FM Conway - Going the Extra Mile

Chapter 7 Building for the Future

Working with a partner is a relatively new experience for us, and it isn’t always easy.

AECOM, a global provider of technical and management services based in Los Angeles. David helped to set the JV up, and he, Andrew, and I were the three Conway Board members, together with three Directors from AECOM. Working with a partner is a relatively new experience for us, and it isn’t always easy. AECOM are a very large company and often need to refer decisions back to HQ. This can sometimes be frustrating from our point of view: we like to move quickly. The third issue was the ‘hardest’ of all. One of the conditions of

the LoHAC tender was that our project reporting systems would have to feed directly into TfL’s reporting systems. This process (known as EDI: electronic data interchange) required capabilities from our computer system that it simply didn’t have. If we wanted this project – or any future projects with TfL – we would have to put in an entirely new computer system; an upgrade to the old system simply wouldn’t do. It had to be what the IT world refers to rather dramatically as ‘a heart transplant’.

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