Excerpts from Train 18 memoirs, Everyone aboard! & Approval Processes

Chapter X :  Everyone  aboard

So, where had we reached as we crossed early days to mid 2017? Our Design, Procurement (called stores on IR) and Finance teams had started working with greater camaraderie and cooperation and this showed results. The consultancy contracts were progressing well, key designs were getting ready and crucial procurement contracts were in various stages of completion. Although I had opted out of the day to day interaction, all the specific-domain as well as cross-functional groups with well-defined responsibilities were functioning well and daily interaction was encouraged strongly. The ICF team and the key vendors were working tirelessly, regardless of the duty hours with a determination not easily seen hitherto in any IR organization. All procurement actions, whether arising out of our consultancy contracts or otherwise, were on high gear. The principle of ordering sub-assemblies and components based on conceptual drawings was extended even for items related purely with the design and development effort of ICF.

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A poor manager of time and greedy of trying to chew a lot, I worked till late. One day, when I was leaving office past 8.30 pm, I met Ankur Chauhan, a Dy. Chief Materials Manager going towards his office floor. “Forgot something?” I asked. He smiled and wished me good night. Later Secretary/ICF Babu told me that Ankur had to finalize so many contracts that he was never able to leave office before 9.00 pm. I later joked with him that if he continued to work so late, I would be obliged to ascribe his late hours in office to something mysterious to his wife. He only smiled and continued to work as he did.

I had earlier talked about the all powerful files of Railway Board. In all government organizations, we have this system of files for all decision-making processes. Much-maligned, not wrongfully, because these files move from table to table at an excruciatingly slow speed. Experts in diverting the issue at hand, some executives send the file in a spin just because they do not want to commit to anything; the infamous jalebi. But the system offers you a cross section of views. Everyone concerned writes his/her views, which may not always be convenient or comfortable. There is, however, an unwritten praxis of getting your underlings, if I may use the term, to put up comfortable notes on file in the direction you want them. You would also find that the system has nurtured many competent officers who would simply ask you, “Sir, aap bolo kya likhna hai. Main note bana ke lata hoon. (tell me, sir, what do you want? I will make a note accordingly.)” But while this may be a safe option for a decision-maker in contrived decision-making, it may backfire too at times. Leaders who become a victim of comfortable notes and proposals from handy tractable officers, whether such officers are competent or not, lose half their strength of leadership.

These views offer an opportunity to think more before deciding. For a confident leader, they are by no means obstacles. I have, therefore, always declared clearly that all are encouraged to record contra views. I never asked anyone to write/propose something which I perceived to be in the interest of the organization. I have tried this all my life; it works as the colleagues working with you feel relaxed to examine issues freely, without fear or favour. Just one caveat: if you delay or send a file in gyration, a plate of jalebis await you, diabetes or not.

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Another evidence that things were changing at ICF came forth when I had Finance officers approaching me with solutions to settle a case; a rarity because Finance officers in IR have the responsibility to examine a case from the angle of financial implication and return, not to suggest a tweak on an executive’s proposal to make it financially acceptable. Let me take a count. I have met more incompetent and shirker executives than negative Finance officers; both abound but just putting it in perspective.

The duo of CDEs, Vavre and Srinivas, had started making presentations in various meetings and conferences. Used as we are on IR with overstatements, hype and embellishments in such presentations, I do not think there was a true comprehension that ICF was attempting to bridge a crucial gap in passenger rolling stock of IR. We did realize that, certainly, but even we did not envision that we were on to something momentous.

Aggrandizement and hyperbole created for something merely ‘more of the same’ is a fad which, unfortunately, more often than not, works on IR, if presented smartly. In short, baloney and crock is digested as something sterling. We had to guard against that. We were doing great but we were not going to arrogate to ourselves a sense that we were doing something exceptional.

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From a huge body of work of the bard, some enchanting and powerful lines get stuck with you without having to memorize them. The lines quoted below, spoken by Camillo in The Winter’s Tale, advise Perdita and Prince Florizel to flee with him to a welcoming court, dissuading them to run away by sea to wherever the wind might take them. What the lovers did is immaterial but a glimpse of them setting sails for shores that lay undiscovered is very fascinating. The ICF team had come together, affording me that rare glimpse:

A course more promising,

Than a wild dedication of yourselves

To unpathed waters, undreamed shores…

A strong group of officers and staff which would largely go unsung in this narrative are from the, Civil Engineering and Electrical Services, Machinery Maintenance and Stores Depots. They were the proverbial invisible players in making of the train but their contribution in the ongoing transformation of ICF was of greater importance than others. A dichotomy? Not at all. As Trivedi battled with production and the CDEs with designs, I was working closely with these groups. The works which were created in my tenure of 29 months are so numerous and gigantic that I jitter at the prospect of recounting it. While some works directly linked with staff welfare would find a part in this book, most of their stellar achievements would not. I do not even know how to cover it here. Their works were the foundations on which ICF has kept on increasing its production to unfathomable numbers; simple example: the number of berthing for coaches was more than doubled by building new sheds and installing fixtures and machines.

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For all these work, these people were always the never say die type. All I needed to do was arrange funding and that was that. There was nary a whimper of demur or cavil but only a pleasant bargain on the date of completion. I pay a sincere tribute to them here, at the cost of committing at the blasphemy of hyper correcting a famous couplet of Ghalib, and move on:

Hazaron khwahishen aisi ke har khwahish pe dam nikle

Bohat  sare the mere  armaan, lekin phir  bhi  kam  nikle

(I had thousands of desires, and so big that each was would kill you. My yearnings were so large but at the end of the day, they were not that many)

Chapter  XI :  Approval Processes

The Design organization is the heart of a coach factory, or indeed any major manufacturing unit, which offers complete solution from concept to manufacture. This was the bulwark on which our success would be built and therefore it needed some resurgence. The D organization of ICF was renamed as the ICF Designs Centre (DC), replacing the old hackneyed nomenclature, Design and Development Wing. Headed by Srinivas, and Vavre, this centre was longing, and itching, to do something big. Not only were both these officers two of the best on IR with a positive disposition geared towards design development of new products, they had nurtured a team capable of helping them do it. We invested heavily in the infrastructure like ergonomically-designed work places with top of the line work stations and software licenses in my tenure. We also endued strongly in improving the work environment of the centre by redoing the façade of the building and developing a huge garden behind it.

ICF Designs Centre with new look facade

Incidentally, following Vavre’s promotion and transfer out of ICF, his place was later taken over by Dash. Vavre had come up for promotion and I had to let Vavre leave in the middle of the most crucial part of the project as there was no way to retain him at ICF on promotion. We missed him, for sure. Dash, however, had proved to be another gem; he had earlier proved his mettle in introducing many innovative measures to improve productivity on shop floor. I recall that within a month or so of my joining ICF, Trivedi had announced in a meeting that Dash had studied and implemented a scheme cutting down the cycle time of furnishing of LHB coaches substantially, mainly through some modifications in mechanical working. Surprised, I asked how come an electrical officer did it for a mainly mechanical domain. There was no such divide in ICF.

Mr. Prospero, there is no tempest and magic and yet I see, “such stuff
as dreams are made on”. What a platform, dear Lafew, come let us, breathe life into these stones, and hope that all that ended well would be well.

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Over the years, through investment in design software and training as well interactions while developing new sub-assemblies/systems and new variants of coaches, the officers and staff of DC had acquired a wide range of expertise in coach designs, tooling for manufacture and manufacturing processes. At the same time, ICF’s development efforts had also helped promote a solid pool of manufacturing vendors in industry with a significant level of expertise in their field. 

                                  The Train 18 design team at work

Early finalization of procurement actions for Train 18 had helped in faster development of sub-assemblies by the concerned vendors. This process of development had a crucial stepping stone: approval of vendors’ drawings and specification. The practice followed extensively for those Train 18 components/systems which had to be outsourced, and later for other developments too, was to define the envelope, mounting details and a broad performance and testing specification. The detailed design work would then be carried out at the vendors’ end. All these items would eventually need to fit, both electrically and mechanically, in the train designed and manufactured by ICF. Close interaction between the vendors and ICF was, therefore, obviously very crucial. This involved that these designs be evaluated and scrutinized by the ICF design team periodically to avoid any mismatch at a later stage. Such a design approval process is nothing new. All the Pus and RDSO have to follow this system comprehensively. But ask any vendor. He would most likely have a sob story to tell about the process of excessive delays and lack of response while he, having invested time and effort, against an order by IR or even otherwise, would bear the brunt, as our system rarely afforded appreciation of the concerns of vendors. Why such delays? They stem from various reasons, and at times, a combination of them. Let us see, 1) apathy and indifference compounded by absence of any empathy towards the vendor 2) mishmash of lack of knowledge and expertise with the vain desire to add unnecessary value 3) frivolous observations arising out of procrastination and indecision or, at times, some vested interest 4) plain sloth, and so on. I am not, for a minute, trying to impugn the process itself. It has to be carried out but certainly not in the distorted way it is done today with inordinate delays being the norm. 

It is indeed time for RDSO and other PUs to reform and professionalize the regime of design approvals or they would soon repent like Richard II, ''I wasted time and now doth time waste me.''

Both the CDEs agreed that for Train 18 project the regular process of approval of drawings would not work. The vendors were already a part of the main design process and they had set up dedicated design teams specifically for the project. In all the key areas, the approval process had to be handled professionally through discussions and iterations involving vendors on day to day basis, including the consultants wherever applicable.

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                                      The Designs Centre Team

Was I holding on to my promise of not meddling with the design effort? Not entirely. Well truthfully, I have spent years at RDSO, learning the nuances of application and assembly engineering as well as development of engineered products. I liked to be abreast with the progress in the DC as all the improvements flowed from their initial activities. On the other hand, every day I would have a request from companies for an appointment; I would invariably meet them provided they had an agenda. I have never understood the necessity of a wasteful interaction, euphemistically called a courtesy meeting. But if they had something specific to discuss, I would always aim for a fruitful meeting with some takeaway for both parties. Most of these companies were concerned with some development or the other, involving the DC and therefore, I would arrange to meet them in the chamber of the concerned CDE, as meeting them alone in my room and then sending them onwards would cause unnecessary delay. This would save precious time of the DC officers who would otherwise troop to my room from their office which was more than a kilometre away. Because of my penchant for meddling in design work and also these meetings, I would visit the DC at least 3 to 4 times a week, at times 2 to 3 times a day. Everyone agreed that the system was unconventional but it worked well.

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Why am I bringing it here? One disgruntled firm actually complained against me to the Board, Vigilance, the Minister of Railway (MR) and many others that I was so engrossed in making a venal deal with suppliers that I spent hours every day in the DC whereas a GM was not expected to actually visit there unless there was some ceremony or function. Imagine the hostility and antipathy one can face as a fall out of some strong action elsewhere! Thankfully, this particular complaint turned out to be pseudonymous one and was eventually dropped. In any case, such complaints did not deter me at all. In addition, thanks to some affirmative action in similar frivolous cases involving some officers, I was able to build confidence in the team as well to choose the right option fearlessly. 

Talking of meddling, I had started interloping in the matters of production officers frequently. I was in charge of a factory manufacturing coaches and at the end of the day, the output would be measured primarily in terms of the number of coaches turned out. I would intrude and even obtrude a good deal with concerned officers. I would, in the end sit with Trivedi and question the progress. One day he told me, politely that I was already doing some good things towards infrastructure, designs, staff welfare and environment and that I should generally leave him and his team alone in respect of production. I smiled and let go. At the end of every month, Trivedi and his team headed by Chief Workshop Engineer of Shell and Furnishing factories respectively Manish Pradhan and Shashi Bhushan would deliver more than what one thought was doable.  It was obvious once again that this was one area I should actually leave alone. I tried and succeeded to some extent but not fully. After all, Zauq tried too:

Behtar to hai yahi ki na duniya se dil  lage 

Par kya karein jo kaam na be-dil-lagi chale 

(It is certainly better to not involve one’s heart in this world but what can one do as things do not work without attaching one’s heart to this world.)

The production level at ICF, in any case kept on climbing phenomenally thanks to these officers and their teams. This ensured that no one needed to hide behind the Train 18 effort to justify inadequate level of production.

(to be continued...)