Six months on from winning a number of awards at the UK Bus Awards, including 2022 Top City Operator and being named the best business in Bolton, Rotala continue to look for opportunities to improve and grow the business.
In the North West a number of key appointments have been made to prepare the business for delivering franchising in Greater Manchester at Diamond Bus NW whilst also looking to grow the Preston Bus business through commercial opportunities and new developments.
We were also proud to announce our recent membership of the Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter, underlining our commitment to high standards of employment.
Matt Rawlinson has been appointed Managing Director after holding a number of key roles in the business since he joined in 2018, with 29 years’ experience in the industry and leading on a number of key deliverables in this time he is now looking forward to the new approach franchising will take the industry. Matt will also be developing a growth strategy for Preston Bus and looking to create new opportunities in Lancashire.
Dave Leonard has been appointed Operations Director after holding a number of key roles in the business since he joined in 2018, with over 43 years’ experience in the bus industry working for a number of operators in varying environments his knowledge will be a key asset to ensuring success. Dave has delivered a number of projects within the Bolton and Preston businesses to ensure operational success.
Tom Calderbank has been appointed Commercial Director after holding a number of keys roles since coming through the companies’ graduate scheme in 2015. Tom’s experience in growing the Bolton business since take over in 2019 and his work as a key lead with the bidding process for franchising allows him to lead commercial delivery in a franchised environment. Tom will also focus on the growth opportunities for Lancashire, working with Lancashire County Council, local employers, education and training providers to support their journeys.
As part of the new structure, a number of other key roles will soon be created to support the North West business, which are as follows:
General Manager (New Role)
Key lead role for the Manchester business overseeing the Service Delivery team to ensure we deliver on our KPIs.
Franchise Managers (New Role)
Will be dedicated to set routes to ensure service delivery and customer experience is to the standard required. Providing a customer ambassador role in the new franchised environment.
Health, Safety, Environment and Facilities Manager (New Role)
This role will support the Northwest in the day-to-day operations in all aspects of health, safety, environment and facility management.
Including driving our values and positive culture throughout the business, aid in delivering and maintaining our ISO45001 & ISO14001 aspirations with our Group HSE Manager and be a valued leader within our business.
HR Business Partner (New Role)
This role will form part of our growing HR team across the group. Emma Woods, Group Head of Human Resources says “The HR Business Partner will be an operational role to support with the employee life cycle, as well as day to day operational / HR support to our people. This role will allow us to continue to deliver on our HR strategy and support with the overall business growth in Greater Manchester.”
Bob Dunn Rotala plc Executive Director commented;
These unprecedented times certainly present some challenges and of course great opportunities. Over more recent times the behaviour of customers, suppliers and competitors have been affected by political, technological, economic and of course the resultant effects left from COVID.
My own opinion is that the business model for operating successful bus companies has significantly changed. Our strategy for the short and medium term is to capitalise on these opportunities, with this in mind our new structure will support the delivery of our plans for the medium term.
Certainly challenging, but that is our opportunity to shine and achieve sustainable growth.