toward early detection will lead their industries in safety, efficiency, and innovation.