FMJ.CO.UK BRITISH MEDICAL ASSOCIATION CASE STUDY
OCTOBER 2021 25
ONE YEAR ON
Over a year on from contract go-live date, Artic’s
Marketing Manager Charlotte Pinder and BMA’s
Head of UK Estates Ian Wade met to discuss how the
contract mobilisation process has progressed given
all the additional challenges of the pandemic.
“The contract was awarded just as the UK was
taken into lockdown,” explains Pinder, “which of
course had something of an e’ ect on mobilisation.”
Ian Wade explains: “As lockdown hit, we all
had to adapt to very specific and limiting ways of
working which could have been a hinderance or
benefit to the successful mobilisation of our new
contract. From the very first kick o’ meeting on
site, the involvement of not only the mobilisation
team, but also our appointed contract manager and
administrator, along with Artic’s Joint MD instilled
great confidence in the process for me and my team.
“With unoccupied buildings, in a way,
some aspects of asset verification
and knowledge were easier
for Artic to establish but
with my estates team
generally working
from home during
this period, we also
had to be confident
that this ‘remote
mobilisation’ was
being carried out
professionally and
with due diligence.
At all steps along the
process Artic’s timely
and accurate progress
reporting confirmed that
all milestones and thresholds
were met … and I slept easy at
night.”
Working under lockdown conditions, meant
that being able to remotely track the mobilisation
progress was even more important than usual. Artic
introduced an innovative solution to help the BMA
clients chart the mobilisation process.
Explains Wade: “Artic use a system called ‘Monday’
which is an online mobilisation portal. We chose to
have ‘Viewers’ access so that I and my team could
check and monitor progress at any time and in any
place, even on our smart phones.
“In the first few days a„ er the contract award
we mutually agreed with Artic all the specific
mobilisation tasks required within their specific
priority and timeframe. We could then see all of
these set into the ‘Monday system’ planner, and
allocated to a named individual for action. The
simplicity of the platform was ideal for us to monitor
remotely the overall progress of the mobilisation
plan itself. This system undoubtedly contributed a
great deal to the smooth and seamless transfer of
the contract from the previous incumbent over to
Artic.”
ENGINEERING CHANGE
“Looking at the engineering side”, says Pinder, “the
buildings here at BMA are intricate and substantial
with a great variety of assets. This is why
verification and condition were requisites of
the tender, so there was a huge e’ ort to go
about understanding the BMA’s estates
assets.”
According to Wade, the BMA facilities
team was encouraged by Artic’s
approach to the mobilisation process in
this regard.
He explains: “They have a
mobilisation engineering team
separate from their everyday service
engineers, and one which concentrates
on the rather specific challenges of asset
verification and checking. At every new
contract award, we want to learn more
about our own assets as they change and
develop and I couldn’t recommend
their Senior Mobilisation
Engineer, John Tyler, more
highly for his work.
“His highly proficient
and accurate
engineering work
on our assets
was coupled
with a desire to
really get ‘under
the skin’ of our
estate assets,
understand
them and take any
relevant proactive
measures in order to
prepare the assets for
contract commencement.
Very quickly our confidence in
their understanding of our assets and
what steps could be taken to ensure a robust
management plan for the future, grew.”
TUPE TRANSFER
As with most new contracts, the mobilisation
included a TUPE element for an existing team of
residential engineers employed by the previous
service incumbent. The concern was that lockdown
might threaten to pose some serious barriers to
successful implementation.
In fact, says Wade this wasn’t the case: “Due to
Artic’s rapid actions on all mobilisation tasks upon
being awarded the contract, the TUPE discussions
started almost immediately with the incumbent
engineers and their previous company.
“We held behind the scenes meetings ourselves
with the engineers during the process just to
check that all was well and they all reported an
enthusiastic and professional approach from the
Artic HR team that instilled confidence for them
joining and continuing to work on our site.”
Wade admits that of more concern was the
existence of gaps in engineering skillsets and a lack
of specific certifications which were pertinent to the
new contract. The allocated Contract Manager Tom
Broughton, himself an ex-engineer, brought this
to the BMA team’s attention a„ er his assessment
of the TUPE team skillsets. Artic took the initiative
here and created a H&S and trade skills matrix
to ascertain where further training was needed.
They were able to cover certain assets within the
buildings using their mobile engineering teams
Working under lockdown
conditions, meant that being able
to remotely track the mobilisation
progress was even more important than
usual. Artic introduced an innovative
solution to help the BMA clients
chart the mobilisation
process.”