Following significant consultation, the result was a new digital safety platform called Network Rail–RailHub, accompanied by an iOS application with offline capability so that workers can use it in remote locations. Network Rail–RailHub empowers users to identify, understand and mitigate railway safety risks, book access to the track to carry out work and capture the progress of their work and lessons learned. It provides a single source of truth for everyone working on or near the railway line.
Sean Meade, Partner, Technology Consulting, Ernst & Young LLP, explains that the project involved a wide range of personnel from the EY organisation and beyond. “We brought together several capabilities from across our Consulting practice to provide Network Rail with the right people to deliver a connected, innovative and holistic solution at pace,” he says. This included people from Technology Consulting, Business Consulting, People Consulting, EY Seren and Global Delivery Services. “By bringing together these diverse teams from across our business, we were able to meet the challenge in a holistic way and approach the problem from every angle, considering the business problem in concert with the very real human element. We also worked alongside industry-leading partners in our ecosystem, including Arup, Capgemini, Egis, Morson and OnTrac, to leverage the expertise our client needed,” he adds.
Driving behavioural change
In a devolved business, an innovative approach to technology deployment was essential. The EY team focussed on giving each of Network Rail’s 13 routes ownership and accountability for their own deployment; they worked closely with each route to execute a detailed business readiness plan to make the necessary people, process and technology preparations in advance of the safety transformation.
To gain buy-in and support for Network Rail–RailHub, the team met with end users around the UK at roadshow events, upskilled ‘super users’ on the system in advance of cutover and maintained a two-way dialogue with stakeholders at all levels across the business.