Downer EDI kicks off major IT transformation

Communication has been an essential aspect of Downer's IT transformation.

Sydney's Millennium Trains are made by Downer Rail, a division of Downer EDI.

From day one, Amoia's strategy was simple - to keep his IT team in the loop on Downer's transformative thinking.

"The principle was really simple - if I was in their shoes, which I have been, how would I have liked to be treated?" he says.

One difficulty in the project was that, although there was a strategic end-state in mind, it remained unclear through much of the process how the firm would reach it.

"I'm very keen on fact-based decision making and when we started the process we pretty much articulated to our guys, 'Look. This is what we're going to do. Here's the problem, we don't know where this is going to end up.'

"We never gave any sense of, 'There's going to be a decision in the next week or so and everything is going to change'.

"It was always, 'We're going to inform you when a decision is made [and] you're going to be given a number of options'."

Amoia says IT staff were told of the decision to outsource "months before we'd actually signed" an agreement with HP.

They were given options to take other roles internally in the newly-restructured IT organisation or to move to HP to work on the Downer account (or other accounts).

"I made a decision very early on that we would be transparent in this process," Amoia says.