North Yorkshire Moors Railway General Discussion

I'd suggest a better start would be clear confidence, of the sort displayed by Beamish, in what NYMR is.

 

I not talking about directing grants away from payroll, but payroll needs to be reduced to those employees who are essential in providing the railway service. The difficulty is financial so reducing expenditure would mitigate the underlying problem.

Quite agree that governance and day to day management are different but at the moment the salaried management seem to be in control to the detriment of the governing body. It is the PLC management who have trespassed across that boundary.

Either we make a change to restore the balance of power to what it was or the whole edifice is in danger of collapse. 1973 may be a lifetime ago but it was a far more successful organisational model than what we have today.

We are in financial failure and without change there will be no payroll for anyone.

 

That is an assumption, and can't be answered properly without considering the cost of change. That also requires proper definition of "essential".

I happen to share your view that the payroll is too large relative to the organisation, but there is a dangerous elision between that observation, and the assertions about structure - they're distinct features, and shouldn't be over-simplified togetehr

 

I'm going off piste on a personal ramble but please bear with me.

Thirty five years ago I first worked for a small UK company in what is called the service sector. We employed professionally qualified staff, support staff, service operatives, catering staff and housekeepers. It was a 24 hour a day 365 days a year service and, as such it employed around 230 staff most of them full time on a shift system.

The organisation was headed by a CEO with many years experience in the specific field of operation. There were just 5 administrative staff (including accounts) and for whom I was responsible.

When I joined it was a brand new company and building up trade was a slow and painstaking business and funding was tight to put in mildly. For the first few years it was touch and go but very slowly trade increased as did our reputation for good and reliable service.

If we had employed non-productive staff at £90,000, £50,000 or even £20,000 that business would have failed. If we had employed unecessary staff even at the basic wage threshold that business would have failed.

Returning to the NYMR it has received all manner of grants, it is supported by all sorts of organisations, it has volunteers who have provided free labour to the tune of millions of pounds for over 50 years. Even with all those advantages it is now in danger of collapse. It may be possible to recover from such a catastrophe as the Llangollen has done but despite the recovery that railway has lost so much along the way.

What I am looking for, and asking others more expert than myself to assist, is to find constitutional answers as to how to remove those who have not only failed, but abysmally failed, to maintain the railway over which they have usurped control.

There are problems which need solutions. What we don't need are obstacles being placed in the path of those solutions.

 

Yo0u mention grants, but I don't think they are a pressing issue - there haven't been any lately that are linked to employment afaik, and nor should any be taken on now. If there are any existing they must becoming to an end by now.

In terms of governance and day to day management, the NYMR always had the Trust Board and a separate Management Committee, since the day it opened. The Trust Board took the big decisions - setting fares and timetables, and the management committee effectively collected the cash. Of course, back then, the Trust Board was composed of people who were from and knew and understood the railway business. That's why, on the commercial side, we had a GM. The Plc was set up as a part of a fundraising exercise, and that's when staff e3xpectations of title and importance began to increase. IMHO it's time to reverse the trend.

 

If the 'crew' currently in charge of the NYMR really wanted to try and succeed, they'd organize day (or longer) visits to several of the many (I could name half a dozen right off the top of my head, as I'm sure most of us could) heritage lines that are succeeding (even in today's difficult environment), and really study them to find out how they are doing it.

And I do mean "study"; just going for a sight-seeing visit, where they do not listen really hard to what people have to say to them, would be a waste of time. Unless they are truly, in their hearts, thinking 'I don't know what I am doing, or how to fix this; these people do, so if I listen hard enough, maybe I can learn something from them', they'd be wasting everyone's time (including their own - and also the time of everyone at the NYMR).

Noel

 

A couple of points. First, on grants, I was using that language for payments from Trust to PLC, nothing more.

Second, and reinforced by the first, I am now an outsider. I am not proposing to participate in a campaign to change NYMR, but I am pointing out where there are apparent gaps in a logic that need to be faced up to. I do not, and have never, worked on the basis that I tell people what they want to hear, even if its inconvenient.

For what it's worth, I do believe strongly that the delegation to the PLC has become excessive, and that the balance between "commercial" and "heritage" has gone out of kilter. I think that is a structural issue but, more importantly, its a people issue. While I didn't envisage the current state of affairs, it is why I opposed the change in Articles 5 years ago, and believe it's sown dragons teeth that the railway as a whole will live to regret.

I have no doubt that the capability exists within NYMR to do better, and that relatively minor changes could have disproportionate impact. The bit that will be difficult without a crisis, and possibly even with one, will be changing the organisational culture so that it always asks "how can this be done by a volunteer" rather than, as appears to be the case now, defaulting to employing someone.

I strongly suspect that needs significant change at board and board -1 level, and that some people will need to step aside - voluntarily or not. Some may be paid staff, some may be volunteers - I've genuinely no idea. Having never knowingly met the CEO, I can't comment knowledgeably on whether she's good, bad, or awful - or whether she's part of the problem or solution (and, yes, I have heard plenty of views). The issues may be of her making, or they may be caused by other factors which removing others might turn around.

The obsessive focus on payroll, and especially higher paid roles, is IMHO dangerous because it presumes an answer without properly diagnosing a condition. Spending too much is not a condition, but a symptom - squeeze the haemorrhage in the wrong place, and you may make it worse, not better.

You ask about constitutional answers. I suggest you find sympathetically minded souls to stand for the Trust Board, who you trust and who the Board will tolerate being in the pot. Then give them time to dig themselves in, and find ways to work from within. The changes a few years ago mean that a frontal assault won't work, so you have to look at siege warfare for patterns. After all - more haste, less speed

 

Before risking going down what might be a nihilistic path, can I suggest that someone suggests that all the senior management and Trust Board members read the last hundred or so posts on here and all sit down in a single room, try to work out where they have gone wrong, and come up with a strategy to bring things back on track. It would inevitably result in quite a lot of bruised egos, but a bruised ego is far better than losing one's job.

 

One issue with that approach " they don't do social media" !!!

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I think, at the very least, annual passenger numbers for 2022-2026 should be published.

With the new online booking system there will be almost instant data on ticket sales.