FOR SOME, MANAGING A HERITAGE RAILWAY CAN BECOME A POISONED CHALICE.
A LOT OF vacancies have been advertised at heritage railways over the past few years, including some pretty senior positions. Things are tough, with nearly all railways wondering how to make ends meet yet, and all the while the ORR seems to be tightening its grip on railway safety.
This is understandable. With incidents on heritage lines niggling away and refusing to reduce year on year, management of competence is so very important. Management of competence also means competent managers and the expectations of (and demands on) senior management grow. Try recruiting someone with the right skills and the chances are they are already in a role of equal standing, but almost certainly earning quite a bit more than the heritage sector can offer.
For most, it is by far the easier and better option to stay in ‘mainstream’ employment, particularly as once you jump ship it’s hard to get back on. The most successful recruiting scenario is of someone who has done volunteer work at a heritage railway, is passionate about it, has amassed the skills and experience needed and is prepared to give up salary and pensions in return for following their passion. Such people are in short supply.
We have seen railways using recruitment consultants and reaching out to sectors such as the museum sector as they try to find someone who has a fighting chance of leading the team. Sometimes this works, but I suspect the failure rate is a bit higher than one might expect. Take a few steps away from the arena of railway management and it can be really difficult to see why it is such a problem. Surely it is a great job and a lifestyle choice, away from the rat race and doing something really rather nice? Get closer though and there are challenges well beyond any ‘normal’ management job. For managers drawn from within the ranks, the job can be a very lonely one. Things usually start well enough with the new manager heralded as being just the person and the one who ‘knows how we tick’ etc. The honeymoon period soon passes, however, when two people at odds with each other and possibly both considered to be friends of the new manager have some sort of disagreement. Things end up with that senior manager being called upon to make a decision. It suddenly becomes apparent to the manager that of the two friends in the room, one will no longer be such a firm friend. With experience, one can envisage such circumstances emerging and possibly find a solution, but ultimately making those decisions is a tough job.
Over time, the number of difficult decisions can take its toll, and there will always a cohort of people that really don’t like the person making them. Normally, managers are not there to be liked, and those who primarily seek popularity will struggle to win through. Paid staff can bring challenges for railway managers too. Money is not everything in life, this we know, and responsibility and the satisfaction of a job well done is motivating. However, a lack of money is a big issue as anyone who has struggled to make ends meet or to bring up a family will tell you. Low wages mean employees looking for ‘side hustles’, becoming weary of doing it, or having their minds occupied by working on some deal that will earn a few extra pounds. Some will feel awkward doing this, some will try to hide it and, for some, it will become a normal part of what they do.
All this costs the organisation in one way or another and can build animosity towards the leaders and managers. It can be rather painful when these matters come to a head and an employee has to leave. Management feels angry about the behaviours and the employees feel they were driven to it. It’s hard to maintain your fascination for railways/locos/history when things like this are going on all around you. Minimum wage legislation that drives us away from a low ‐wage economy can help with some of these problems, but with many heritage railways reliant on manual labour (well, we are preserving both railways and working practices of bygone times) it brings further problems in balancing the books and the stress that goes with that. A railway manager once remarked that it was necessary to grow skin thicker than a rhinoceros hide to be able to run a heritage line.
Another protection mechanism is for the manager to build some distance between themselves and the people they manage. All too quickly, however, this can go wrong. The manager may seem distant and detached, ultimately losing that all ‐important link with the people and things that make the railway tick, and typically this has terminal consequences for that leader. Surely it is all worth it though, and great fun to be part of all those projects and events? Well, yes, it is to a degree, but it would be interesting to peer into the diaries of some of those managers. Ever heard volunteers complaining that the managers are not around at the weekends while all the volunteers are working? Managers are, of course, required to attend committees and members’ meetings, event planning and local business link ‐ups. The list goes on and, of course, if the manager does have to work all weekend then they can always have a couple of days off in the week, right? Except many of the staff who, most unreasonably, would like to work a regular working week expect the manager to be around when they are to get stuff done. Those Monday morning meetings can be so important for getting things done, but not so effective if the manager is not in until Wednesday.
So, back to recruitment, what can we do? The long list of vacancies tells us we have to do something if we want to keep enjoying our railways. As I have said before, a heritage railway is a very expensive hobby. We have to face up to the fact that if we want them to survive, which means competent people managing them safely, then we need to attract managers and leaders to work for the sector in a fair and reasonable way.
Some folk liken railway leaders to football club managers, both subject to huge amounts of opinion on social media about how the job should be done. The difference is, of course, that those football managers get paid a king’s ransom, but heritage railway managers don’t. There has been much talk of the railway preservation bubble bursting. I have commented that it is happening if we could but recognise the signs. One of the signs is that some people simply walk away because they don’t like running them any more.