V/Line – V/Line’s Certification and ISO55001

Projects, products or frameworks that demonstrate new techniques or innovative approaches to asset management best practice at any or all of its life cycle stages.

1.   Summary of the project:

The Asset Management Framework team at V/Line championed a two-year accelerated program to refine and develop the Asset Management System gaining approximately 25% uplift in maturity and being the first government organisation in Victoria to be ISO 55001 certified.

The team applied the Global Forum for Maintenance and Asset Management (GFMAM) framework allowing for a systematic approach for communications, training and assurance programs.

The certification journey required leveraging on existing processes, creation of governance bodies, development and adoption of foundational frameworks, artefacts and processes, training and awareness programs, and enterprise wide continuous improvement programs.

2.   Description of project or framework addressing the assessment criteria

Starting baseline prior to 2018. The key challenges at the time of starting V/Line’s Asset Management maturity journey –

  • Understanding of assets and their condition;
  • Investment in assets and people – Funding had not kept pace with the levels required to maintain a fully operational and reliable network;
  • Significant growth in patronage, up 88.3% between 2006/07 and 2015/16, driven by the implementation of Regional Fast Rail, Regional Rail Link and population growth in outer Melbourne and Regional areas;
  • Various asset management system audits (inc. assessments against ISO 55001 and AMAF) pointed to low maturity in asset management capability as well as business maturity in general;
  • Improving collaboration between teams and business units;
  • Improving our Stakeholders confidence in V/Line’s ability to operate and maintain assets:
    • Significant number of asset failures resulting in customer delays, service cancellations, network shutdown and reputational damage;
    • Excessive wheel wear in VLocity trains;
    • Failure of VLocity trains to activate boom gates on time

Driver for change: Partnership Agreement (2017) with DoT stated a requirement to attain ISO 55001 Certification by Jan 2021

The Asset Management Journey gained momentum in 2018 when teams were established to support the foundational work. A “High Level” ISO 55001 gap analysis was conducted and found over 90% major non-conformance to the standard.

The fast tracked program required a transformation of the business to become certified to ISO55001 within two years. Some of the foundational developments were:

  • Extensively revised the Asset Management Policy. Board approval in Dec 2018
  • Submission of the first ever “7 Year Funding Business Case” to DoT to seek sustainable funding
  • Undertook first AMAF Self-Assessment – 2018/19 AMAF Attestation
  • Established Governance Committees as support for the AM Journey
  • Utilise GFMAM Framework to develop the Asset Management System  and foundational artefacts such as Strategic Asset Management Plan (SAMP)
  • Established Corporate Asset Management Maturity KPIs
  • Implemented AM education programs

To understand the landscape of improvements required to meet certification and beyond, a baseline maturity was determined in 2019. The outcomes found that V/Line were at 35% maturity and required a serious of improvements to close the gap on certification requirements.

The first year of intensive continuous improvement initiatives and implementation saw an uplift to 41% maturity (scope of maturity was reduced to ISO clauses) and closed all ISO55001 clause gaps resulting in certification being achieved before deadline.

Benefits to date:

  • Asset management – raising awareness across the business has created a positive shift in culture, and reduced “siloed mentality”.
  • Dormant initiatives have been revived and given new visibility through this process. These include sustainability, customer satisfaction and performance. For example, the V/Line Management System was once isolated to a single business unit and is now in use enterprise wide 
  • Improved control of operations is a significant benefit of the work done so far, with a visible reduction in catastrophic failures, compared to 5 years ago. This has a positive benefit across the whole network and delivers improvements in service delivery, safety, and financial performance. 
  • More robust decision-making processes have enabled business decision-makers to raise awareness and justify their plans in the context of corporate objectives. This alignment also makes it easier to reject plans on an objective basis when they don’t meet specified criteria and removes some of the subjective bias that can influence decisions. 
  • Ongoing maturity uplift for V/Line signals a collaborative work environment and a culture that seeks improvement independent of compliance requirements. In V/Line’s regulated context, such an environment provides confidence to stakeholders and satisfaction for V/Line employees

3. Opinion as to specific contribution made by the nominated individual/team/organisation

The Core Team (Asset Management Framework Team) drove the program over the two years:

  • Raymond Ngo (Manager, AM Framework)
  • Gerard Domingo (AM Assurance Specialist)
  • Thapelo Oageng (AM Improvement Specialist)
  • Fiona Beckley (Asset Information Specialist)
  • Andrew Norman (Change Manager)

The team, led by Raymond Ngo, essentially created the improvement program based on ISO 55001 non-compliance and GFMAM requirements. The program was rolled out Enterprise wide, and required intense training programs, coaching sessions from Executives, to senior leaders as well as field staff and monthly catch ups to monitor progress of the enterprise program.

The fast tracked program could not have been achieved without the tremendous efforts of Raymond Ngo, Andrew Norman, Gerard Domingo, Thapelo Oageng and Fiona Beckley.

4. General comments you may wish to add

The AMF team had a unique approach in adopting the GFMAM framework as it became the basis for every part of the Asset Management System. Colour coding of each GFMAM subject was used in all comms, in strategic documents, and even as invites for maturity assessments. The consistency and application of colour helped get messages across quicker.

The systematic approach also allowed for a cleaner and easier line of sight between Corporate KPIs and Asset Management KPIs. Existing processes and practices were leveraged against and mapped accordingly to the asset management system:

Scroll to Top