Make Ready and workshop transformation 2020

East of England Ambulance Service

Context

A regional ambulance service was in the process of implementing “Make Ready” and introducing internal workshops across the Trust to improve the reliability of vehicles and equipment available to their clinicians, increase the amount of clinical time available to provide patient care, and deliver significant financial savings to the Trust.

This would mean introducing two entirely new teams to the Operations Support directorate:

  • Make Ready would take responsibility away from Operations for preparing vehicles before shift starts including cleaning ambulances, packing kit, and completing safety checks
  • Workshops would take back outsourced vehicle maintenance and repairs, which traditionally led to unnecessary Vehicle Off Road (VOR) delays

It would also require new IT infrastructure and tools, to support initial implementation and ongoing operations.

The complexity and magnitude of the task, involving several interdependent workstreams as well as interaction and collaboration with a large number of stakeholders (including frontline service delivery), required additional capacity and expertise not immediately available within the Trust. TN would support the initial implementation effort, kickstarting the ~5-year transformation (the most ambitious of its kind in any ambulance service in the UK).

Approach

Segmented programme into three workstreams:

  • Make Ready
  • Workshops/Fleet
  • IT & Tools

Expedited the pace of delivery by actively driving implementation, collaboration, and problem-solving across organisational divisions within the Trust, and across a dispersed geography. Supported specific collaboration between Operations and Operations Support through direct engagement and integration of Operations stakeholders

Bridged any disconnect between organisational understanding of delivery and the reality on the ground; accurately identifying & communicating the specific blockers to delivery

Developed capability to deliver the full 5-year Integrated Transformation Programme, following the period of  intensive TN support

Impact

  • Delivered Make Ready in 5 hub stations as the first phase of implementation, establishing strong working relationship with operational colleagues:
~
70
crew hours released daily
~
80
local operational manager hours released daily
  • Implemented internal workshops in 4 hub stations, and introduced several initiatives to improve effectiveness and efficiency (e.g. rota demand alignment and time-based servicing):
50%
reduction in vehicles off road at peak of day
18%
increase in vehicles available to operations at peak of day
  • Established the governance infrastructure to deliver full ITP, including systems & processes and management infrastructure (data and analytics) to achieve accountability within the Operational Support team and to deliver assurance to the wider Trust
  • Built internal capability and developed comprehensive plan to support implementation effort of the remain 17 hub stations without external support

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