The BBC W1 Programme - Case Study Example

The BBC W1 Programme s Submitted by s: Contents Contents 2 The BBC W1 Programme 3 1.Introduction 3 1.2.Resources 3 1.3.Challenges 4 1.4.Coordination 4 1.5.Successes of The BBC W1 Programme (2012) 5 2.The successes of the programme 5 2.1.Construction 6 2.2.Renovation 7 2.3.The first phase 8 2.4.The second phase 9 2.5.Consolidation of operations 10 2.6.Improvements in appearance and maintaining artwork 11 2.7.Programme management strategy 12 2.8.Further improvements 14 3.Setbacks 15 4.Conclusion 16 5.Bibliography 17 1. The BBC W1 Programme (2012) 1.1. Introduction In 2002 the decision was made that three of BBC’s biggest broadcasting buildings located in London had started showing age and this paved the way for the biggest initiative of work in the history of the Broadcaster. The broadcaster needed an advanced pioneering hub at the centre of London and Broadcasting House was picked to become the home for the broadcaster’s national and international journalism, its television services, Network Radio, online teams as well as professional support services. This brought together thousands of employees into one building. The initiative was to be referred to as W1, the postcode for the broadcaster’s famous Broadcasting house. The vision statement of the programme was “coming together to serve our audiences better” while the overall objective was bringing the people and teams together in a newer top-notch broadcasting centre so that the serviced provided for the audiences may be improved. The programme was intended to be delivered on time and within the budget while ensuring that it was supporting innovation and enhanced ways of working that would allow the delivery of additional efficiencies and value for money. It was also important that the building which was being developed be open and accessible thereby increasing the public value and enhancing the levels of flexible working. 1.2. Resources The budget for the programme had been set as 1.046 billion pounds that was obtained through a thirty year bond. The required resources were mobilized based on every stage of the programme with the initial emphasis being on the design of construction and technology. The recruitment of the director of the programme and the change team was done five years prior to the closure of the program in order to organize workflow changes, communications, industrial relations as well as comprehensive mitigation schedules. A permanent finance manager together with an assistant were integrated into the team to ensure that a constant focus on the budget, costs, financial benefits, contingency spending and a monthly summary was provided to the W1 change Group, its steering committee and the BBC Finance Committee on a quarterly basis. A huge part of the recruitment came from other sections of the corporation so that a tight control over costs could be maintained while creating a broader pool of internal expertise. All-inclusive feedback sessions were maintained in the process of the mitigation so that the experiences associated with the ones who would move early could be appreciated and any necessary alterations made using the change control procedures. The meetings entailed meeting neighbours whereby the newly arrived departments defined their activities to the rest of the occupants. 1.3. Challenges This endeavour was the corporation’s biggest ever capital project during a time of enormous strain with other continuing BBC programmes such as the BBC North expansion that was taking place at Salford as well as the delivery of broadcasts to the London Olympics. The delivery of the project was also taking place during a time that was characterized by extreme scrutiny both politically and through the media. The construction was faced by huge engineering challenges as the building had been surrounded on all the sides by big residential structures and its foundations required digging three stories into the ground only a few meters above the underground lines. The BBC had no prior experience of moving so many live programmes into a completely new building that had new technology and the main risks during this programme included the commercial collapse of a core contractor as well as on air failures. 1.4. Coordination Three core teams that assisted in making sure of the success of the programme were the construction team, the fit-out team and the team in charge of technology, with the latter being instituted in 2009 concurrently with an appointment of the new project director, Andy Griffee. The programme had various dependencies along with stakeholders apart from the immediate occupying output Divisions with associations with other projects continually being charted by the BBC PMO. Interactions with other professions such as HR, procurement and communications among others, were maintained, while the other stakeholders were evaluated through the degree off support they provided. These evaluations were critical in informing the communications plans together with other activities. 1.5. Successes of The BBC W1 Programme (2012) The second phase of this colossal initiative was delivered thirty million pounds under the estimated budget and this trebled the financial benefits that had been initially acknowledged in 2002 (Bbc.co.uk, 2013). The Bush House together with the Television Centre was emptied and consequently decommissioned on time and therefore did not attract any penalty payments. Additionally, more than five thousand five hundred employees were moved successfully without any losses in their output. For the first time ever, the corporations broadcasting technology professionals were in agreement that all the technology that would exist in broadcasting house would be of the same nature. This greatly assisted in delivering considerable savings on the 154 million pounds budget on its work since it installed more than three thousand kilometres of cabling, eleven new television studios as well as fifty new radio studios. The programme team has continued to apply the lessons that it learnt and captured to other considerable projects throughout the corporation and beyond, with many of them accepting new positions as well as other projects and programmes. 2. The successes of the programme As part of a key integration of the property portfolio of BBC in London, the Broadcasting House has gone through a lot of renovation and has also been extended (Bbc.co.uk, 2014). This entailed the knocking down of post-war constructions on the eastern section of the structure and construction of an additional wing that was concluded in 2005 as a replacement. The core structure was renovated and an additional building constructed on its rear side. The official name of the building is Broadcasting House but the corporation also utilizes the term New Broadcasting House when publicly talking about the new extension instead of the entire building, with the original building being referred to as the old broadcasting House (Jansson and Lagerkvist, 2009, p. 252). 2.1. Construction The construction of Broadcasting House dates back to 1928 and programmes were progressively transferred into the building (Butsch, 2000, p. 99). The first ever musical programme was allocated to Henry Hall who was a bandleader along with the BBC Dance Orchestra in 1932. Consequently, the first ever news bulletin was read by Stuart Hibberd on March 18 while the last transmission that took place in Savoy Hill was on the 14th of May and the official opening of the building took place on 15th of May, 1932 (Bracken, 2011, p. 170). The structure had been designed by George Val Hill together with the M T Tudsbery, who was the corporation’s civil engineer while Raymond McGrath, an architect with Australian and Irish origins was responsible for designing the interior of this building. He was the leader of the team that included Serge Chermayeff as well as Wells Coates and was responsible for designing the vaudeville studio, the associated green together with the dressing rooms in a flowing art Deco style. The structure has steel frames and faced with Portland stone (Bizley, 2008, p. 124). The radio studios were located in the middle core surrounded by offices so that there could be some distance between them and radio operations while having access to sunlight. The residents in the area raised oppositions that led to the structure being changed. The eastern part of the structure blocked out the light, and subsequent to objections and pursuing the correct ancient lights, the building was adjusted in such a way that the roof on the eastern side sloped. Structures below the ground, such as hundred year old sewers, posed challenges during the process of construction as the building is directly above the Bakerloo line of the London Underground. Additionally, noise that is generated by the passing trains in the Victorian Line can be heard inside the radio there, but this noise is undetectable in recordings. On the ground floor, windows were fitted from the floor all the way to the ceiling and it was believed that financing this kind of project would require that the ground floor be leased as a retail unit but the rapid expansion of the corporation did not allow this to occur. The building displays artworks, with the most noticeable one being the statue of Prospero as well as that of Ariel, which were created by Eric Gill (Street and Street, 2009, p. 122). The selection of these statues is appropriate as Prospero was a illusionist and academic while Arial is a spirit of the air that transmits radio waves. There was alleged controversy that surrounded some features of the statues when they were constructed and it is purported that they were amended. They were stated to have been the work of Gill as God and Man, instead of Prospero and Ariel and that there is a miniature curved picture of a girls on Prospero’s back (MacCarthy, 2011, p. 384). 2.2. Renovation From the beginning of 2003, Broadcasting House went through major refurbishment in a programme that was referred to as the W1 Programme that sought to renovate the structure and integrate several operations of the Broadcaster in a new extension. The new extension accommodates both the television and radio extensions of BBC News that were moved from Television Centre while the BBC world Service moved from Bush House in July 2012 while BBC Radio except BBC Radio 5 Live moved to Salford Quays (Gillespie and Webb, 2013, p. 16). Radio 2 along with 6 Music was relocated from the Broadcasting House to newer studios in Western House where they remained even after the renovation was completed. The renovation on the building was carried out in two stages that started with the demolition of two extensions to the initial building that had been built after the war (Dalton and Stone, 2012, p. 127). The developments that were associated with the renovations were part of a broader strategy to reduce costs while merging the BBC property portfolio and centralizing its operations in London. The development is projected to result in more than seven hundred million pounds in savings in regard to the remaining twenty one year lease that the broadcaster has on Broadcasting House. 2.3. The first phase The initial phase entailed renovating the original building that had begun showing age and required structural repairs together with a newer wing on its eastern side. In the old building, the east roof that was sloped was removed and most of the rooms stripped back all the way to their walls, but making sure to retain and preserve most of the Art Deco architecture (Schwartzman, 2006, p. 15). Most of the work was directed at the lower walls and ceilings that did not include the Art Deco structures and the reception area was recreated to include a new desk, though it maintained the message and statue as attention pieces. Numerous rooms, including the south tower, had their ceilings removed so that new joists that would provide reinforcement could be added. The new Egton wing is somehow of a similar shape to the main building, boasting of a contemporary design and window arrangement but maintaining structures like Portland stone. The plan that was employed in the construction of the additional structure was anticipated to match the initial creativity in architecture and was the done by MacCormac Jamieson Prichard (Ericson and Riegert, 2010, p. 45). The work on the first phase was culminated in 2005 and the queen unveiled the revamped Broadcasting House together with the new annex on the 20th of April 2006 during the celebration of her birthday. All the sections of the extension were subsequently fitted and completed by 2007 and the Egton wing was renamed to John Peel Wing in honour of the late Radio 1 Disk jockey who had been perceived to be a great radio talent, in 2012 (Eccles and Ward, 2012). The wing is considered to fit the tribute of an individual who personified a lot of what the Broadcaster stands for but this naming was put in doubt when reports of Peel having sexual associations with a fifteen year old girl during the sixties emerged. 2.4. The second phase The second phase involved the construction of a large wing at the back of the main building that was supposed to link together the other two buildings to create a plaza between them. The initial architects were replaced as they were not in agreement with the adjustments in regard to costs, since they were focused on maintaining the superior quality of the initial design. The construction consequently reached completion in 2010 under Boris Lend Lease, and the building was handed over to BBC in 2011 but during the renovations, most of the BBC radio stations were relocated to other office blocks adjacent to the Portland Place. The extension that was constructed in the second phase houses the BBC News and Journalism departments together with high-tech technical equipment and newer studies that accommodate the BBC News bulletins on television, the BBC News Channel and the BBC Arabic Television among other television stations (Slack and Parent, 2006, p. 101). At the centre of this new studio, there is the biggest newsroom in the globe. Walking around the newsroom enables the public to have a meticulous view at the journalists working, connecting the reception area to the Radio Theatre and a café that is open to the public as well as BBC staff. The outdoor plaza complements this area and could be used as an outdoor arena as well as theatre with the intention of engaging the public with the processes involved in radio and television. This extension is covered in glass around the court section and warped in a manner that contrasts the two annexes on both sides while continuing the glass high up the building. The face adjacent to Portland Place remains in close similarity to Portland and glass that can be seen on Egton wing. The new extension was officially opened by the queen on 7th June 2013 and this improvement was awarded the Programme of the Year award during the 2013 yearly awards (BBC News, 2013). 2.5. Consolidation of operations The new Broadcasting House that is in central London has been able to consolidate over five thousand members of staff for the entire network of the Broadcaster that reaches a global audience of more than two hundred million people. The Building hosts one of the biggest and most intricate workplace schemes in London and promises collaboration among the creative workers at the company who operate three news channels that run the whole day, nine radio networks as well as twenty six language services. The design has allowed BBC to maximize the use of space while incorporating cutting edge technology that has created a flexible environment in which the BBC can adjust to meet the continuously changing needs (Aad.co.uk, 2014). The scheme has assisted in the celebration of the diverse identities of every department that exists in the unified BBC brand while featuring a characteristic red and orange palette. This brand has continuously allowed the company to broadcast from many different locations in the headquarters. Flexible workstation collections with additional data and power outlets are able to put up with the changes in sizes of teams in the company. Additional work spaces in the new building include fifty seven meeting rooms together with seventy two touchdown areas. The building has also provided several spaces that allow for formal collaboration while quiet one-on-one spaces are clustered around the perimeter of the two big halls. A sequence of end-to-end booths that face the hall provide shared spaces on every floor. The shedding of a number of smaller buildings all over London, with the aim of consolidating activities has enabled the broadcaster to introduce a unified technological system that includes a single IT department and the same kind of training throughout the entire organization. The BBC has reported that the building has been critical in improving its bottom line through sharing of contents and guests in an easier way, cutting on costs associated with support and training, eliminating the smaller and surplus buildings and using innovative workflows to decrease costs. 2.6. Improvements in appearance and maintaining artwork The renovation of the Broadcasting Building may well be useful and doubtless works, but it is difficult to avoid feeling that the heart of the building was ripped prior to the building aging. However, the people who were in charge have maintained that the design of the renovation is still based on the original design associated with MacCormac. Regardless of the fact that the renovation led to the loss of the original News Room as it was the defining space of the project, Lucy Homer who was the architect of the project continues to maintain that the scheme that was used was fundamentally the same as the original one. According to the lead architects, the initial News Room was special but it would have been darker thus needing more artificial. The project concentrated on what would work in the best way as far as communication was concerned in the different ways that the employees and the visitors will use the building. The appearance of the News Room, all shining steel and glass with intonations of bold colours that spreads out to the adjacent floors that has resulted in a feeling of a classy corporate headquarter that has a big technical plant within it that creates programmes. Since the public typically pays for the BBC, the renovated Broadcasting House is accessible without any particular uncertainty and they are allowed to view the News-Room, be present at concerts and also observe at aspiring collections of art-works that have been integrated into the new structures. The courtyard is a huge work of art and Called World, which cost 1.6 million pounds, has gently curving surfaces that resembles the surface of the earth. This has been traversed with mosaic lines of latitudes and longitudes while being engraved with the names of places from all over the world which echo the motto of the broadcaster: “Nation shall speak peace unto nation”. Jaume Plensa’s “Breathing” which is an inverted glass and steel cone, is at the top of the new wing that faces in the direction of the All soul’s Church and cost nine hundred thousand pounds. This artwork symbolizes the broadcasting essence while at the same time being dedicatory to the members of the fourth estate who died while they were on assignment. Even though this arts initiative that has been commissioned for the Broadcaster by the public arts agency Modus Operandi, has been criticized, the broadcaster believes in an emphasis on promotion and encouragement art, which is the main reason why it maintains orchestras together with buildings like the original Broadcasting House that is embellished with a sculpture that was created by Eric Gill, making the BBC different compared to other broadcasters. Regardless of the successes that have been seen on the project in regard to its appearance, the entire project could have been developed with more style, thoughtfulness and efficacy. Nevertheless, the building will continue to be perceived as an imposing but functional headquarter notwithstanding that the uncertainty associated with its structure reflects the uncertainty that is faced by the broadcaster as it struggles to remain ahead in the digital era. 2.7. Programme management strategy After being accused of not getting value for money in the initial phase of the renovation and the restoration of Broadcasting House, BBC developed some measures that were supposed to reverse the cost overruns. Even before the second phase began, it was reported that the corporation had already recovered forty five million pounds and had expectations of finishing all the heavy construction on the second phase on time and all the installations by the end of 2012. Unfortunately, the second phase was much more complex as the structure that consists of nine storeys and three basement levels was supposed to create about sixteen thousand square meters of additional space that had to be fitted with almost twenty thousand kilometres of cable in order to supply twenty seven acoustic studios, television studios and the largest live newsroom in the globe. Therefore, the BBC had to make improvements to its programme management strategies in order to avoid the criticisms that had developed during the initial phase of reconstruction as it had been poorly managed. The strategies were developed as early as 2004 when the project management system was streamlined through reducing the team responsible for construction and property from ninety four to forty. Then the team was restructured to ensure constant communication, sharing of ideas, and collective resolution of issues. The programme management strategy was supposed to integrate the different mindsets at BBC into one through the elimination of references to varying roles. Therefore everything was integrated into a single supply chain, thus eliminating the mention of property management, design teams and construction management groups. The corporation also established a programme management office in 2009 to make sure that all the parts in regard to delivering the New Broadcasting House is planned meticulously, put in the budget, and adequately staffed with individuals who appreciate its intricacies. The corporation also made sure that the workers at the construction understood that what they were working on was not an ordinary office block, and thus worked with a workforce that included a huge number of technical and acoustic professionals who had prior experience. It also recruited a number of unusual specialists including an air traffic controller to lead the project of bringing the buildings together into one entity in order to share utilities. 2.8. Further improvements The Broadcasting House that set back the BBC almost one billion pounds to see it through to completion needed expensive makeovers within eighteen months after it was officially opened. The corporation had to inject a lot of money in the refurbishment of the some of the floors including the sixth after the employees had made complaints that the new building did not inspire them adequately. The improved design of these floors included an intricate reverence to EastEnders along with a room for meetings and an area that has been railed by iron which may be used for various purposes. The carpets in these floors were removed and arts that feature landmarks from soap operas that have tan for a long time were installed while the other floor was supposed to feature a theme that was based on the most prominent characters that appear on BBC shows. The renovation was started subsequent to a committee agreed that a refurbishment of the office was important in creating a one of a kind uniqueness for the corporation, but this was not taken positively by a section of the employees. The renovations were stared a few weeks after the youth channel was closed so that the corporation could be able to cut costs. The management of the corporation stated that the renovation was necessary as the creative staff had made complaints that the floors could not inspire them enough. It went further to explain that these renovations were done to transform the spaces to become more artistic and alive at costs that were reasonable. This was aimed at making sure that the corporation will continue to produce superior television programming for those who pay the license fees justifying the need for changes that will develop the most creative setup possible for the employees. This initiative should be considered in the perspective of the broadcasters continuing transformations of its properties that is making it realize savings of more than sixty million pounds every year up to 2017. 3. Setbacks The final costs of the redevelopment of Broadcasting House that was already more than four years late and more than fifty five million over the intended budget included around 3.2 million pounds spent on furniture and twenty six thousand pounds on graphics. The corporation did not reveal the amount it spent on individual decorations and instead stated that revealing the costs would have negative effects its bargaining position with its suppliers. However, according to the company, the estimated costs that have been saved after exiting other properties in London and consolidating the operations under one roof had more than tripled to around seven hundred and fifty million pounds. The development of the new building was plagued with delays and increasing costs after the company fell out with the initial architect. More than six thousand employees moved into the renovated headquarters but it is considered that the shift has not been completely smooth. The employees have been complaining to their superiors that they kept hurting their feet on the revolving doors that had been newly fitted at the entrance of the building. The workers complained that the entrances either hurt the front or back of the foot as they walked through the entrance with spinning doors. The initial project architect was not comfortable with the commissioning of a 1.6 million pounds statue and a nine hundred thousand pounds sculpture that resembled a torch on the roof of the building and consequently left the project midway. The National Audit Office also condemned the corporation for not being able to get value for money in the process of the two billion pounds spending spree that was directed at the new headquarters. The Audit watchdog stated that the corporation demonstrated weak governance while accusing it of not abiding by good practices. The creative director who was involved in the project received two salaries of one hundred and fifty thousand pounds for the presentation of the Image series, along with the 183,300 pounds that he was already collecting (Horne, 2012). A different incriminating report by the National Audit Office directed criticism at the corporation over its decision to relocate some parts of its operations that included Radio 5 Live to a purpose built building that cost the corporation a further one billion pounds(Ariel, 2012). The BBC executives were further harangued for paying more than twenty four million pounds in over-generous allowances that were meant to persuade the employees who were based in London to move to the north. This plus the overspending associated with the Pacific Quay head offices in Scotland results to an excess of approximately two hundred million directed at building projects. 4. Conclusion The renovation and revamping of Broadcasting House meant that for the first time in history, the entire broadcaster’s national and international operations including, radio, television as well as online journalism would be accommodated in one building(Bowman, 2007, p. 208). The new building was also responsible for housing the head offices of BBC Radio and Music. The renovations at the building were planned in two successful phases with the initial phase comprising of the restoration of the original 1932 Broadcasting House that had been listed as Grade II. This building is still the home of the national radio and the East Wing that was constructed along with it, now houses the Arabic and Persian television operations together with BBC London. The first phase was finished successfully in 2005 and consequently opened officially by the Queen in the following year (Fullman and Strachan, 2012, p. 52). The second phase was an addition of a totally new extension that was intended to provide a more space for operations as well as a modern broadcast centre with cutting edge technology for all aspects of BBC’s Journalism. The construction and the technical fit-outs were also successfully completed and the phased move into the building took place in 2012. 5. 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