The Workforce for a Modern Railway

Kayleigh has been in the rail industry for over 14 years, holding leadership roles on major programme like Crossrail and HS2. Most recently she has been appointed as National Programme Director for Access for All, tasked with the recovery and reform of the portfolio to deliver better for passengers.

As the Apprenticeship & Graduate Programmes Manager on Transpennine Route Upgrade (TRU), I am dedicated to fostering the growth and development of early talent within the rail industry. My role involves overseeing apprentice & grad programmes that equip individuals with the skills and opportunities needed to kick-start their careers. Working on a programme of such national and regional importance, which is transforming train travel across the North, is incredibly rewarding. I’m proud of the incredible work being done by our apprentices & grads so far, with many more to join us as the TRU journey continues.

Bonnie is a consultant to the rail section with over 10 years' experience. She is also the CEO of the not-for-profit Young Rail Professionals LTD (YRP), having spent 5 years on its board of directors. Its mission is to "promote, develop and inspire the next generation of rail." With regions across the United kingdom and the republic of Ireland, as well as working groups to focus on heritage, Young Rail Tours, INTOrail, RAILWEEK, EDI and its own Annual dinner and awards. 

She is the winner of the Women in rail awards :Inspirational woman of the year 2022. Working on projects such as Crossrail and HS2, she is primarily an infrastructure consultant. 

I’m Alice Smith, currently working as a Level 4 Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability Apprentice at TRU, where I’ve been since 2023. Before this, I graduated from the University of Leeds in 2022 with a 2:1 degree in Ancient History and History.

Throughout my career, I've gained experience in various areas, including early engagement, environmental management, project management, and data analysis. I also co-chair the TRU Sustainability Champions Network and serve on the committee for the Early Career Professionals. My time at TRU has helped me develop a diverse and well-rounded skill set, and I’m passionate about applying what I’ve learned to create a lasting, positive impact on both the environment and society.

My name is Millie Semple, I am an Assistant Procurement Manager at HS2 Ltd. Prior to this I was a Commercial procurement and Supply chain apprentice. I embarked on my apprenticeship journey in 2022.

Since joining HS2, I have attended multiple events across the UK, spanning from Edinburgh to Bristol meeting lots of inspirational people along the way. I’ve enjoyed volunteering and have represented HS2 at a number of events, including conferences, career fairs and other formal engagements. I am also a member of the Early Careers Networking Committee, helping to organise events for other apprentices and graduates.

Fiona is Head of Delivery Partnership at Transpennine Express, where she coordinates across the business to ensure that it is on track to realise the benefits for customers. She also leads a team of experts delivering TPE’s contribution to the Transpennine Route Upgrade, ranging from managing customer disruption and safe integration of infrastructure changes, to procuring rolling stock and delivering the station enhancements needed to realise the benefits of the Programme. Fiona has recently celebrated her four-year anniversary at Transpennine Express after joining from Great Western Railway, where she led the project team that delivered the award-winning Exeter Depot.

Neil heads up Workforce Planning in NSAR. He has worked with numerous clients and bodies in delivering the skills and workforce analysis of the rail sector, the wider transport and infrastructure sectors and other sectors in the UK, as well as overseas. He is recognised as a leader in the field of strategic workforce planning, generating data and analysis leading to productivity and economic assessments of the required workforce and changing nature of skills. 

He is responsible for forecasting the future skills, numbers and workforce requirements of the rail industry; providing data, support, advice and guidance so the industry is enabled to deliver the right numbers of people, with the rights skills in the right location at the right time to meet industry needs and government investment commitments. He is also the author of NSAR’s Annual Workforce Survey Report (https://www.nsar.co.uk/2024/12/findings-of-the-nsar-rail-workforce-survey-2024/) .

In response to the rail industry’s increasing desire to make informed skills decisions based on sound judgement, Neil initially developed a prototype and subsequently a fully functioning web-based tool. The tool (the SIM) is capable of predicting industry wide labour requirements across a range of work types, asset types, regions, skill levels and standard occupational classifications. The tool also holds all of the industry investment plans. This work also included obtaining and analysing the data to populate the model which has been used for forecasting labour requirements in a number of rail industry bodies, be they employer specific or at a more regional or industry level. Neil has developed extremely close links with Government bodies, such as the Department for Transport, Infrastructure Projects Authority, Department for Education and the Department for Business and Trade.

Neil is also a Board Director of the National Training Academy for Rail, a joint venture training academy between NSAR and Siemens, and has helped numerous other employers with their own curriculum and training requirements, specialising mainly on developing demand profiles for the business cases. 

Fiona Stewart-Knight is Assistant Vice Principal Business Partnerships & Director of the Institute for University to Business (IU2BE) Education at Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU).  She leads a multi-functional team dedicated to the identification and resolution of human capital challenges in corporate, public and third sector organisations through the design and delivery of work-based, higher education programmes.  Responsible for GCU’s Graduate Apprenticeship portfolio, Fiona has assured GCU’s position as Scotland’s leading provider of graduate apprenticeships to industry since 2017.   She and her team work with over 400 employers and have a steady state of 1000 apprentices registered on undergraduate and masters programmes, many within the UK rail industry (TOC’s, FOC’s, engineering, construction, AI data science etc) and supply chain.  With a tendency to engineering, digital technology and railway operations management, she has secured multi-year corporate client projects in South Africa with State Owned Enterprise Transnet Freight Rail (13 years), Apprentice Technician development in Offshore Gas with BP in Mauritania and Senegal, establishment of the African Leadership College in Mauritius and a 20 year collaboration history with the Chartered Institution of Railway Operators UK. 

Since joining Transpennine Express in 2023 as a Project Coordinator, Grainne has become an Assistant Project Manager on the new trains programme, working at the cutting edge of rolling stock procurement in the face of industry changes, and has recently completed her APM PMQ qualification. Before joining TPE Grainne spent the previous five years working as a Primary school teacher in Early years and Key Stage One and prior to that she worked in various sales and marketing roles in Sydney, Australia.