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How can you reduce the risk that comes with opening a new or upgraded facility like an airport terminal, or with a business change such as organisational re-design? That’s where operational readiness comes in.
There’s nothing more important than a successful launch day - if a customer has a poor first experience, they won’t be rushing back for their second. And the best way to guarantee everything goes to plan is preparation.
Our Advisory services use a comprehensive methodology we call operational readiness activation and transition (ORAT), working alongside your people, processes and assets to ensure successful business outcomes. The result? Everything runs smoothly from day one - as it did when Heathrow's new Terminal 2 opened in June 2014.
The importance of people
If you want your business to be ready, you need your people to be ready. That’s why we believe preparing your team is the most important part of operational readiness.
“If you want an asset like an airport terminal to be operationally ready, it’s incredibly important to get people on-board, engaged, trained familiarised and inducted. ”
Alan Newbold Director
You need your team to know exactly what to do – because the smallest unexpected change in even the tiniest of details can transform success into failure.
For instance, imagine an unfamiliar new system means it takes airport staff a few seconds longer to allow each passenger through the gate to an aircraft. The total delay would be several minutes, with potentially severe knock-on effects elsewhere.
Applying organisational psychology
Preventing things like this happening on day one requires carefully planned training. Our organisational psychologists design targeted training that gives people the opportunity to understand the changes ahead and practise new processes in advance.
Never was this approach more necessary than in the opening of the world’s biggest airport terminal - Dubai, Terminal 3. Our training programme had to familiarise its staff and shareholders with new specialist technology, as well as more than five million square feet, split over eight floors. When the terminal opened, they were ready to process 43 million passengers in year one.
“Arup has always been about technically brilliant people solving problems for our clients. Today, that technical brilliance also embraces the science of organisational psychology. By applying this scientific rigour, we ensure that people involved in a new asset or with a business change can perform at their very best from day one. ”
Stephen Pollard People and organisations leader
Indeed, our experience in this area was built ensuring some the world’s biggest and most complex airport terminals, and the people who work there, were operationally ready. Heathrow Terminal 2, Dubai Terminal 3, Mumbai Terminal 2 and Perth Terminal 2 are just a few recent examples.
Succeed from the start
Our ORAT service isn’t just for the aviation industry - the team’s knowledge and experience have helped clients across a wide range of industries.
When Transport for London (TfL) needed to keep public transport running smoothly during the 2012 Olympic Games, we helped them create the 24/7 Transport Coordination Centre.
We are working with the team at the new Royal Adelaide Hospital in Australia, giving them the expertise they need to succeed from the start. Before the new site opens, ORAT thinking and methodology are contributing to ensuring that staff workflows are ready, and scenarios and logistics have been tested - allowing the hospital to open its doors to the public with confidence.
With our help, we can ensure you’re ready too.
Heathrow T2 explored
In June 2014 Heathrow T2, one of the largest privately funded construction projects in the UK, opened seamlessly on day-one.
Over a two-year period we designed and delivered training for 25,000 staff members and involved 14,000 volunteers in 175 readiness trials, to ensure a smooth transition, leaving the airport with a world-class performance legacy for the future.
Hear more from some of the key people who made that happen.
Launch know-how
Our new tried and tested methodology de-risks the start of new services across industries
