1st December 2018

Helping one of the world’s busiest airports prepare for its largest international terminal.

Billed as a world-leading iconic terminal, BAA’s Terminal 5 is larger than Terminals 1, 2, 3 and 4 put together.

With an innovative supplier contracting model that would have BAA absorb all risks, it was more than the BAA and British Airways partnership that was at stake, but real passenger lives and the reputation of Britain as a whole.

This case-based colloquium explores how the complexities of collaboration were controlled by Coplexia founder Amir Khodaparast, and the influence this assignment has had on the design of the Coplexia Collaborative co-operating model.

In the lead-up to Heathrow’s Terminal 5 coming into operational readiness, BAA IT Applications Management and Support Services lacked confidence in their ability to identify and deal with the possible impacts of T5 on over 300 legacy systems across the BAA world.

The senior leadership team recognised a need to change how they operate in order to cope with business-as-usual demands on top of mounting new requirements coming in from construction, engineering and technology projects from across the vast Terminal 5 ’empire’ of suppliers and several internal BAA-wide change & transformation programmes.

“Amir’s work formed the basis of new procedural systems, tools and delivery methodologies that are still in use today.”

Adding to the complexity was a need to align every key decision with venture partners British Airways, as well as: –

  • A £10b hostile takeover by Spanish consortia Ferrovial;
  • A novel new contracting model that made BAA entirely accountable for T5 rather than any supplier;
  • A change in HR and Payroll systems that risked thousands of staff not receiving payments on time;
  • A minefield of legal considerations, from TUPE to human rights implications on the use of retina biometric data; and
  • A heightened level of terrorist activities that frequently brought airport operations to a standstill.

Working on behalf of the Head of BAA IT’s Applications Management & Support Services, Coplexia founder Amir Khodaparast successfully unearthed hidden risks and issues before designing and delivering a Change Programme for BAA IT to work more collaboratively with the rest of BAA as well its extended worldwide supply and value-chains.

He won senior stakeholder buy-in from across the whole of BAA into a collaborative quality management system that ensured co-operational excellence in Risk ManagementCapacity Planning and Service Delivery.

This resulted in the broadest stakeholder communities working together as #VirtuallyOne workforce assess and remediate over 300 different legacy systems for possible impacts of T5 coming into operational service.

Want to know how?

For the full story, please join us in another of our case-based colloquiums to learn about how we controlled the complexities of collaboration to deliver the promise of prosperity through partnership. Express your interest below.

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NB: The scope of this work excluded the implementation of three new systems, including the new baggage handling system that failed, causing havoc for passengers with much bad press at the time.

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