Most operations become ready implicitly: under pressure, while already running, with the knowledge in a few people's heads. ORAT makes it explicit. Someone writes down what “ready” means, and the operation is measured against it.
What is operational readiness?
Operational readiness means an operation can run as intended from its first day: the people know their roles and have been trained, the procedures are written and have been tried, the systems are set up and talk to each other, and someone has written down what “ready” means and checked the operation against it. An operational readiness plan is the route to that point, and an operational readiness review is the check that it has been reached. Operational Readiness, Activation and Transition (ORAT) is the name of the formal discipline.
Who it fits
- A facility or production line that is already running, and growing faster than its processes.
- A program or organization standing up something new.
- An operation that will be handed over: to a new team, a new operator, or the people who run it next.
- Teams spread across sites, where the way work is done differs from place to place.
The discipline is the same anywhere an operation has to be made ready.
What makes readiness hard
- The work often cannot stop. Readiness has to be built while the operation keeps running.
- Knowledge lives in people. It has to be written down and shared before anyone moves on.
- “Ready” has to be defined. Someone has to write down what it is measured against.
The five phases
Operational readiness is phases one to three: people, process and systems prepared. Activation is phase four. Transition is phase five. Where an operation is already running, the phases overlap, because the work cannot stop. The length and scope of each phase are agreed with you.
01Assess
Map how work runs today, and agree in writing what “ready” means. Out of it come a current-state map, a readiness definition, a gap and risk register in order of risk, and a roadmap.
02Plan
Roles, naming, processes and integration, laid out: who owns what, what everything is called, how work moves, and which systems need to talk to each other.
03Build and train
Systems stood up, procedures written, the team trained. Project management, integrations, standard operating procedures and written processes are built on the software you already use.
04Trial and go live
Run it for real, measure it against the readiness definition, and go live when it meets it.
05Hand over
Readiness reviews, a handover package, and the team running it on its own. Then we step back. What goes in the package, and the live-run test that shows it worked, is in handover to operations.
Operational readiness, commissioning and change management
The three are often confused, and each covers something the others do not. Commissioning proves the equipment and systems work as designed: installed, tested and accepted from whoever built them. Operational readiness proves the operation works: people, procedures, supplies, systems and support, together. A line can be fully commissioned and still not be ready to run, because nobody has written down who does what when it stops. Change management helps people adopt a change, through communication, training and support. Readiness includes that for its people part, and adds the processes, the systems, the definition of “ready” and the handover.
Results
Standard operating procedures
Written from how the work actually runs, step by step, and kept current.
Naming conventions
One shared language for jobs, stages, roles and records, used everywhere. How we build one →
Written processes
How work moves, who owns each step, and what “done” means at each stage.
A working project system
Every job in one place, with owners, approvals and status.
Connected systems
Work entered once and kept in step across the tools you use.
Readiness and handover
Readiness reports, training material, and a handover package.
How we work alongside you
Two ways, and they can be combined. Hands-on, as a senior operations lead working part-time inside your operation. Or by helping you stand up, train and oversee your own team to run it. Either way, the documents, systems and processes are yours.
Your data and access
We agree with you up front where each kind of data lives and who can see it. By default it stays in your environment, on accounts you issue, and the details are written into the agreement before we begin.
The first step
A readiness assessment: phase one, on its own. It produces the current-state map, the readiness definition, the gap and risk register, and the roadmap, and they are yours whether or not you go further. The rest is scoped from what that first look finds.