"Hello, good evening and welcome"

It seems that my fears were unfounded. Shortly after the last entry I received details of an induction week starting on 4th April at the Ipswich Town football ground at Portman Road.

The week itself was billed as a corporate induction, and centred primarily on 'one' as a company and why we were important as individuals. As someone new to the company and the industry, it was interesting and surprising to hear more about the basis on which the 'one' franchise was won, and the nature of the relationships between the various railway companies and the effect that this has on the services being offered.

Although there was a lot of corporate blather, there were sessions on customer service, conflict management and communication. Some of these topics may seem a bit odd for drivers to cover, but the group was mixed and included newly inducted customer service staff and even engineers.

The worth of these sessions was ably demonstrated on a "field trip" that took place on the Tuesday. Having split into smaller groups we were tasked with surveying four 'one' stations. The day itself saw a fair bit of disruption, with signalling problems, failed trains at Liverpool Street and on the mainline at both Stowmarket and Diss, and a fatality on the WAGN network all contributing to the fun of the day. For our group starting at Ipswich, we spent all day on the trains and actually saw very few stations due to the importance of making connections. With all this chaos around, one of the biggest priorities was making sure that passengers were informed at all times, and it was plain to see the important role that drivers had to play in this, even when not actually driving.

As well as inducting us into the company way of thinking, there were sessions on some of the relevant legislation that we would be expected to have to comply with, some basic fire safety training and an introduction to track safety and railway terminology from a no-nonsense former fitter of many years experience. The last of these was one of the most interesting and enjoyable sessions of the week, and the only one in which I took copious notes. Having been apprenticed to the railways during the last days of steam, the trainer was never short of an amusing or thought provoking anecdote to illustrate some point or other.

All in all it was a relaxed and very interesting week. I don't think that there was an awful lot that I would consider was "training" as such as so much of it was commonsense, but I would consider it a very good grounding in the basics of the company's ethos and the expectations that they have of me as an employee. How much of it stays with me by the time I complete the training process remains to be seen.