Passenger Trains > Amtrak has a new president and EVP

Press release from Amtrak:June 23, 2022

Amtrak Appoints Roger Harris President and Gerhard Williams Executive Vice President of Service Delivery & OperationsWASHINGTON – Today, Amtrak CEO Stephen Gardner announced the promotions of Roger Harris to President and Gerhard (Gery) Williams to Executive Vice President, Service Delivery & Operations, effective July 5, 2022.“Amtrak has entered an exciting new era of growth and development, with more opportunities than ever before,” said Amtrak CEO Stephen Gardner. “The appointments of Roger to President and Gery to Executive Vice President of Service Delivery & Operations by our Board will help the company accelerate our progress in recovering, growing and transforming the business.”As President, Harris will directly report to Gardner and lead the coordination of the service delivery and operations, marketing, customer service, network planning, real estate, and accessibility functions of the company. Roger and his team will be dedicated to improving the delivery of Amtrak’s services and the experience it provides its customers and partners, while ensuring the integration of critical functions that market, sell, plan, design, and deliver its services to our current and future customers.Harris has served as Chief Commercial Officer in charge of marketing and revenue since April 2019. He is a proven leader with more than 25 years of experience in the transportation industry, expertise across all commercial functions, and decades of collaboration with various operating functions to create field-tested product improvements built around the needs of customers. Reporting to Harris will be Williams, Executive Vice President, Service Delivery and Operations; Dennis Newman, Executive Vice President, Strategy & Planning, and his current direct reports, while a new Chief Commercial Officer is sought.Williams is succeeding Scot Naparstek, who is retiring to Texas after 10 years of service to Amtrak, including serving in this role since January 2017, where he successfully led Amtrak Operations through the many challenges of the COVID-19 Pandemic while delivering major safety improvements, such as the implementation of Positive Train Control safety technology across the Amtrak network and the U.S. rail industry’s first FRA-approved Safety Management System. Williams will be responsible for leading the strategic development of Amtrak’s operating capabilities, including the transportation, mechanical, infrastructure, and customer service functions, as well as overseeing the day-to-day delivery and improvement of services to Amtrak customers onboard its trains and in its stations.Williams is a proven leader in the railroad industry, with more than 30 years of experience. Since January, he has served as Senior Vice President, Service Delivery & Operations and joined Amtrak in June 2017 as Vice President and Chief Engineer responsible for the maintenance, construction and delivery of Amtrak’s railway infrastructure assets, including the Northeast Corridor. Prior to Amtrak, he held a wide range of senior leadership roles with CSX, including Vice President, Mechanical, Chief Mechanical Officer, and AVP Network Operations – Locomotive Management.

Do the terms "deck chairs" and "Titanic" seem appropriate to apply here?

and the award for the most corporate buzz words per sentence in a press  release goes to.......
If anything for the better actually happens at amtrak, I will be amazed.

New prexy is a former airline executive (Aeromexico, Delta Air Lines, Sun Country Airlines, Northwest Airlines and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines) !

SAME SONG, THIRD VERSE!

I believe that all of us truly want Amtrak's leaders to succeed.  Maybe there is another Paul Reistrup or Graham Clytor in this bunch.

bb

The bigger the press release, the smaller the person's true abilities.  Lots of talk vs. just saying "Here's the new guy--he's good at what he does.  He starts on Monday."

Coach

What an amazing collection of buzzwords and bureacratic gobbledygook.  The phrase 'proven leader' is a way of saying, "We're taking someone no one has ever heard of and putting him into a position of prominence."  Sink or swim time.  Sheesh.

-John

So Amtrak still has 10 Vice Presidents at very high salaries with assistants/secretaries. Way too many, but the Railroad Passenger Association says nothing about this. 
https://www.amtrak.com/executive-leadership



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/24/22 05:41 by grlhughes.

grlhughes Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> So Amtrak still has 10 Vice Presidents at very
> high salaries with assistants/secretaries. Way too
> many, but the Railroad Passenger Association says
> nothing about this. 
> https://www.amtrak.com/executive-leadership

Nothing particularly unusual about that structure. 

grlhughes Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> So Amtrak still has 10 Vice Presidents at very
> high salaries with assistants/secretaries. Way too
> many, but the Railroad Passenger Association says nothing about this. 
> https://www.amtrak.com/executive-leadership

Because they look forward to a seat at Amtrak management's [children's] table. ("Speak when you are spoken to"). 

Since Anderson -  Amtrak management are just a bunch of political appointees -- collecting a Government 
paycheck -- and doing nothing but downgrading Amtrak service.

A real change would require them to restore Sightseer lounge cars; -- restore full dining service;
open diners to coach passengers, etc.  Also, spend that $15B -- and stop all "customer facing" cost cutting.

Until then, it's just more blah, blah, blah

As Rodney Dangerfield would have said about us, "Tough crowd, I tell ya, tough crowd!”

ronald321 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Since Anderson -  Amtrak management are just a
> bunch of political appointees -- collecting a
> Government 
> paycheck -- and doing nothing but downgrading
> Amtrak service.

Always has been. Political appointees were not new under Anderson. Clayton and Gunn were both Political appointments.


> A real change would require them to restore
> Sightseer lounge cars; -- restore full dining
> service;
> open diners to coach passengers, etc.  Also,
> spend that $15B -- and stop all "customer facing"
> cost cutting.

That's dwelling on the past. Amtrak needs to focus on the future if it wants to survive.

If they can piss away $1 billion a year subsidizing the NEC, they can put back dining cars. 
The just spent $425 million in NJ to speed up Acela by 90 seconds. 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/24/22 07:52 by joemvcnj.

So was anyone else struck by the beginning of the second paragraph:
“Amtrak has entered an exciting new era of growth and development, with more opportunities than ever before,”

I don't see growth and development at all; I see reduced frequency, reduced consists, reduced access to info, reduced .....

WP17

 

Correct - Amtrak Redux.

WP17 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> So was anyone else struck by the beginning of the second paragraph: “Amtrak has entered an exciting new era of
> growth and development, with more opportunities than ever before,”

Corporate boilerplate.
 

We shall see guys, we shall see.

Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss.

Posted from Android

The practice of naming "Presidents" for what used to be called Divisions, Business Units, etc seems to spreading.  Looks good on a resume