CrossCountry is part of the Arriva group, one of the leading providers of passenger transport in Europe. Arriva employs over 60,000 people and delivers more than 2 billion passenger journeys across 14 European countries annually.

CrossCountry had struggled to maintain the competence management processes within its Control team.  Duty Managers were tasked with staff assessment, but they were too busy with their day job and grappling with the vast amount of paperwork and lack of time, so there were few real, meaningful assessments being carried out.

CrossCountry realised the impact this was having on their business, so they decided to look at alternatives.  They tendered for an electronic management solution, and AssessTech won the tender.

The setup and implementation were led by David Slater, Head of Train Service Delivery, who had previously used ACMS in his role at GWR.  CrossCountry decided to introduce electronic competence management into the Control department ahead of a wider roll-out across the business.  The Control department plays an instrumental role in working across the entire business.  Dave and his team rewrote their paper-based competence management processes, with support from AssessTech, to ensure their processes going forward were fit for purpose.

ACMS is already starting to transform the competence management process within the Control team.  Assessments are now conducted on tablets, with the quickest (voice standards checks) now taking only 10 minutes.  More in-depth assessments now allocate the time previously used for assessment planning, writing, and filing to spend quality time assessing the candidate.  The change in approach has been a real bonus for the Duty Managers. The traffic light system and the adoption of coaching conversations to provide developmental feedback during assessments are creating a more inclusive approach.

The implementation of ACMS was relatively easy for David and his team.  AssessTech provided CrossCountry with a test site, ensuring full internal buy-in and staff were already accustomed to ACMS before rollout.  AssessTech also tailored the platform to align with CrossCountry’s processes.  There are now plans to roll out ACMS to the entire business within CrossCountry, including Guards, Drivers, and Catering staff.

 David Slater

Head of Train Service Delivery,  Cross Country

“We have already seen a massive impact within the business through the adoption of electronic competence management.  The amount of time to do the assessments has been extensively reduced, staff are fully engaged in the process and we have full transparency of the process.  I can see tasks being completed on a daily basis which enables me to provide regular management updates and we have the processes in place if we were to be audited. I would categorically say that we are now on top of our assessments for the first time in 3 years.

“It’s been great working with AssessTech to digitise the existing CMS.  This now allows our assessors to focus on developmental feedback rather than shuffling paperwork around.

“I think it is paramount to focus on what really matters for assessment, rather than just ‘ticking boxes’.  Developmental competence management focuses on the quality of the assessment and gathering useful feedback.  It’s a robust process to follow for any organisation considering this approach.”