Research project
Improving supply chain operations efficiency in maintenance and landscape services
- Start date: 10 January 2025
- End date: 20 December 2026
- Principal investigator: Wenjuan Zeng
Description
Ground Control is an Essex-based company operating one of the UK's largest field-based grounds maintenance businesses.
Its Grounds Maintenance division delivers landscape, environmental, and specialist services across a national portfolio including hospitals, airports, railway infrastructure, and utilities, generating over £60 million in annual turnover. The division relies on a geographically dispersed workforce of around 200 direct employees and up to 3,000 subcontractors, coordinated through a Field Team model that channels work to local businesses.
As a B-Corp certified and carbon-neutral company, Ground Control places strong emphasis on operational excellence, sustainability, and innovation. To support its ambitions for operational improvement and capability development, we worked with Ground Control managers within its Maintenance Division, bringing together academic insight and operational practice across two stages of engagement.
Research overview
Stage 1 (January – December 2025) was conducted with the Process Integration Manager. I provided knowledge input and practical advisory support, helping the Process Integration Manager apply concepts from Operations and Supply Chain Management directly to their work.
Topics covered included process mapping, needs analysis, supply chain principles, lean six sigma methodology, and cross-departmental communication and business process integration.
A parallel workstream involved Ground Control's newly developed Marketplace platform, an AI-assisted online tool enabling customers to request and receive service quotes rapidly. I advised on platform testing, end-to-end process review, identification of improvement areas, and the design and evaluation of a customer pilot, including questionnaire development and analysis of customer feedback.
Stage 2 (ongoing) is being delivered in collaboration with Ground Control colleagues responsible for Process Optimisation Analysis, focusing on knowledge exchange in emerging technology and its practical application within the Maintenance Division.
I am working with the team to support the development of a centralised IMS Maintenance Working Area, a structured digital hub within Microsoft Teams serving as the single point of access for documents, guidance, and operational information across the division.
I will continue to provide knowledge and advisory input on how AI-assisted tools can be applied to information architecture, process standardisation, and knowledge management, and support the design and implementation of the planned Maintenance Copilot Agent, including the organisational conditions needed to make it effective.
Key findings
Stage 1: Operational inefficiencies within the division were found to stem largely from structural gaps, including unclear process ownership, inconsistent information flows between departments, and limited shared frameworks for analysing problems, rather than individual performance.
The Marketplace pilot surfaced practical insights into customer experience and process friction at the point of service quotation, informing targeted improvements ahead of wider rollout.
Stage 2: Ongoing.
Impact
Stage 1: The Process Integration Manager developed applied expertise in process mapping, supply chain management, lean methodology, and structured client engagement, all of which were directly integrated into their day-to-day role within the division.
The monthly engagement format proved particularly effective, allowing knowledge to be built incrementally and tested against real operational challenges as they arose rather than applied in isolation.
The Marketplace pilot provided Ground Control with structured customer feedback and actionable recommendations at a critical pre-launch stage, strengthening the platform's readiness and its potential to significantly shorten the sales and quotation process at scale.
Stage 2: Ongoing.
Contact
Stage 2 of this project received funding from Leeds University Business School’s Impact and Engagement Support Fund.