Planning for the London Olympics

Craig Cameron blogs about the invisible technology layers we don’t see behind the Olympic games, how these layers might have been compromised in recent weeks and how better planning when it comes to employees could have worked wonders.

It is not the purpose of this blog to be controversial or highly opinionated but given the London Olympics is starting this week, and it is the biggest single sporting event that any of us are likely to witness in our lifetime, we had to include it somewhere.

If our purpose behind these articles is to be informative then what does a once in a lifetime event like London 2012 have to teach Atlas customers at large?
The company G4S has been in the news a great deal recently but we’re not going to focus on how or why they have allegedly failed to carry out their “believed to be” contractual duties. That is being covered elsewhere and we would have very little to add.

What we do want to highlight are the very real operational difficulties involved in getting 10,000 people from not-employed over to employed, trained, on-site, supervised and ready to go. Not only do we know about that but we are experts.

For example:-

• One of our customers carries out work on power stations, including nuclear ones. They have to recruit as many as 500 highly qualified people, each of whom has very high security clearance. This has to be done in around a two week period. How do they manage this? They use the Atlas HR Hub.

• Every February, and within a three week period, another one of our customers has to recruit nearly 500 seasonal staff, suitably qualified to work with children and vulnerable adults. How do they manage this? They use QlikView Business Discovery.

• One of our customers has 10,000 employees who have to be scheduled into, each week, nearly 900 different locations. It is a legal requirement for them to have minimum numbers of suitably qualified staff at each location before they can legally open the shop. A repeated failure to comply would result in a removal of the very licence our customer needs to operate their business; it can be that serious. How do they manage this? They use the Atlas Employee Roster Software, and frankly they would not have the operation they have without it!

• Another one of our customers who are in the food processing industry have to ensure that no-one (employees and visitors) who has been on a foreign holiday in the last three days enters their factory.

Then of course apart from employing hundreds or thousands of people you have to ensure they actually turned up for work. We have solutions for that also, including options that are activated by phone calls or smart phones messages i.e. no computer necessary.

Sadly none of this Atlas software or technology is in use at London 2012, but even without our super clever stuff, we are still confident the Games will be a success.
We know this will be difficult, but for a moment let us forget the London 2012 Olympics are happening this week.

Please ask yourself this question, how big a difference to the labour management in your organisation would some of this super-clever Atlas staff make?

Armed Forces Day is extra-special for Adam’s son (and new daughter-in-law!)

You may know Adam Wilkinson, TSM engineer at our Leeds office. His son, Thomas, was married on Saturday to Stephanie at a service & reception in Wetherby, north of Leeds.

What made the day extra-special is that Thomas is in the army and a veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan, and Saturday 30th June 2012 was Armed Forces Day.

Thomas wore his full military dress uniform for the service and displayed his medals proudly. A joyous occasion for all concerned and all of us at Atlas wish Thomas and Stephanie our warmest wishes for the future.