Who are we?

South Western Railway (SWR) operates over 1,500 services each weekday across the network and employs more than 5,000 people. We provide easy and convenient mobility, connecting people and communities in South West London, southern counties of England, and the Isle of Wight.

Join our team and help us continue to improve quality of life, by bringing people together to get the most out of life.

SWR is part of FirstGroup, the largest rail operator in the UK and second largest bus operator in the UK outside London. FirstGroup operates services throughout the UK and Ireland, with over 30,000 employees providing services that make travel smoother and life easier.  FirstGroup works hard to reduce its impact on the environment, introducing cleaner and more environmentally responsible methods of transport.

About the job

The holder of this post is responsible to support the Fleet Depot Manager to ensure that the fleet allocated to Farnham Depot and associated sidings, meets all safety, performance, maintenance, quality, and train planning requirements. To ensure allocation of rolling stock to appropriate diagrams for the train plan.

Your main responsibilities will be:

• Plan, organise, monitor, and control all aspects of shift production to ensure all targets are met in terms of performance, availability, and reliability of the train service.
• Rolling stock requiring attention is identified and reported to the control centre to maintain the allocated fleet in good condition.
• Control the use of materials and levels of manning to ensure that whilst there is adequate of both to progress work, that actual expenditure does not exceed budget.
• The Movements Manager has the delegated authority to make critical decisions which will influence the operation of local depots and you must be prepared for this autonomy.
• Develop teams and plan for their training, competence assessments to Level 3 standard, carry out team briefings and be the focal point for communication.
• Use IT systems as necessary to record compliance checks and produce documents relating to safety and environmental briefs.
• Booking/recording of work is effectively controlled and reported in required time scales using the systems and methods in place.
• Prepare and allocate trains in time for traincrew to take them for service, giving clear instruction to crews as to unit and siding train is in.
• Ensure all work is completed or deferred and recorded before units are allocated to service.
• Team management responsibilities include, but are not limited to:
  • Planning and conducting interviews.
  • Ensuring high quality of timely workmanship without compromising on safety
  • Supporting, assessing, and enforcing full depot and safety regulation adherence of the whole team, inclusive of; engineering, technical and contracted support staff
  • Managing staff performance including investigations, attendance management, welfare, and disciplinary meetings

As a minimum, you will need to have:

• Proven management experience is essential
• Currently in a team leadership position
• Good communication skills
• Report writing skills
• Experience of working in an operational environment and a background that demonstrates the ability to use rules and regulations.
• Experience of IT systems such as Microsoft Office
• Full UK driving licence is required, driving vehicles up to 3.5t.
• Level 3 Assessor Qualification preferred - training can be provided
• IOSH Managing safely preferred - training can be provided
• Legionella Responsible person preferred - training can be provided

About the location

Fratton Depot is a Traincare facility adjacent to Fratton Station. The depot teams are responsible for the maintenance and presentation of class 444/450's, to ensure a safe, clean and reliable service for our customers. The depot has two pitted maintenance roads and a refuelling station for Great Western's 166/5 services and South Western Railway's 159/8's. Recent enhancements have increased our depots capacity enabling South Western Railway to run reliable services, more frequently.

Additional Information 

To be successful in this role you must have proven experience in leading and managing a team

Working pattern

Working an average of 37 hours per week 

Permanent night shifts: 1900 - 0600, 5 days on / 5 days off. 

The Reward

In return we offer a competitive salary and a variety of valuable benefits, including:

• Free duty and leisure travel on SWR services for employees
• Free leisure travel for spouse/partner and dependants (criteria dependent)
• 75% discount on many other train operating companies
• Full training and support with development
• Large range of exclusive retail offers
• Excellent pension scheme

We all belong at SWR. FirstGroup's vision is to provide an inclusive environment for all colleagues, across its group of businesses, ensuring all candidates have an equal opportunity to access meaningful employment.

We value our differences such as age, gender, LGBTQIA+, ethnicity, religion, and disability. We maintain a zero tolerance towards any form of prejudice towards our colleagues, customers, and future talent.

We celebrate and encourage diversity of thought, progressive ways of working and seeing all our colleagues grow and thrive.

We review all roles and job descriptions to ensure they are accessible and, where possible, we support and provide flexible working options; we recommend that you refer to each vacancy description for further details.

If you require additional support to complete your application due to a disability or neurodivergent condition, for example, dyslexia, dyspraxia, or autism, please follow the links below.  We encourage you to share any additional needs you may require so we can provide a fair and equal process for all who apply.

https://exceptionalindividuals.com/neurodiversity/

https://www.healthassured.org/blog/neurodiversity/