Innovative London road works co-ordination Programme is put back on track

The challenge

You may have seen the TV beer advert that shows how, in an ideal world, utility companies and road work programmes would be working together to minimise disruption. The living embodiment of this is the ‘London Works’ programme that looks to design and implement an enabling Information Management (IT/IS)
platform and new working practices for the real-time coordination of road works across London’s Boroughs and utilities in order to comply with legislation.

The programme involved significant systems integration challenges (both IT related and organisational) – requiring the cooperation of TfL, 33 Boroughs and up to 50 utility companies and was also set against a very demanding timetable. The picture was further complicated by the myriad of key stakeholders - all with competing expectations and requirements.

At the time when support was requested from us, the project had stalled due to technical challenges. It was identified that there were more fundamental issues underlying the technical ones, namely lack of focus and leadership, lack of agreement and clarity around the programme objectives and governance. We recognised that this programme was a ‘mission critical’ component of the client’s delivery strategy with very high schedule risk relative to the fixed legislative
milestones; the chances of successful delivery had dropped to c.5-10%. Clearly, ‘turn-around’ intervention was required. The inherent challenges (multi-parties, technical complexity, new legislation, cultural change, etc), coupled with the immutable delivery dates, would ensure the risk profile was never ‘comfortable’.

Our approach

We placed a carefully selected programme director to regain control of an ‘off-course’, static programme. He was originally tasked with ‘turning around’ London Works and latterly with guiding the programme through complex legislative, IT and process change. It was vitally important that the solution should be defined by the key stakeholders (TfL, the Boroughs and the utility companies) so that it could be seen as a solution for London and actively used by those stakeholders in carrying out their day to day tasks – breaking down barriers to cooperation.

How did this deliver value to the client?

London Works was successfully ‘turned around’; whilst future releases are in abeyance awaiting clarity in relation to future legislation, the delivered solution met the expectations of the programme board and the diverse stakeholder community.

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If you would like to talk to us call on the number below. Alternatively, click on the consultants email address, provide us with your details and we will call you back. We look forward to speaking to you. Contact: Email: Tel: Dom Moorhouse dommoorhouse@moorhouseconsulting.com +44 (0) 1225 446 313