Network Rail wins APM Innovation in Project Management Award

Network Rail wins APM Innovation in Project Management Award

The winners of the annual Association for Project Management (APM) Awards have been announced at a live ceremony which took place at Old Billingsgate in London on Monday 15 November.

The APM Awards, sponsored by RPC UK Ltd, recognise the very best within the project profession, from aspiring young project managers to complex and transformational projects and programmes taking place in the UK and internationally.

Network Rail was successful in winning two prestigious awards on the night: the Innovation in Project Management Award, sponsored by Provek, for its Accelerated Innovation (AI) programme and the Shell Health, Safety, Security and Environmental (HSSE) Award, sponsored by Shell, for its Safety Task Force.

For the first time in 2021, all entries, across every category, were automatically considered for the Innovation in Project Management award, and the winner selected by the APM Awards judges and Awards Steering Group for demonstrating outstanding excellence in innovation.

PA Consulting and Network Rail are revolutionising the railway through the delivery of the AI programme by employing agile ways of working and a bespoke delivery framework to test ideas from the front line, enabling the business to deliver benefits faster, and to progress ideas to a prototype concept in weeks rather than years.

The AI Programme is focused on delivering public benefits by improving the performance of the national rail system, affecting everybody who uses it every day. The new ideas generated via the programme will help Network Rail to deliver its strategy of putting passengers and freight first.

The programme is already delivering benefits and has the potential to deliver total benefits in excess of £231m. The programme has proved that taking a disruptive approach can accelerate the delivery of innovation for an innovative future for Network Rail.

The key benefits that the AI programme focused on delivering included:

• Reducing the number of delays and the number of delay-minutes
• Improving the live information offered to passengers and the passenger experience
• Providing an environmentally, economically and socially positive service for future generations

In addition, the programme has delivered:

• Engaged stakeholders at every level of the organisation in the challenge of innovation and brought them on the AI journey.
• Implemented a positive ’failing fast’ culture and process, stopping projects that are not meeting expected benefits earlier, resulting in a 60 per cent greater cost efficiency.
• Methodologies, skills and tools for delivering new ways of working and productivity in an organisation that is traditionally ‘waterfall’.
• The first non-IT programme in Network Rail to fully adopt agile techniques, to demonstrate the value within Network Rail.
• Trialled design competitions and hackathons as new ways to engage with the supply chain and produce new value-adding capabilities.
• New business engagements and relationships with start-ups and innovation specialists

Steve Carden, Partner at PA Consulting, said: “We are really pleased to see innovation happening at pace at Network Rail and it is fantastic to be recognised by APM for this award.”

Professor Adam Boddison, chief executive at APM, said: “I would like to congratulate Network Rail and the teams involved in their success at the APM awards.

“Our awards are all about celebrating the outstanding successes and achievements of the project profession. This year’s awards have been made all the more significant because we have been able to welcome everyone back face to face at our ceremony for the first time since 2019. I would like to congratulate all of this year’s award winners and finalists for their fantastic achievement, they are a true reflection on the growing talent and opportunity within the profession.”

For a full list of the APM Award 2021 winners visit apm.org.uk/apm-awards/.

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