13 November 2026Consultancy.uk
Develop Consulting has launched a new podcast, aiming at helping listeners to improve their operational outcomes. The first episode of the Improving Operations Podcast focuses on how airports can maintain safety and compliance, without compromising on customer service excellence.
Develop Consulting is an advisory firm focusing on applying lean principles, primarily in the manufacturing and healthcare spaces. But the firm also works to apply Lean principles for clients who are among the world’s leading organisations across rail, aerospace, automotive and maritime organisations.
Drawing on this wide range of expertise, the firm has launched a new series of podcasts. Complementing its sister podcasts, The Improving Healthcare Podcast and The Maritime Forecast, the Improving Operations Podcast launches with an episode focusing on airports.
Hosted by Darren Jones, the discussion sees
Hosted by Darren Jones, the discussion sees the Develop Consulting expert joined by Al Titterington, director of OSC Airport Consulting and a former airport executive with 25 years of experience, and Steve Clark, airports director at Develop Consulting.
During the recording, Clark noted, “Safety and compliance are extremely important, but they shouldn’t be the drivers. They should be the outcome of delivering an exceptional service. Quite often we work with airports that are very focused on compliance and not on the actual operation, and that isn’t sustainable.”
Tittering added, “The customer and the colleague both want a frictionless experience, and that starts all the way from kerb to cloud. Everything in between can affect whether they see it as good or bad.”
Safety and excellence
Airports focusing on compliance rather than performance risk
Airports focusing on compliance rather than performance risk storing up problems for the future, according to experts. Tittering went on to explain how an airline missing its departure targets had initially blamed the airport. When the team followed the data back through the process, the real cause was passengers queuing for bag drop before the kiosks opened, creating a surge at security and late arrivals at the gate.
He continued, “We went back to the root cause and did it collaboratively to take out the blame game. We removed the bottleneck, which was right at the very beginning, and the airline’s customer satisfaction went from third bottom to top of the league.”
Design decisions also came under the spotlight. At one large airport, moving the assisted travel lounge by around 150 to 200 metres was worth roughly half a million pounds a year in operating costs.
According to Clark, Develop Consulting designs
According to Clark, Develop Consulting designs “from the inside out”. By working out how the operation needs to run and how it can run efficiently, the firm’s experts are then able to “put the surround around it” – with making those changes on a blank piece of paper being “so much more cost efficient than managing the operation later.”
On resourcing, meanwhile, both agreed that data only has value when teams can act on it.
Clark explained, “There’s a tremendous amount of data in airports, but a serious lack of information. If people cannot influence a KPI, then it’s the wrong KPI.”
The episode closes with lessons from outside actly
The episode closes with lessons from outside actly shaped his airport’s customer journey model, along with retail and high-end logistics
To listen to the full episode, or more in the upcoming series, the Improving Operations Podcast can be found
- Develop Consulting
- Lean & SixSigma
- Operations
