Thought Leader Consultant of the Year
Reza Zaman is a senior manager making a vital contribution to suicide prevention, bringing a holistic and nuanced view to how technology can be used effectively and ethically to save lives.
For more than eight months, Reza invested his own time to develop a practical and expert perspective on how to successfully deploy artificial intelligence (AI)‑enabled visual safety and security (VSS) systems for suicide prevention. He then shaped this into a tailored framework with his clients at Network Rail. His work is now informing other infrastructure owners and managers wanting to use technology to prevent suicides, as well as academics and the Samaritans, the UK’s leading suicide-prevention charity.
Its impressive reception is down to Reza’s success at integrating domains that don’t normally intersect – AI, public-health safeguarding, infrastructure projects and operational responses with ethics and efficiency – and presenting actionable guidance to his client and at industry-leading forums.
A real challenge was listening to harrowing stories and the lived experience. During his research, Reza was on a train when someone committed suicide. Being immersed in the topic and experiencing its impact first-hand was emotionally difficult but strengthened his desire to make a real-world difference. He is achieving this by enhancing academic understanding, advancing cross-industry thinking and risk-assessment criteria, and encouraging the sharing of best practice. With Network Rail alone reporting 293 suicides/suspected suicides in 2024/25, the positive impact of Reza’s work cannot be overstated.
View the profile in the MCA Members Directory.