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I saw an example of this happening the other day and it got me thinking! There are always lots of problems bouncing around on big complex projects like Crossrail. There’s a lot of value to be gained by transferring these innovations across boundaries from (say) one site to another. But doing this successfully is notoriously…

I was looking forward to my holiday reflecting that in August it was likely that the activity and commitment across the programme couldn’t possibly sustain the levels seen in June and July as colleagues also head off on their holidays. What has actually happened has been a bit of a surprise! We have seen our…

With Tim on holiday, I have been given the responsibility of completing the Programme Manager’s blog. I hope to do him justice! In July, the innovation programme entered the evaluation phase with a tremendous 125 submissions reviewed by the Working Group. Six submissions were recommended for investment and were reviewed by the Crossrail Innovation Forum…

The innovation programme continues to mature as the awareness and engagement with projects gains momentum with further launch events held at Plumstead, Farringdon and Tottenham Court Road in the last month. Tier 1 leadership engagement has been another area of focus this month, drawing up innovations from the internal systems of Costain, Skanska, Ferrovial, Vinci…

Today marks the line in the sand the Innovation Team drew when we agreed the schedule with Andrew Wolstenholme at the Crossrail Innovation Forum in January 2013. The line represents when the metaphorical draw bridge is lifted on the innovation submissions such that we will now evaluate the submissions received to date. There are only…

  I would like to introduce to you Rahul from Imperial College London. He may look like a shady character in his leather jacket, but Rahul has aspirations to become a Doctor of Innovation! Imperial College London are collaborating with Crossrail to research on how Crossrail implement the vision of an innovation programme and how…

This week, we saw the total number of Crossrail innovations submitted into the Portal surpass 100. Of the 108 submitted those; the programme is progressing (or “discovering”) 36 innovations and over half are focused on the theme working more efficiently. More importantly, the number of shared innovations uploaded onto the innovate18 website has grown from…

Friday 24th May 2013 at The Royal Society On Friday, the innovation team joined Crossrail’s Early Career Professionals (ECP’s) for their second conference following the success of the last ECP event in September 2012. The focus of the conference at the Royal Society was innovation and we warmly welcomed guest speakers: Crossrail’s CEO Andrew Wolstenholme…

Returning from paternity leave this week, I have spent the last few days catching up on what has been going on across the Innovation programme. What is clear is that we are starting to generate some really interesting ideas. When speaking to Ben Hardy (Paddington CRL Project Manager)  about the challenges his site faces, he…

Since our launch on 22nd April 2013, we have attracted over 150 members to the innovate18 Platform, including members of the Crossrail executive and Tier 1 project leaders. The Crossrail Innovation Team have already visited thirteen (13) Crossrail sites to discuss how best to engage with their teams. There is clearly an appetite to innovate…