Recruitment
Judges for RailStaff Awards 2023 so far...
As Transport for London’s Chief People Officer, Fiona’s focus is on making sure that TfL is a truly great place to work, for everyone.
Responsible for the delivery of our award-winning People strategy including Transformation, Diversity and Talent, employee relations, strategic resourcing, reward and recognition and the TfL pension fund.
Prior to joining TfL, Fiona was the HR Director, HR Supply Chain and Labour Relations at Coca-Cola European Partners for 5 years, having joined from Asda where she held a number of senior roles across the HR Business Partnering functions, and the labour relations teams.
Our Rail Person of the Year Winner 2022!
A Chartered Member of IOSH, experience working in rail, manufacturing and law.
Experienced in Safety, Risk Management, Change Management, Accident Investigation and Cognitive Interviewing techniques.
Ed Holds a Masters Degree (LLM) in Health Safety and Environmental Law and a First Class BSc(Hons) degree in Occupational Health and Safety Management. Ed is the Chair of the IOSH Railway Group represents IOSH on the RM3 Governance Board
Karl joined Transport for Wales in April 2018 as Rail Infrastructure Director.
He is responsible for delivering the South Wales Metro programme and other infrastructure projects across Wales.
An advocate for all things positive, ranging from Executive Champion for ED&I, Armed Forces Champion, STEM Ambassador, sponsor of the Building Futures Pathways programme and Chairman of the Employment Advisory Board at HMP Usk & Prescoed. In short, if it helps others and creates a platform to support less represented groups in society, Karl is eager to help.
He joined TfW from Network Rail, where he held the role as Senior Programme Manager delivering a wide portfolio of construction projects, along with overhead line equipment in support of the electrification programme. In his earlier rail career Karl delivered complex track renewals, along with various enhancement schemes country wide.
Prior to joining the railway in 2011, Karl achieved the rank of Warrant Officer Class 2 as a logistician in the British Army, where he was responsible for the planning, co-ordination and control of military movement on deployments worldwide.
Outside of work, he is a trustee of The Buchanan Trust, a not-for-profit veteran’s charity that provides and builds affordable Almshouse accommodation, to help veterans with their transition from military to civilian life.
Married and a father of two beautiful girls, any spare time is spent in the garage learning to be a bladesmith, where the more respectable items are sold and part of the proceeds donated to veteran charities.
Richard is a Chartered Engineer, with over 25 years’ experience in delivering and developing asset management capabilities for both UK main-line and high-speed railways.
Responsible for providing client leadership to HS1’s supply chain, fulfilling the Asset Stewardship objectives in the concession agreement, embracing technology and innovation to improve productivity and ensuring that HS1 Ltd continues to deliver a world class asset for HS1’s customers.
Sustainability is an integral part of the HS1 business and Richard lead the development of the HS1 Sustainability Strategy and the implementation of the plans for HS1 to play its part across all aspects of environmental and social sustainability. A key success has been the energy procurement strategy including power purchase agreements and the implementation of energy reduction schemes such as regenerative braking.
Richard is a Signalling Engineer by training and has carried out several roles within the discipline from technician through to maintenance management and strategic leadership as Head of Signalling and Communications for Network Rail (CTRL), and Route Asset Manager for the Network Rail Anglia Route. He has since lead multi-disciplinary maintenance delivery teams on busy parts of the UK rail network and the Route Engineering function for HS1 before becoming Engineering Director.
Richard is a currently a Director of the High-Speed Rail Group, promoting a world-class High-Speed rail network in the UK, and is also an active mentor. Living in Kent with his wife and two children, he enjoys playing the guitar, listening to music and cycling, regularly taking part in events and adventures.
Rob is Managing Director Route Services at Network Rail.
He leads a group of 6 businesses, with a combined £1.6bn opex and 4,500 staff providing all IT, Telecoms, engineering advisory, shared services, training, supply chain and procurement functions for the UK railway. He is also a member of the Network Rail Group ExCom.
He specialises in leading, growing and delivering turnaround in large operational buisnesses for private and publicly funded organisations. This global track record is complemented by a strategic consultancy background and a finance MBA.
Rob is an advisory Board Member at Cranfield University, Logistics, Procurement & Supply Chain faculty and a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Logistics & Transport.
Alan joined Train’d Up as Managing Director in June 2022, with a remit to maintain the highest standards in national Apprenticeship delivery, whilst increasing market share. Responsible for managing multiple teams within the organisation, Alan knows only too well, how important well managed teams are in driving standards and achieving success.
Alan moved to Train’d Up last year from a leading North East based training provider, where he held the position of CEO, having worked his way from practitioner to senior leader.
He started his career as an engineering apprentice some 35 years ago and is an enthusiastic and passionate ambassador for apprenticeships and workforce development, within the transport and engineering sectors.
Glynis Appelbe joined the G&W UK/Europe region in March 2016 as HR Director – UK/Europe Region.
Prior to G&W UK/Europe she was the Head of HR for a FTSE listed global diversified mining company, Eurasian Natural Resources (‘ENRC’) PLC, spanning Europe, South America, Africa and Kazakhstan. Prior to RNRC she spent 16 years working in financial services related environments in subsidiaries of Barclays, ABN Amro and Hitachi Capital.
Ms Appelbe earned a business degree from University of Limerick, Ireland and is a member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development.
Jo Gretton is Telent’s Chief Executive Officer responsible for leading the company to deliver excellent customer service, continued growth and ensuring that Telent is a great place to work.
John joined TBF in 1998; he loves working in the charity sector. He knows the help and support that TBF provides to public transport workers and their dependents makes a significant difference in times of need, hardship and distress.
Before TBF, John worked for LUL as a direct recruit guard before becoming a train operator, so he has first-hand experience of the difficulties experienced by rail staff. Unfortunately, his career in operations was cut short by Type 1 Diabetes, leading John to start a career in administration.
The fund currently has over 58,000 contributing members and, along with their partners and dependent children, indicates how many people can call upon the fund for help. TBF will spend approximately £3 million on direct benefits to its beneficiaries in this financial year. That is an impressive achievement when you consider that TBF membership costs just £1.25 a week.
John says he is incredibly proud to be part of TBF, especially in 2023, its centenary year, as it is not every day that you can be part of an organisation that makes such a difference to people when they need a helping hand and each year that passes more and more help is required. He would like all employing companies within the public transport sector to understand the difference TBF membership can make to their employees' work-life balance, which in turn helps reduce employee turnover. Some employers have agreed to Employer Paid and pay their staffs' £1.25 weekly contribution, as they see this as a benefit they can afford and demonstrate they care about their employees' wellbeing.
Julie has been a charity CEO for over eighteen years.
She has led some of the UK’s most well-known charity names including Action for Children, Girlguiding, Family Planning Association and the Suzy Lamplugh Trust. Julie joined Samaritans as CEO in November 2020. She is currently Vice Chair of NCVO.
Julie began her career as a youth worker (after a stint of five years as a Post Person) and in the early 90’s worked in some of the most deprived parts of SE London, working with young drug users and those involved in crime. She began her leadership journey at a charity called Charterhouse-in-Southwark where she was first a Manager of the young people centre and then over the next six years progressed to Assistant Director.
Through her career Julie has earned a reputation for her passionate advocacy of the voices of those with lived experience being at the heart of a charity and for her commitment to meaningful equity and inclusion. She has a reputation for driving change and for the authenticity she brings to her leadership. At Girlguiding she created headlines when she described the century old charity as “the ultimate feminist organisation”.
In 2014, she was named by Third Sector as the ‘Most Admired Charity CEO’ and in the same year was a castaway for BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs.
In 2019, she was awarded The Charity Times Awards for ‘Outstanding Individual Achievement’ and was voted by Charity Times readers as one of the sector’s Most Influential Leaders.
Julie grew up in rural Essex and has recently returned there with her Partner Sean after 26 years of living in SE London.
In 2020 Julie co-curated a book on experiences of sibling loss following the death of her brother.
Mark co-founded GeoAccess in 2014. A graduate from the University of Portsmouth with a BEng (Hons) in Engineering Geology and Geotechnics, Mark has always had a head for dizzying heights. With a career spanning ground and site investigation, across the Highways, Railway, and Utilities sectors, Mark’s vision was to create a company which would provide solutions where clients were presented with challenging access issues, using not only rope access, but new innovative and technical solutions such as UAV and submersible drones.
As a small aircraft Pilot himself, introducing a drone element to the business has absolutely made sense. In more recent times, and alongside his business partner David Frost, Mark has grown GeoAccess into an Asset Management company. Mark’s experience as part of the Network Rail Civil Examination Framework Agreement contract has more than equipped him with the foresight and knowledge to offer workable solutions to both clients and contractors alike working throughout the various Asset Engineering sectors.
Mark is a firm believer that regardless of the challenge, it is always possible, even if one has to be a little creative, to find a solution for the client. To date, he has succeeded in this endeavour
Wayne is an experienced Civil Engineer having spent thirty years working within the complex railway industry. Wayne has held senior positions in a variety of fields including Structure Examinations and Track Maintenance. He has achieved success using his excellent leadership, technical and personal skills and is passionate about using technology to improve the safety and quality of structure examinations. Wayne is co-owner and Technical Director of Inspire (Structures).
“I attended the awards last weekend and very good they were too!”
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