Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) is a process that extends the business value of traditional Repair and Maintenance. RCM measures the economic and safety consequences of equipment failure and determines correct strategies for safe, cost effective, and loss preventive maintenance.

Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) standard JA1011 defined RCM as answering the following questions.

1. What are the machine's functions and desired performance standards? (Functions)
2. How can the machine fail to fulfill its required functions? (Functional Failures)
3. What can cause each functional failure? (Failure Modes)
4. What happens when the failure occurs? (Failure Effects)
5. How does each failure matter? (Failure Consequences)
6. What is done to predict or prevent each failure? (Proactive Tasks and Task Intervals)
7. What should be done if a suitable proactive task cannot be found? (Default Actions)

Next: RCM Process