Susana Gozalo

Said the following about Magda Taranowicz:

“I would like to nominate Magdalena Taranowicz for the Apprentice of the Year award 2019 of the RailStaff awards.

I first met Magdalena when I was managing the HS2 Main Works Civils Contract design for the Align Joint Venture. She had recently joined Jacobs and was looking to grow her competencies in project management, so she joined the project management team collocated with the Jacobs team in the Align offices working collaboratively with HS2 and the Align Joint Venture contractors, Bouygues TP, VolkerFitzpatrick and Sir Robert McAlpine.

Magdalena encapsulates the passion for growth, learning and development each apprentice should have. Through her curiosity, wanting and eager to learn new things and getting involved in every single aspect of the project I have seen Magdalena grow from strength to strength from a quiet, yet competent, individual to a key member of the team who does not shy away from stating her point of view in meetings, challenging colleagues and delivering technical work in support of the members of the team.

She has combined her college education with a very demanding, full time, client facing role with plenty of deadlines and working in a very fast paced environment.

Her particular focus on health and safety, through the management of the Align procedure for getting professionals out on site is to be commended, including getting Site Visit Leader training to accompany personnel on site.

She worked as a project controls assistant supporting the project management team tracking planned budgets versus actual budgets working through a variety of excel worksheets and dashboards. As she progressed into the design coordination department it was commendable how she transitioned all of her responsibilities as a project controls assistant to her mentee and kept on the support and guidance to transfer all of her learned knowledge.

Magdalena improved her understanding and knowledge of the CDM process and responsibilities of a principal designer by identifying risks and managing the design risk assessment process and originating the various design assumption registers for various packages of work.

Earlier this year and recognising the value she has brought to the design effort in Align she joined the drainage design team where she brought innovation through the development of her designs via Aecosim and she produced tutorial and guidance notes for the rest of the team who were traditionally working in AutoCAD.

It is great to see Magdalena develop into a very accomplished engineer. She has also become a STEM ambassador and will be delivering her first STEM event in October. She has passed her BTEC with flying collars achieving the highest mark D*D. She has now started a part time Civil Engineering degree and will be combining these efforts with her responsibilities at work.

It is because of all the reasons explained above that I believe Magdalena deserves to win Apprentice of the Year. She is an example to follow and it will be great to continue supporting her development and learning in the rail industry in the years to come.“

Bhavin Bakhda

Said the following about Magda Taranowicz:

“I would like to nominate Magdalena Taranowicz for Apprentice of the Year 2019 in the Rail Staff awards.

I first met Magdalena when I was working on the HS2 Main Works Civils Contract design for the Align Joint Venture. She had joined the team to grow her competence in project management and joined the project management team. She had been assigned to work within the project controls team, however quickly started to assist me in the Technical Assurance side of the project. During this time, she demonstrated drive to progress in her career and her work ethic was outstanding. She had a passion to learn new things and to expand her knowledge. She questioned aspects of her role and ways of working, to the benefit of the project and to better her own understanding.

During this period, she also became a buddy to a new apprentice and started to guide him through the start of his career process sharing her own experience and inspiring him to become a key part of the team. At the same time, I became her Line Manager and can say with hand on my heart that she has been a joy to manage.

As a person Magdalena is a driven young engineer with a passion for growth and learning. I do believe that she has the potential to be a great engineer. While on HS2 she has grown exponentially and has become an integral part of the HS2 team. When she started in on the project, it was clear that she was a shy person, however with time and encouragement she has made great strides in personal development and is now a confident team member.

In parallel with working on a very demanding and very public project, she has completed her 3-year apprenticeship course in 2 years. Not only did she complete her course in reduced time, she was able obtain the highest mark possible of D*D* (Distinction star x2). This is something that the company, team and I are very proud off. She has now started her part time Civil Engineering Degree at South Bank University; she already has an ambition to do a PhD, which shows a drive and vision of what she wants to do with her future.

While she has been working with me, she has expanded her knowledge on Health and Safety, especially in CDM regulations and the management of site safety. She has also learned the processes with regard to technical assurance and requirements of design reviews for all the assets that Align are to deliver. As mentioned above she also assisted the project controls team with regard to tracking budgets between Planned and Actual forecasts and the onboarding of new members of the team. Her handling of all these roles simultaneously was admirable as she was able to take all of this in her stride.

Over the past 9 months, Magdalena had moved to the drainage team to gain technical experience. She has undertaken the transition from Design Management to Drainage Design demonstrating her adaptability and ability to assimilate new ideas and methods. She has been come a key member of the team, and her confidence has increased so that she is able to express her views and ideas to more senior members of the team. Her work with Aecosim has been of the highest quality, and hence she has produced guidance notes for others to follow.

Outside of work Magdalena has also become a STEM ambassador and will be delivering her first STEM event in October.

I feel incredibly proud of what she has achieved both in her work and her personal growth and this is why I would like to nominate Magdalena for the Apprentice of the Year award and I do believe she would be a worthy winner.“

Garry Coleman

Said the following about Magda Taranowicz:

“Magda’s enthusiasm for learning new things and determination to succeed make her a standout candidate for Apprentice of the year.

Magda joined the ALIGN-D drainage design team in February 2019, to work on the HS2 MWCC C1 project. Prior to this, Magda worked with the Project Management team on the same project. She decided to change to a design role to gain design experience. In this short time, she has quickly developed from someone with little knowledge of drainage design to an integral member of the team.

Magda’s flair for learning new software quickly became evident as she took on the challenge of becoming team champion of a new piece of software for converting from OS grid to snake grid coordinates. By compiling a step by step user’s guide, she was able to help the rest of the team to be able to use the software effectively.

Having excelled at this task, Magda was given the much more complex task of designing the drainage channel between the two portal structures at the Chiltern Tunnel South Portal. To achieve this task, she had to quickly become familiar with CAD software such as AECOsim and AutoCad, and hydraulic design software such as MicroDrainage. Through asking intelligent questions, Magda not only learnt how to use these software packages, but also learnt the concepts of drainage design such as identifying catchment extents, the effects of different surface finishes on the rate and volume of runoff, and different methods of collecting and conveying that runoff to suitable outfall points. By learning how to assess the hydraulics of open channel flow using the MicroDrainage software, she was able to determine the most efficient solution to meet the design criteria and constraints. As the design of the portal structures developed, the resulting changes required the design of the channel to be re-visited. Each time this occurred, Magda was able to work more and more independently to amend the design as required. Magda was also able to utilise the knowledge of the various disciplines gained during her time in the Project Management team to liaise with the various disciplines to ensure the design of the channel was fully coordinated with the other aspects of the design.

While this is only one of the tasks Magda has completed since joining the drainage design team, it displays her ability to quickly grasp new concepts, to understand the criteria and constraints that shape a design, and to understand the importance of teamwork to achieve an efficient and effective overall design. It also displays her determination to work hard to succeed in the tasks given to her, and her eagerness to take on new challenges and continually develop her knowledge and understanding. These abilities and attitudes have made Magda a pleasure to work with and an integral member of the team. I have no hesitation in recommending Magda for the Apprentice of the year award.“