Chiltern Railways
Depot Manager
Get notified of more jobs like this · No spam, ever
How your CV stacks up
Upload your CV to see how well it fits this job role
?%
Role: Depot Manager
Location: Wembley
Contract Type: Permanent
Salary: Competitive
Job Purpose
Provide senior leadership for all rolling stock maintenance, servicing, and depot operations at Chiltern Railways. Own the strategic direction of the depot, driving a transformational culture shift focused on safety, quality, performance, and operational excellence. Align depot performance with wider business goals while ensuring compliance with legal, regulatory, and company standards.
Key Accountabilities
- Act as the senior-most authority on site, accountable for achieving all safety, performance, quality, and customer service metrics
- Develop and execute the depot strategy in alignment with long-term business and fleet plans
- Provide inspirational leadership, establishing clear expectations, driving accountability, and championing continuous improvement
- Drive a positive culture change program, embedding proactive safety behaviours, engagement, and collaboration
- Lead cultural change to embed proactive safety behaviours and promote a high-performance, engaged workforce
- Ensure safe systems of work are established, maintained, and followed for all depot activities, providing assurance through audits and feedback to individuals
- Investigate and lead audits, inspections, and investigations to drive compliance, learning, and continuous improvement
- Manage depot workload delivery to meet maintenance plans for Chiltern Railways and other customers, ensuring high-quality output and compliance with standards
- Maintain appropriate staffing levels, skill competencies, and training plans to deliver operational needs now and in the future
- Own the full depot budget, including staffing, tooling, facilities, materials, and revenue generation opportunities
- Build strong strategic relationships with internal stakeholders (e.g. Safety Team, HR, Performance, Operations) and external partners (e.g., Network Rail, ROSCOs, contractors, suppliers) to achieve depot and fleet targets
- Oversee contractor compliance, safety practices, and delivery quality
- Maintain accurate asset condition data to support asset management planning and long-term fleet performance
- Support depot improvements by providing input on infrastructure changes from an end-user perspective
- Ensure compliance with all health, safety, environmental, and railway standards by collaborating with relevant team
- Chair and represent the depot for local consultations, influence engagement, and negotiation meetings with staff representatives and trade union
- Undertake general and statutory inspections as required
- Participate in the engineering on-call rota, providing senior support for unplanned events
- Cover other roles in the engineering team, and deputise for Head of Fleet Delivery as required
Reasons to use Rodeo
Start with a chat, not a search bar
Grad scheme, placement, apprenticeship? Not sure what you want yet — that's fine. Your agent talks it through with you and turns "I have no idea" into a shortlist.
It searches the market for you
Every day your agent scans the market matching roles against what actually matters to you, not just keywords on a CV.
Only hits
No noise. No "maybe this fits." Just roles with a clear explanation of why they're right — and where to focus when applying.
Personal Specification
Get help with your application
Your very own career expert that helps elevate your application to the next level.
Essential
- ONC NVQ Level 4 or higher
- Significant experience in managing traction and rolling stock maintenance operations, including budget and team leadership
- Demonstrated success in leading cultural change programs and improving operational maturity
- Strong understanding of railway safety standards and regulatory requirements
- Excellent communication skills for engaging effectively at all levels, both internally and externally
- Analytical skills with the ability to solve complex technical and operational challenges
- Strong experience with union engagement, chairing meetings, consultations, and negotiations
- Proficiency with IT systems relevant to fleet maintenance and depot management
- Commitment to continuous personal and team development
Desirable
- Degree in engineering, management, or a relevant discipline
“It took my CV and asked me questions relevant to understanding what kind of jobs to suggest for me. Suggestions were almost perfect. Jobs were exactly what I’ve been looking for.”
Jessica, London
Location