You Cannot Outsource Accountability: Inside a $30B Infrastructure Portfolio with Omer Iqbal

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Welcome to the Major Project Podcast.

(00:01):
I'm your host, Orion Matthews.
In this pod, we are learning from the people that work on projects over a billion dollars, trying to tease out lessons and learnings from these big endeavors. 4 00:00:12,429.999 --> 00:00:19,659.999 My guest today is Omer Iqbal, senior portfolio manager in the investment PMO at Sydney Water. 5 00:00:20,89.999 --> 00:00:27,310 Omer's career has taken him from project engineering and project controls through portfolio leadership and board level work. 6 00:00:27,589.999 --> 00:00:38,899.998 So today, we are exploring what happens when project success is viewed not from a single project team, but from the perspective of executives responsible for multi-billion dollar capital portfolios.

(00:39):
Omer, welcome to the podcast. 8 00:00:42,70.001 --> 00:00:42,920.001 Thank you, Orion. 9 00:00:42,929.997 --> 00:00:45,639.998 It's really good to be here, and thanks for the nice, introduction. 10 00:00:46,249.999 --> 00:00:46,610 Appreciate that. 11 00:00:47,659.999 --> 00:00:58,936 Really appreciate you coming on, and before we get started, maybe you can give us a little history about how you got into major projects to begin with Yeah, basically the background is of civil engineering.

(00:59):
.001I've been working about two decades across the breadth of infrastructure projects, oil and gas, mining, telecommunications, defense, rails transport, roads and bridges, and now, uh, water and water sector. 13 00:01:15,366.001 --> 00:01:17,136.001 So that's, that's my background.
Yeah. 15 00:01:19,96.001 --> 00:01:23,696.002 How did I get into project contr- uh, major projects? That's a good question. 16 00:01:24,746.002 --> 00:01:25,616 It was never like this. 17 00:01:25,616.001 --> 00:01:37,905.997 I think my first project was, I think about $20 million, a very small project, uh, working for, within oil and gas space, but it was setting up the site facility. 18 00:01:38,95.997 --> 00:01:46,195.997 But, the sooner the company was awarded about a $500 million project there, and boom, uh, the whole dynamics changed. 19 00:01:46,326.002 --> 00:01:55,355.997 It sounds like a story that is very common, which is starting on a small project and then something kind of balloons and the opportunity hits and you find yourself in a new space.

(01:55):
.004Did you love it at that point when you... 21 00:01:57,356.001 --> 00:02:04,116.004 Or was it kind of terrifying being on the $500 million project all of a sudden? Yeah, I think, yeah, the heat is different. 22 00:02:04,556.006 --> 00:02:08,916.005 If a project is less than, say, $50 million, it is very painful. 23 00:02:09,96.007 --> 00:02:13,706.002 It has constraints, it has the devil in details kind of situation. 24 00:02:14,406.005 --> 00:02:17,936.001 But when they go bigger, the conversation is very different. 25 00:02:18,800.007 --> 00:02:28,200.007 When they cross a hundred million dollar mark, suddenly the conversation is all about, uh, the bigger impacts, the stakeholder management and the shareholder interest in there. 26 00:02:28,620.007 --> 00:02:30,70.007 The constraints change. 27 00:02:30,70.007 --> 00:02:35,130.006 The project is not six months or one year, it's about five-year-long project. 28 00:02:35,160.006 --> 00:02:41,350.006 The long-term impacts of this project in the society and the community or part of the infrastructure that it's going to be a part of. 29 00:02:41,370.007 --> 00:02:46,380.006 So it changes significantly and it is daunting. 30 00:02:46,680.005 --> 00:02:53,100.007 It's a bit scary at first, but yeah, as an engineer is what you, well, you, you do what you got to do. 31 00:02:53,150.007 --> 00:02:59,250.006 You understand the impact, you understand the scope, and then sooner or later you realize it's just another project. 32 00:02:59,730.005 --> 00:03:01,390.007 The same principles applicable here. 33 00:03:01,550.004 --> 00:03:03,380.005 Uh, the, the fundamentals are same. 34 00:03:03,990.003 --> 00:03:20,612.006 Uh, the impact is slightly different or more than slightly different, but you just use the same, same rules here Well, this kind of reminds me of something that you said once, which is that portfolio management is a bridge between the boardroom and the people delivering the work. 35 00:03:20,832.006 --> 00:03:29,92.006 So it sounds like you've been on both sides now, delivering the work in the fields on those smaller projects, and then also being in the boardroom. 36 00:03:29,152.005 --> 00:03:44,42.004 Like, when did you sort of make that sort of insight that you're essentially, as these projects get bigger, you're sort of a bridge between these two worlds as a portfolio manager? So started working with contractors, then soon moved towards the client side roles. 37 00:03:44,602.006 --> 00:03:58,292.003 And it was not until about five years ago when I was working on a multi-billion dollar project with Transport for New South Wales, and I got a volunteer board opportunity with PMI Sydney chapter. 38 00:03:58,522.004 --> 00:04:03,462.006 I was sitting on the board, and at the same time I also started, studying MBA. 39 00:04:04,332.004 --> 00:04:10,702.005 Now that was the time where I started to look at my project, and my work was also demanding. 40 00:04:10,712.005 --> 00:04:16,192.003 It was COVID, once in a lifetime kind of challenges we were facing at our work front. 41 00:04:17,152.008 --> 00:04:47,322.009 And I started questioning, why are we doing this project? What is the impact of this project? What kind of organizational risk are the targets of this government or this organization or this infrastructure that we're trying to achieve by delivering this project? Is this end date really an end date that we actually want to work towards? So that bigger piece thinking started to emerge in my mind, and then same time I was studying MBA, sitting on the board, and then I realized, okay, so when you're working on a project, you are trying to deliver a project. 42 00:04:47,362.007 --> 00:04:54,992.007 But when you're thinking as a strategist, as an MBA strategist, you're trying to connect the board with the mission, vision, and objectives. 43 00:04:55,482.009 --> 00:05:17,71.996 But w- if you're sitting on a board, you have a bigger purpose of the project is is it reducing the risk of the organization? Is it creating value to the organization? So yeah, this all started to amalgamate and, uh, lucky enough a couple of years later, I was sitting on a portfolio position and, and making all the decisions or participating in making all those decisions. 44 00:05:17,171.997 --> 00:05:17,311.997 Wow. 45 00:05:17,611.999 --> 00:05:17,801.999 Yeah. 46 00:05:17,802.001 --> 00:05:22,2.013 I find, the canvas of thinking, the horizon of thinking really expanded. 47 00:05:22,472.011 --> 00:05:37,462.018 It was never about are we delivering right? It was always are we delivering the right thing? Are we delivering the right value? But when you're working in a project space, you really get to think like that. 48 00:05:38,980.021 --> 00:05:44,890.021 That was the biggest shift I went through That's a really elegant way of describing it. 49 00:05:44,910.021 --> 00:05:52,390.02 I've had someone say it's sort of like, zooming out from the forest, you know? Like how high do you wanna go is almost like the difference. 50 00:05:52,480.02 --> 00:05:57,720.02 Some people get really uncomfortable when they zoom pretty far out because just doesn't work for them. 51 00:05:57,720.02 --> 00:06:02,440.02 They wanna be maybe at a more detailed level, and they're really good at the tree level. 52 00:06:02,730.02 --> 00:06:18,190.018 So to make that transition kind of requires, like you said, the MBA, the board service, all those things kind of come together and it, and it clicks into like, I understand what I'm doing at this viewpoint and how, how I can actually be a contributor. 53 00:06:18,290.02 --> 00:06:25,150.018 It reminds me of the time when I did my PMP exam, right? And we were doing the training, the PMP exam training. 54 00:06:26,500.02 --> 00:06:31,860.018 I was very early in my career, bare minimum meeting the criteria to do the PMP exam. 55 00:06:31,900.017 --> 00:06:33,690.021 I said, "Okay, let's prepare for it. 56 00:06:33,690.021 --> 00:06:34,380.021 Let's get it done." 57 00:06:35,904.02 --> 00:06:46,114.019 There's one concept in PMBOK which was so confusing at that point in my life, was the concept of sponsor, a project sponsor. 58 00:06:46,214.019 --> 00:06:49,774.02 What do you mean a project sponsor? I'm doing a project management course. 59 00:06:49,804.02 --> 00:06:53,164.019 I want to be a project manager, or I want to be a project leader. 60 00:06:53,574.02 --> 00:07:00,544.018 What is a sponsor? What does it mean? What, why is he, he's, or he, he or she is issuing the charter? It was always confusing at that point. 61 00:07:00,554.019 --> 00:07:07,614.02 But anyways, passed through the exams, lived through two decades of my experience, and voila, I'm the sponsor. 62 00:07:09,524.018 --> 00:07:15,164.017 So it is pretty much a full circle of a project life cycle that I'm living through. 63 00:07:15,704.017 --> 00:07:18,524.02 And that was the biggest, biggest change in my thinking. 64 00:07:18,574.02 --> 00:07:35,614.019 Okay, so a sponsor's job is to ensure project has the right amount of budget, right conditions, uh, to deliver, identified constraints that it should deliver within, and the value, the benefit realization, and the as underlying assumptions. 65 00:07:35,974.018 --> 00:07:40,624.02 So in a project space, you would think project sponsor's job ends by just issuing that charter. 66 00:07:40,994.022 --> 00:07:47,634.016 But in reality, there's a lot more going on in the back end, challenging the assumptions, why we're doing these projects. 67 00:07:47,744.022 --> 00:08:13,464.02 Uh, are the, uh, the future growth of the city is aligning with the numbers we're getting from the Ministry of Housing Department, or are we getting the same numbers on the, on the labor shortages? Why are we doing these projects in an innovative way? All those conversations that are happening at the sponsor level, which I was blindsided for a very long part of my career, and it started to open up in the last five years, and portfolio management is the space where it all happened. 68 00:08:13,864.017 --> 00:08:14,64.017 Yeah. 69 00:08:15,44.017 --> 00:08:36,244.012 I think, uh, you know, while we're re- reini- like re-reminiscing about our college days, I wanna take you back 'cause I had a very similar experience, slightly adjacent, where I was I was in a business analysis class, and they had technical requirements and business requirements, and it was like I could not at that point understand the difference. 70 00:08:36,304.013 --> 00:08:39,754.01 I was like, "If they need a button moved on a form, that's a business requirement." 71 00:08:40,14.012 --> 00:08:42,364.015 And, I, I could never really get my head around it. 72 00:08:42,364.015 --> 00:08:46,64.005 I got it enough that I could pass, but at some point it sort of clicked. 73 00:08:46,64.005 --> 00:09:03,773.995 And I guess the interesting thing for people is that when you go through those tests, if, if you're at that point, 'cause I think a lot of people run into it, it's just good to like place mark that it's not just semantic jargon, sort of there is actually something there, and if it doesn't make sense, it will in time perhaps. 74 00:09:04,143.989 --> 00:09:09,346 Um- Well, hey, uh, just one last question for you- Yeah Omer, I really wanted to ask.

(09:09):
But you helped PMI grow tremendously in Australia, uh, I think something like 700%, 600% growth, and you're also, you know, coming on this podcast. 76 00:09:20,866.001 --> 00:09:22,636.001 Thank you so much.
.001Is there maybe a story that you could share about contributions to the space that you've been making, because you've been very active, and what it kinda means for you personally to do these things? I'm gonna go reverse on the answering the question. 78 00:09:36,826.002 --> 00:09:36,856.002 Yeah.

(09:36):
Personally, it is extremely rewarding giving back to the community. 80 00:09:41,545.999 --> 00:09:48,725.999 And I, I was lucky enough when I started my career, I found a mentor. 81 00:09:48,725.999 --> 00:10:06,735.993 He passed away in 2013, Sabir Chauhan, and, uh, he really took me under his wings and, uh, and gave me the, the vision and the insights on how things are done, trusted me, gave me the confidence, and pushed me to achieve more, on my role in, in the past.

(10:08):
.005That time I realized that it's not only 9:00 to 5:00 that you have to live. 83 00:10:14,76.006 --> 00:10:15,266.006 You have to do more than that.
.999You need to be able to create a space for mentoring. 85 00:10:19,26.002 --> 00:10:27,55.999 You need to be able to create a safe space for professionals to come and have communication and discuss their ideas and bounce back those ideas. 86 00:10:27,916.002 --> 00:10:34,405.999 And that time in Pakistan, a long time ago, uh, PMI Lahore chapter was that space. 87 00:10:34,706.003 --> 00:10:48,846.004 And I would go there, I would meet my seniors, I would listen to their stories idealize that this is the job we should be doing or this is how we should be doing, or this guy works in States, he came back on a vacation and he's delivering a lecture today. 88 00:10:49,166.005 --> 00:10:56,300.009 Would hear those stories, and those stories are Part of my success journey. 89 00:10:56,300.009 --> 00:10:58,70.009 They're, they're big part of who I am. 90 00:10:58,100.009 --> 00:10:59,440.009 The lessons many people... 91 00:10:59,830.009 --> 00:11:01,580.009 Everyone is a teacher for me. 92 00:11:01,580.009 --> 00:11:06,720.009 I learn from everybody, right? And all those interactions I had was really good. 93 00:11:06,720.009 --> 00:11:25,760.009 So when I came to Sydney, I was part of PMS Sydney chapter, and during COVID we realized it has a big challenge I was recently elected as a board director and was given an opportunity to lead the board as a president and, uh, and take the chapter away from its, uh, state of, a bit of a limbo into proper functional organization. 94 00:11:25,830.008 --> 00:11:28,560.01 So yes, we increased membership by about 600%. 95 00:11:29,290.007 --> 00:11:33,850.01 We did, uh, start doing events from 10, 12 a year to 60 a year. 96 00:11:34,100.009 --> 00:11:38,100.01 We created, uh, liaisons with the universities. 97 00:11:38,780.009 --> 00:11:43,660.011 We kickstarted, one of the biggest non-for-profit mentoring program in Australia. 98 00:11:44,730.01 --> 00:11:49,0.009 So those were the journeys, and it gave me tremendous satisfaction. 99 00:11:49,180.011 --> 00:11:52,600.011 It gave me a lot of pleasure to, to know that I was there. 100 00:11:52,600.013 --> 00:11:56,640.011 I could return back to the community that I benefit a lot from myself. 101 00:11:57,190.014 --> 00:12:04,20.008 And coming to this podcast and many other, the reason is to share what I know and give this confidence to other... 102 00:12:04,20.008 --> 00:12:19,60.013 There, there would be very well a kid listening to me and you while doing a long walk or going for a drive right now, and the message to that person is that, yes this is for you to listen and, uh, and give us a feedback as well later on if you can. 103 00:12:19,460.015 --> 00:12:23,40.011 But this is for you to listen and learn and maybe inspire a bit. 104 00:12:23,950.012 --> 00:12:24,760.015 Stay curious. 105 00:12:24,760.018 --> 00:12:28,760.012 So how we grow? By staying curious and by, by being inspired. 106 00:12:28,910.012 --> 00:12:32,364.017 So this is what it is all about That's awesome. 107 00:12:32,434.017 --> 00:12:33,304.017 That's really well said. 108 00:12:33,314.017 --> 00:12:45,474.017 You know, there's something really enjoyable when you convene people and you see them connect with each other and sort of build that, uh, you know, build connections, make deals, find jobs, do all these things. 109 00:12:45,474.017 --> 00:12:48,944.017 It's a very satisfying feeling to be able to convene a space. 110 00:12:48,944.018 --> 00:12:52,614.018 And, um, I think, uh, it- I really appreciate you sharing the backstory on that. 111 00:12:53,254.018 --> 00:12:53,274.018 Yeah. 112 00:12:53,674.018 --> 00:12:56,604.018 I can't wait to talk about Sydney Water. 113 00:12:56,604.018 --> 00:13:00,534.018 I think this might be the biggest program we've had on the show. 114 00:13:00,874.018 --> 00:13:03,234.019 And I was really shocked when you told me how big it was. 115 00:13:03,244.017 --> 00:13:11,904.018 So maybe for those outside of Australia, can you give us a rundown of Sydney Water and kind of the role it plays in the community, the size of... 116 00:13:12,64.016 --> 00:13:14,954.015 that we're talking about here? Thank you very much. 117 00:13:15,64.014 --> 00:13:15,924.014 Sydney Water. 118 00:13:16,44.013 --> 00:13:19,514.016 Sydney Water is 135-year-old entity. 119 00:13:20,544.013 --> 00:13:27,334.011 It is the biggest water infrastructure, I believe, in this region, in the Southern Hemisphere, I believe, if I'm not wrong. 120 00:13:27,974.013 --> 00:13:31,384.012 We deliver, Sydney Water delivers 1.5 121 00:13:31,394.011 --> 00:13:34,894.014 billion liters of water every day to the people of Sydney. 122 00:13:35,744.014 --> 00:13:48,74.012 It is a human- huge infrastructure, about 25,000 kilometers of drinking water pipeline and about 30,000 kilometers of water sewer pipeline, uh, within Sydney. 123 00:13:48,124.011 --> 00:13:50,474.011 That is a very complex asset infrastructure. 124 00:13:51,54.011 --> 00:13:53,404.011 And it- the funny thing is, it's all invisible. 125 00:13:54,364.017 --> 00:14:04,802.016 You don't see any of that You, a- an average consumer just turns on the tap one day or takes a shower or ma- cooks a g- fix themselves a cup of coffee or a tea. 126 00:14:04,962.016 --> 00:14:10,52.016 They don't realize the whole mammoth of a infrastructure and institution behind it. 127 00:14:10,52.016 --> 00:14:11,22.015 So that's Sydney Water. 128 00:14:11,532.016 --> 00:14:18,572.016 We have a desalination plant, we have our reservoirs, we have our water, pre-treatment facilities, water filtration facilities. 129 00:14:19,182.016 --> 00:14:21,672.017 The drinking water codes are changing globally. 130 00:14:21,722.017 --> 00:14:22,902.017 We're impacted by it. 131 00:14:22,932.016 --> 00:14:24,392.015 We are also changing those things. 132 00:14:25,392.017 --> 00:14:29,812.019 So it's about 6 million people here, and they're going to be 10 million apparently. 133 00:14:30,322.017 --> 00:14:34,532.017 Uh, this population's going to be increasing, uh, as per the numbers from government. 134 00:14:35,322.016 --> 00:14:36,932.018 It's a massive infrastructure. 135 00:14:36,942.014 --> 00:14:37,752.014 It's so huge. 136 00:14:37,792.013 --> 00:14:44,972.016 I personally, I myself didn't knew when I joined Sydney Water how big it is, every day, I'm still exploring. 137 00:14:44,972.017 --> 00:14:47,782.018 It's three years now and I'm still exploring new things. 138 00:14:48,862.016 --> 00:14:55,12.016 Can you take us back? Like, when was the moment you, like, walk into this thing, like you said, y- you were kind of surprised. 139 00:14:55,542.017 --> 00:14:59,932.02 When did you get that, "Wow, this is affecting millions of people. 140 00:15:00,152.013 --> 00:15:01,232.011 This is a big deal." 141 00:15:01,272.016 --> 00:15:05,342.011 Did, do, do you have a moment like that you could share when you started? Yeah. 142 00:15:05,662.008 --> 00:15:06,912.007 It's a bit personal here. 143 00:15:07,62.009 --> 00:15:09,812.01 So for me it's, the journey was slightly different. 144 00:15:09,862.012 --> 00:15:19,612.011 So my dad is a mechanical engineer, and he used to work in the desalination plant in Saudi Arabia for Ministry of Water, right? And that's where I was born, that's where I grew up. 145 00:15:19,672.008 --> 00:15:24,182.008 And I used to, you know, being the curious kid, always asking your dad questions. 146 00:15:24,212.008 --> 00:15:39,182 "What do you do? What does it mean? Where does this pipe goes? Where does this pipe comes from? What do you mean removing salt from the water?" So I would ask all these questions, and I had fair bit of an understanding that this facility is supplying to the water of, uh, whole city of Riyadh. 147 00:15:39,862.01 --> 00:15:43,782.007 And when I joined Sydney Water, I did have that understanding. 148 00:15:43,941.994 --> 00:15:53,322.004 Even then, realizing how our day-to-day decisions can impact the lives of people in Sydney Water in 30 years' time is huge. 149 00:15:53,962.001 --> 00:16:00,311.999 So when I walked in, I started to look at our portfolio, I started to look at our key investment drivers. 150 00:16:00,412.004 --> 00:16:15,804.01 And usually where in my previous experiences an investment driver or a size of a program or a portfolio will have two, three reasons or two, three key drivers for investment, here it was about 80, 8-0 That had me. 151 00:16:17,4.01 --> 00:16:24,224.01 I was like, "Whoa, what does it mean?" Uh, yes, there's a lot going on. 152 00:16:24,264.01 --> 00:16:32,464.01 So you can imagine an entity that's 135 years old, and the last big capital investment was about 50, 60 years ago. 153 00:16:32,474.009 --> 00:16:32,494.009 Wow. 154 00:16:33,334.01 --> 00:16:40,254.009 All the assets, or majority of the assets, are facing aging issue, and then the growth is, uh, increasing. 155 00:16:40,884.009 --> 00:16:43,104.01 Uh, water guidelines globally are changing. 156 00:16:43,284.01 --> 00:16:52,284.01 That has an impact on our asset productivities, plus this drought or the rainfalls, the extreme weather impacts, that changes a lot of things for us as well. 157 00:16:52,904.012 --> 00:16:55,134.01 So yeah, there's a, there's a lot going on. 158 00:16:55,224.012 --> 00:16:57,84.01 There's a lot going on on a day to day. 159 00:16:57,474.012 --> 00:16:57,984.013 Never a dull moment. 160 00:16:57,994.012 --> 00:17:04,664.01 Like, how, how many programs or projects, like what's the total size would you say? Just any, you know- Okay. 161 00:17:04,664.011 --> 00:17:05,824.014 Let me- I'm sure it varies, but... 162 00:17:06,104.011 --> 00:17:06,374.011 Yeah. 163 00:17:06,634.014 --> 00:17:08,714.013 Let me build that, uh, question. 164 00:17:08,724.014 --> 00:17:11,674.013 Let me build for an audience as well, a bit of a suspense here. 165 00:17:14,4.013 --> 00:17:26,826.014 So the l- last 10 years, on an average, Sydney Water was doing, or this entity was doing about $300 million capital investment a year That, yeah, that's fair. 166 00:17:26,826.014 --> 00:17:28,96.014 No, that's fairly decent. 167 00:17:28,526.014 --> 00:17:28,776.014 Yeah. 168 00:17:28,776.014 --> 00:17:32,816.014 That increased to about currently at $3 billion a year. 169 00:17:33,776.014 --> 00:17:44,706.013 We have projects in the pipeline pretty much clear of about $30 billion, and in the next 10 years- Wow we're going to be delivering about $26 billion-ish of that. 170 00:17:45,136.014 --> 00:17:50,326.014 And in the next immediate five years, we are aiming to deliver about $14 billion worth of projects. 171 00:17:50,966.014 --> 00:17:51,956.012 So that is the size. 172 00:17:52,36.013 --> 00:17:59,726.013 Now, how many projects? That's interesting because a billion-dollar project could be sliced into 100 small projects. 173 00:18:00,286.013 --> 00:18:01,196.013 That's often the case. 174 00:18:01,386.011 --> 00:18:13,606.013 So for billion-dollar projects identified, we have about, you can say six of them, which is like proper almost 600, $700 million meeting the major projects criteria. 175 00:18:14,356.013 --> 00:18:23,396.013 These little renewal jobs of the assets and small growth, uh, components in brownfield or greenfield environments, that is a lot. 176 00:18:24,106.013 --> 00:18:39,746.012 So total active projects are about 1,000 in, uh, in construction space, and if you include opex with maintenance facilities and all of those areas, you're talking about around 2,000 projects at any given moment happening. 177 00:18:39,816.016 --> 00:18:50,396.02 So you can reverse math and evaluate how many project controls people we have, how many project managers we have, how many designers we have, and how many contractors we have engaged in Sydney Water. 178 00:18:51,516.018 --> 00:18:53,416.016 So it is a very busy time for us. 179 00:18:54,216.015 --> 00:18:55,226.015 Okay, just quick question. 180 00:18:55,226.017 --> 00:18:56,966.013 I wanna dive in just on this. 181 00:18:56,966.013 --> 00:19:26,56.021 Like, are you doing, like, classic EVM, earned value management, like applying all the principles at some level for those projects? Do you have some kind of custom-rolled way of managing such a large portfolio? And then concurrent to that question, I'm, I'm sort of curious if you would talk a little bit about maybe some of the differences that might exist between water infrastructure and maybe, like, other mega projects like, uh, oil and gas or nuclear or something like that. 182 00:19:26,766.02 --> 00:19:30,406.025 Evaluating, evaluating the progress of projects in a portfolio space. 183 00:19:30,606.017 --> 00:19:31,486.026 Beautiful question. 184 00:19:32,456.023 --> 00:19:48,916.012 Now, traditionally, you would have earned value, and earned value would-- submission of an earned value at a program level would give you an idea, yes, we were supposed to be planning to burn around $100 million a month. 185 00:19:49,346.022 --> 00:19:51,276.012 We are burning $100 million a month. 186 00:19:51,296.019 --> 00:19:56,956.023 Are we getting the same value out of that, uh, situation or not? So that is your classic earned value. 187 00:19:59,436.021 --> 00:20:11,326.021 But when you have a portfolio of the size of thousand projects, out of thousand projects, 600 are pretty much live on site, 700-ish live on site, contractors working on day in, day out. 188 00:20:11,436.02 --> 00:20:24,966.018 When you look at a portfolio space, in portfolio we are looking at a project from the birth of a project to its business development gates, which is business cases, initiation, options finalization of options. 189 00:20:24,966.018 --> 00:20:27,26.015 And okay, now we are ready to go for delivery. 190 00:20:27,526.014 --> 00:20:34,596.016 After hitting that mark, then we go out in the market, tender the project, contractors hired, contractor board, and then they start delivering and then they finish the job. 191 00:20:35,6.017 --> 00:20:46,16.015 Now the job is handed over to the operator and they start using it, and then they come back, "Ah, the pump was supposed to generate 50 megaliters, but it's generating only 30 megaliters." 192 00:20:46,196.015 --> 00:20:50,526.011 Then you go back, redesign again, add another pump to the whole thing, and then the whole cycle goes back. 193 00:20:51,406.014 --> 00:21:00,236.011 So in a life cycle of a project, the whole idea is, um, delivery component is about 10 to 20%. 194 00:21:01,550.013 --> 00:21:15,410.012 There's a lot more on the outside that's happening, and the conversation is, is the project going to deliver the value that it's aiming for? Yes, earned value helps to track the progress of a project. 195 00:21:15,430.013 --> 00:21:47,200.012 Yes, cost burning numbers are important as well, but way more critical for us is to know that is this project part of the journey of success for the whole organization? Is it going to deliver the value that we are trying to deliver? Is it going to hit the needle of the infrastructure risk status from high risk to low risk or low risk to very low risk? In Sydney Water, we have a delivery system, and delivery contractors are hired through an NEC suit for alliance contractors. 196 00:21:47,770.013 --> 00:22:00,330.01 There's no certain-- no-- You, you would say that earned value is there in action or not is not going to drive my decisions at the portfolio space or for an executives to make a quicker decision or, or a later decision. 197 00:22:00,340.012 --> 00:22:09,210.012 Yes, it does impact to know there's a milestone we need to meet or we need to finish a project by a certain deadline. 198 00:22:09,290.012 --> 00:22:13,440.014 Are we doing it or not? That is it, and how certainty we have. 199 00:22:14,60.016 --> 00:22:19,20.013 For tracking all of this system, we have a, we have a separate ring, which is performance delivery hub. 200 00:22:19,200.015 --> 00:22:21,760.012 They are tracking it by, uh, earned value management. 201 00:22:22,80.012 --> 00:22:23,20.012 And there was, uh... 202 00:22:23,60.016 --> 00:22:30,100.014 We trialed a few years ago a something called O-OMD, Overall Measurement of Delivery. 203 00:22:30,260.013 --> 00:22:34,330.011 It was a concept taken up from, Scottish Waters, uh, in Europe. 204 00:22:34,520.015 --> 00:22:40,650.01 So what it means, at a portfolio level, you just give every activity a certain weightage on all the projects. 205 00:22:40,700.008 --> 00:22:46,250.009 A certain milestone will get certain weightage, and then you take it as one unit and you create a singular S-curve. 206 00:22:47,520.008 --> 00:22:54,150.011 So that is a basically level of effort tracking and seeing if we are pushing projects in the right direction or not. 207 00:22:54,630.008 --> 00:22:55,540.007 That is one tool. 208 00:22:55,970.012 --> 00:23:01,400.008 But again, the bigger purpose is, uh, of portfolio is not to track a project's, uh, earned value management. 209 00:23:01,400.008 --> 00:23:03,310.013 It is essentially to identify the outputs. 210 00:23:04,130.012 --> 00:23:10,648.009 Yep I think it's a critique you can have on earned value is the word value in earned value. 211 00:23:11,118.009 --> 00:23:19,278.008 It's you know, if your ear- if your project is to drive to the store to get some groceries to then come back and cook a meal for your family, as you're... 212 00:23:19,318.008 --> 00:23:22,498.007 Like, the goal of that project is to get dinner on the table. 213 00:23:22,818.008 --> 00:23:33,758.008 If you use an EVM process to track that whole process and the inputs and stuff, like, as you're progressing it, like, nothing about what it's saying is actually kind of relating to that final goal. 214 00:23:33,828.006 --> 00:23:47,488.006 I mean, it is in that you do these things to get to that goal, but in a way, the value that you're wanting is to feed your family, which you're kind of measuring indirectly by measuring progress against scope, schedule, and budget. 215 00:23:47,498.008 --> 00:23:53,377.999 Let's say there's a project that's $100, $200 million and you're, you're at the executive level. 216 00:23:53,378.006 --> 00:24:23,317.997 What kind of information are you gonna take to a committee to decide whether to move that forward or not? What's the key sort of pieces that you need for, to make those go, no-go decisions? One thing we need to understand that organizations, and many organizations are really good in delivering an exceptionally awesome speed for a project that is completely not needed. 217 00:24:24,317.997 --> 00:24:31,677.998 So we can, we can do a wrong project exceptionally well, but that does not necessarily mean we should be doing it or not.

(24:32):
Now, in a delivery space a project manager has a very simple role, essentially to manage the triple, good old triple constraint. 219 00:24:41,647.999 --> 00:25:01,467.987 But when it comes to a portfolio space, you are identifying the value of this project and how it aligns with the risk appetite of the executives, uh, s- they have set for the environment, for the safety, for the public health, for the regulatory, limitations placed on them by, from various, various bodies. 220 00:25:01,917.979 --> 00:25:08,137.979 There, there's, there's a tendency for us engine- for us en-engineers, we like numbers, and we like lots of them. 221 00:25:09,317.979 --> 00:25:24,567.977 And we have this tendency to create really complex reports and 50, 60, data points, uh, and total different KPIs, and we'll be able to create a very beautiful dashboard or a report for an executive, but that's not what they need usually. 222 00:25:25,587.977 --> 00:25:34,947.976 They really need to carry the stewardship of the business, and they need to identify projects that create the biggest impact on that needle. 223 00:25:36,207.976 --> 00:25:48,17.976 With the needle of organizational risk situation is the-- is this organization operating at the risk? Say, say not for Sydney Water, say it for a retail business or good old Apple. 224 00:25:48,687.976 --> 00:25:49,627.976 It could be anything. 225 00:25:50,437.976 --> 00:26:04,787.977 Is this project going to increase the sales, or is this project going to create a better marketing value in the market? What it's going to do-- trying to achieve or whatever the challenge we are trying to have, uh, resolve in this organization, how this project is going to bring it down. 226 00:26:05,317.978 --> 00:26:16,247.976 Now, the challenge where we sit at the mid-level between the project managers and the executives is evaluating the impacts of those projects and linking them back to those those indicators. 227 00:26:17,277.976 --> 00:26:27,537.975 The biggest challenge is, uh, we need to have a clear and defined benefit framework with a benefit catalog, and each catalog item speaking to the executive needs. 228 00:26:28,687.975 --> 00:26:37,867.975 If we have that cleared out, now that is a perfect value proposition, you can present it to an executive underlying many assumptions. 229 00:26:38,687.975 --> 00:26:51,957.974 In the case of Sydney Water or any water sector globally, you could have a $100 billion plan for a growth project considering the population increase trends provided to you by the departments, relevant departments, but they could be totally wrong. 230 00:26:53,447.974 --> 00:27:03,117.975 You may end up doing all those growth projects way too early, and those, uh, and those growth forecasts are going to materialize only 50 years later than you finish the project. 231 00:27:03,747.973 --> 00:27:13,917.972 So in those 50 years, you could have invested money where ev- something else was needed for the customer, or something else that could have benefited the organization and its, uh, consumers better. 232 00:27:14,617.976 --> 00:27:48,707.964 So as an investment executives or executives that are going to sign off of a business case, the biggest concern from them to, for them to understand on a investment decision or a project is it urgent? Why? What are the assumptions behind it? Did we challenge those assumptions? If we challenge those assumptions, what was the alternative? And why we are not doing the alternative, and why we are doing this project? Now, that is the statement that we have to prepare for an investment decision and to push forward. 233 00:27:48,867.966 --> 00:28:07,117.967 I love it, and just to play it back a little bit, what I heard you talk about is that engineers love quantitative things because math is perfection when it comes to logic, but value is a subjective term, and it has qualitative pieces to it at times. 234 00:28:07,517.959 --> 00:28:35,87.966 And there's this, uh-- there's a complex relationship in terms of how you take the quantitative and qualitative and line those up together to bring that information to an executive, and then executives are going to want to develop confidence in that sort of assessment, which means asking questions like what are the alternatives? Because I, I feel like the greatest fear of many executives is somebody shows up in your office, says, "Let's spend $300 million. 235 00:28:35,87.979 --> 00:28:36,587.978 Here's the plan," bada boom. 236 00:28:37,27.966 --> 00:28:40,597.98 You tell them, uh, you ask a few questions, you interrogate it, they say it's good. 237 00:28:41,599.976 --> 00:28:51,279.976 But they remember the story of their mentor saying, like, "Don't trust anything that comes from this gr- or d- you know, don't trust the facts that you're reading on the paper. 238 00:28:51,279.976 --> 00:28:55,789.975 Like, always be suspicious because they're, because these numbers are so complicated." 239 00:28:56,69.976 --> 00:28:56,209.976 Yeah. 240 00:28:56,259.976 --> 00:28:57,179.976 Confidence is hard. 241 00:28:57,229.976 --> 00:28:58,319.976 It's a currency. 242 00:28:58,329.976 --> 00:28:59,579.976 It's hard to establish. 243 00:29:00,89.976 --> 00:29:11,853.975 I've heard that you've figured out a way around that, so I'm just curious if you could riff a little bit on how you come at these, numbers and presentations, give people the confidence that Yeah That it pieces together. 244 00:29:11,853.975 --> 00:29:13,413.975 Engineers are not economists. 245 00:29:13,413.975 --> 00:29:21,153.977 And when I was studying my MBA, right, when I was studying the economy subject that did really move the gears in my mind. 246 00:29:21,323.977 --> 00:29:29,543.977 Uh, I started thinking very differently, and at that point I was thinking, "Well, economy should be a fundamental course in engineering education." 247 00:29:29,663.976 --> 00:29:34,253.979 Now, going back, how do we articulate? First of all, it's, uh, it's not me, it's the whole team. 248 00:29:34,263.977 --> 00:29:44,253.978 We have a whole function, and there are different different roles and responsibilities in evaluating the values and, uh, and the purpose of certain projects. 249 00:29:44,783.978 --> 00:29:58,673.975 Are they aligning with the greater housing development objectives? Are they aligning with the new water framework? Are they aligning with the assets breaking down situation? Water is so unforgiving, and this is such a necessity. 250 00:29:58,833.975 --> 00:30:01,833.976 You need it every 30 minutes of your day. 251 00:30:02,533.973 --> 00:30:09,673.975 And there's not-- we cannot afford to have a tap run dry, or we cannot have, streets flooding with the sewer lines. 252 00:30:10,253.975 --> 00:30:11,413.969 That cannot happen. 253 00:30:11,693.969 --> 00:30:19,543.966 So there's a, there's a zero tolerance in certain areas that just keeps the, makes the value definition straightforward that it's going to happen. 254 00:30:19,833.972 --> 00:30:21,303.971 We have to do this project for this reason. 255 00:30:21,873.973 --> 00:30:22,563.973 Now, where's... 256 00:30:23,403.972 --> 00:30:38,193.967 The, the fear is that also an engineer versus econo- economist mindset is a certain project or a certain part of a project may be considered as a gold plating for an engineer, but maybe not for an economist. 257 00:30:38,563.968 --> 00:30:51,453.972 For example, building a really big wastewater treatment facility and having a little park next to it so the community is not really scared of that wastewater treatment facility, and they understands how the water works, so it engages the community in the journey. 258 00:30:52,213.969 --> 00:30:57,413.971 An economist will really love that, but an engineer would think that is an absolute gold plating. 259 00:30:58,23.974 --> 00:31:03,883.985 We could use that money into investing more, uh, more advanced sensors or et cetera, et cetera. 260 00:31:04,543.978 --> 00:31:05,683.979 So that always happens. 261 00:31:05,683.979 --> 00:31:08,663.975 And yes, executives do walk in with a prejudice. 262 00:31:08,763.976 --> 00:31:09,873.975 And I think that's their job. 263 00:31:10,83.984 --> 00:31:16,13.984 Uh, when eight people-- Y- y-- There's-- I read this somewhere, the most expensive meeting is where everybody agrees. 264 00:31:17,391.983 --> 00:31:18,121.983 Oh. 265 00:31:18,331.983 --> 00:31:19,711.983 I think one of those situations. 266 00:31:19,751.983 --> 00:31:25,641.983 If everyone is agreeing to everything on, in a meeting room, well, that's the time wasted for everybody. 267 00:31:26,171.982 --> 00:31:29,831.983 So there should be someone to challenge it, and that's the role of an executive. 268 00:31:29,841.983 --> 00:31:39,411.982 If not the executive or it's, it's a challenge for us to challenge e- each other and ourselves in the room that this project is indeed going to deliver the value it's going to deliver. 269 00:31:39,661.981 --> 00:31:41,801.982 And therefore we are gonna have check marks, checkpoints. 270 00:31:42,281.982 --> 00:31:44,611.981 So we're going to say, "Okay, we're gonna deliver this project. 271 00:31:44,611.982 --> 00:31:49,401.98 We're going to go to three, five, six gates, or these two, three milestones, and we are going to stop there." 272 00:31:49,601.98 --> 00:31:52,891.982 There's gonna be hold point, and we're going to reflect what we're going to do. 273 00:31:53,151.983 --> 00:31:56,231.983 The good old plan, do, check, act, philosophy. 274 00:31:56,231.983 --> 00:31:59,371.982 I think it was, uh, Shewhart's, framework of plan, do, check, act. 275 00:31:59,651.981 --> 00:32:00,631.981 It's still relevant. 276 00:32:01,651.981 --> 00:32:08,523.984 It's a, it's a 100-year-old, uh, theory, but still relevant I just wanna tap in on this- Yeah real quick. 277 00:32:08,523.984 --> 00:32:12,483.984 Like you said the the meeting that everyone agrees on is the most expensive meeting. 278 00:32:12,993.984 --> 00:32:29,453.983 I think w- what I'd love to hear from you about how you set culture to prevent that, because oftentimes I think the discipline we're in with engineers and things, people are not people pleasers, but they're doers, and they're... 279 00:32:29,603.984 --> 00:32:35,203.983 They like to avoid conflict and focus on what's working and lean into that. 280 00:32:35,603.983 --> 00:32:42,33.982 What you're talking about is a healthy culture that doesn't shy away from conflict, that can raise issues, things like that. 281 00:32:42,33.984 --> 00:32:55,373.984 Do you have any leadership tricks? Like, how do you foster that in a team? What do you need to do to make it so that people can be disagreeable and don't leave a conversation with someone's feelings hurt? That's, amazing. 282 00:32:55,393.985 --> 00:32:55,583.985 That's... 283 00:32:56,33.984 --> 00:33:09,93.983 but to summarize it, and something that I'm really passionate and I've been trialing at my workplace for the last 10 years, ever since I've had a manager role, is psychological safety. 284 00:33:10,263.98 --> 00:33:29,123.984 Now, what is a psychological safety? Psychological safety is the people around you, or people in the room of the meeting, should feel comfortable enough to speak up without having a fear of, of, of hierarchical, you know, hierarchy fears. 285 00:33:29,193.982 --> 00:33:35,943.986 Hierarchy is real, and when, when you're talking about billion-dollar private sector construction or public sector, that's... 286 00:33:36,113.988 --> 00:33:37,723.984 there are egos involved in there. 287 00:33:37,723.988 --> 00:33:41,663.981 There are very different and very interesting personalities sitting in the room. 288 00:33:42,273.984 --> 00:33:46,973.99 So how do you break that ice with them? It's a two-way street. 289 00:33:47,503.989 --> 00:33:59,383.987 If an executive really wants to have a very detailed and very in-depth, uh, discussion happen in that room, they have to create a very open, psychologically safe environment. 290 00:33:59,953.989 --> 00:34:07,557.993 How do we do is literally fail early theory So you're gonna try something, try it now. 291 00:34:08,147.993 --> 00:34:09,647.993 Don't wait for it to be perfect. 292 00:34:10,237.993 --> 00:34:11,357.993 Progress over perfection. 293 00:34:11,647.993 --> 00:34:17,637.993 If you have a thought and you are not really sure about it, you don't wait for thinking about it in detail. 294 00:34:17,637.993 --> 00:34:18,987.993 You can always flag it. 295 00:34:19,367.993 --> 00:34:22,847.993 Hey, it is a risk that I identify in this, proposition. 296 00:34:23,277.994 --> 00:34:29,407.995 It is a risk that I think this major project is not going to hit the goals or the milestone they're gonna hit because the trend line is low or high. 297 00:34:30,617.994 --> 00:34:35,557.995 Your job is to flag those indicators as a controls or a project professional. 298 00:34:35,977.995 --> 00:34:40,427.993 You should do it with pride and full confidence. 299 00:34:41,717.993 --> 00:35:04,937.991 Now, if you are a leader in a space, you should encourage that in your team but if you are sitting in an, in an environment where you don't have that much of a wiggle room, or you cannot dictate a culture for you because you're a junior resource or you're a junior in the room, all that you can do is understand the personalities and try to connect your point of view and try to align them with one of the leaders in the room. 300 00:35:05,317.99 --> 00:35:14,377.993 For example, so there's a project we know that is going to have a safety concern, and we are rushing too quickly. 301 00:35:14,487.99 --> 00:35:18,677.993 We are going to head on the construction, and this could have a safety concern. 302 00:35:19,477.996 --> 00:35:26,717.992 So I'm going to wait for the moment and see in the executive room if the safety general manager walks in and he's attending this room. 303 00:35:26,777.991 --> 00:35:32,217.994 I'm going to straight away try to flag it with that Individual, number one. 304 00:35:32,727.994 --> 00:35:34,67.994 Uh, "Hey, we're doing this project. 305 00:35:34,277.994 --> 00:35:35,867.994 I have a safety concern in there. 306 00:35:35,957.994 --> 00:35:48,777.995 Do you also re- resonate with me on this point on yes or no?" And then the dialogue starts, and he or she may give you really good pointers, and then you can go and look at that, and that will clarify you either or you'll be, you'll, you'll be right, or you will learn something. 307 00:35:49,397.995 --> 00:35:55,797.994 The other alternative, for example, there's no one in the room, then you connect it with the organizational goals. 308 00:35:55,827.995 --> 00:36:06,507.994 You can say that, "Hey, we are working in this X, Y, Z organization, and one of the key cardinal rules in this organization is the safety of the people, and, uh, we are encouraged to speak about it. 309 00:36:06,597.994 --> 00:36:13,297.99 But yeah, in general, psychological safety is sec- psychological safety is 100% leadership responsibility. 310 00:36:13,737.993 --> 00:36:17,637.989 Leaders, modern-day leaders have to embed that in the marketplace. 311 00:36:17,677.991 --> 00:36:21,537.988 You cannot be a leader anymore if your team is not psychologically safe around you. 312 00:36:22,67.99 --> 00:36:27,247.988 Gone are the days of, uh, military dictator style working in offices. 313 00:36:28,7.993 --> 00:36:29,367.988 I think that's very historic. 314 00:36:29,367.994 --> 00:36:31,237.987 And with Gen Z and Gen Alpha, you can't. 315 00:36:31,747.991 --> 00:36:36,767.989 You need to, you need to create that space for them to experiment things to understand and speak openly. 316 00:36:37,407.992 --> 00:36:52,928.001 And if you have a concern about someone being, not s- switched on with the, with the terminologies or not understanding, uh, the different, s- organizational or cultural boundaries, then you need to have that separate training with those individuals. 317 00:36:53,378.001 --> 00:36:59,358.003 You should not impede or you should not stop the psychological safety culture in your organization. 318 00:36:59,427.997 --> 00:37:02,157.997 It's 100%, 100% required. 319 00:37:02,808.001 --> 00:37:05,118 I cannot work without a psychological safe environment. 320 00:37:05,217.997 --> 00:37:05,777.997 That's how. 321 00:37:07,28.003 --> 00:37:07,388.003 Yeah. 322 00:37:08,308.002 --> 00:37:24,998.002 I would almost wonder, I, I don't know if there's an index for psychological safety, but if there were one, I would argue that you could have a project with all the right scope, all the right funding, and the right people on deck, but if you don't have psychological safety, I bet the failure rate is extremely high. 323 00:37:25,438.001 --> 00:37:28,978 A phrase I keep saying to my team, is assume positive intent.

(37:29):
Mm.
Which is trying to frame people's, you know, words immediately as a positive thing that's coming from a place of positive energy. 326 00:37:39,427.998 --> 00:37:43,717.998 But I like wrapping that around psychological safety makes a lot of sense to me. 327 00:37:44,87.997 --> 00:37:46,147.995 Indicator wise, I can chime in on this one. 328 00:37:46,547.996 --> 00:37:53,117.994 I think it's the, the King of Brunei, he has come up with this, the alternate of GDP is, indicator of happiness. 329 00:37:53,177.997 --> 00:37:58,557.998 So he said he's not going to report on a national GDP, he's going to report on the national happiness indicator. 330 00:37:59,267.997 --> 00:38:10,137.996 So probably we can cheat from his, uh, from his way of, uh, evaluating the happiness of their people to psycho- psychological safety- Yeah indicator. 331 00:38:10,468.001 --> 00:38:13,498.001 And this is, again, as an, uh, we are thinking as engineers here, Ryan. 332 00:38:13,968.001 --> 00:38:15,117.997 We're coming up with- Mm a number. 333 00:38:15,118.002 --> 00:38:18,718 We're trying to assign a number to to a vibe essentially. 334 00:38:19,397.998 --> 00:38:41,617.996 So if an organization, if you walk into an organization and everyone's there for six months or one year, and there's nobody there for long, it's, it's, their organization is acting as a musical chairs or a revolving door, people are walking in and walking out, so the human resource turnover is really high, that is a dead giveaway they are not doing something right. 335 00:38:42,77.999 --> 00:38:42,97.999 Yeah. 336 00:38:42,817.996 --> 00:38:48,117.997 That organization lacks psychological safety 100%, because i- it's not... 337 00:38:48,617.999 --> 00:38:50,907.998 No one enjoys to go to work. 338 00:38:53,257.999 --> 00:38:53,387.999 Right.

(38:53):
.987There are a few crazy ones out there, they're really passionate to work the rest of their life, but most people, they, they leave their kids, they leave their pets at home or their loved ones, and they go to a workplace. 340 00:39:07,107.982 --> 00:39:08,537.981 They want to do something. 341 00:39:09,467.985 --> 00:39:14,277.996 They have made their way to the office door with an intention to deliver. 342 00:39:14,767.992 --> 00:39:24,627.987 Now it's the job of the leadership and the organizational culture to make sure that the environment is conducive enough so that the person has done his part of the deal. 343 00:39:24,817.995 --> 00:39:26,747.987 They've got the qualification, you hired them. 344 00:39:26,897.997 --> 00:39:28,57.997 They've got the references. 345 00:39:28,367.998 --> 00:39:29,107.993 They have everything. 346 00:39:29,558.001 --> 00:39:33,67.988 Now it's your job to provide them that environment that they deliver. 347 00:39:34,617.997 --> 00:39:39,207.997 And the biggest part is definitely psychological safety, uh, creating that space. 348 00:39:39,257.997 --> 00:39:42,977.997 I always say this to my team, uh, "Your failure is mine 100%. 349 00:39:43,337.997 --> 00:39:45,327.997 Uh, you can always say that it was a direction from me. 350 00:39:45,907.997 --> 00:39:49,337.996 And if we succeed, that success is your title 100%." 351 00:39:49,607.996 --> 00:39:54,217.997 So that's a very simple rule, and that takes away that stress from the people. 352 00:39:55,457.997 --> 00:39:56,647.996 We tried so many things. 353 00:39:56,677.997 --> 00:40:07,463.997 We, uh, believe it or not, in only two and a half years with Sydney Water, we wrote Sydney Water's history's first benefit framework There was a benefit framework. 354 00:40:07,733.997 --> 00:40:24,213.998 And currently, very recently, I authored, or I'm, I'm starting to author a whole value management office concept, because we need to get away from this economic and the numbering campaign and start looking at the projects and their values and some- somehow come up with an indicator as well. 355 00:40:24,623.998 --> 00:40:47,63.996 What is the value of this portfolio, of this program, and how are we going to ensure that the dollar invested is the right dollar invested and we're getting the right return out of it? Because it's a public sector, any project we do is We- Go, let's, So any project that we do or any major project that anyone is doing in the world will have an impact at least 10, 20 years down the line. 356 00:40:47,123.996 --> 00:40:51,730.6623333 So it's no way you can say that this project has generated the value it was. 357 00:40:51,780.6623333 --> 00:41:02,880.6663333 The real value is really long-term, and that's not long enough, uh, that's not short enough for a board to get their promotion or executives to get their bonuses. 358 00:41:02,890.6633333 --> 00:41:02,910.6633333 Yeah. 359 00:41:02,950.6603333 --> 00:41:12,950.6633333 So how do you evaluate that this dollar is invested in, in the project in the right speed, right amount of time? And that's where I'm working on, that's where I'm writing down. 360 00:41:13,450.6633333 --> 00:41:21,510.6663333 I'm exploring so much good work done by many consulting organizations globally, and we are going to be talking with them and, uh, and develop this further. 361 00:41:21,570.6663333 --> 00:41:31,890.6643333 So yeah, psychological safety environment, when we wrote down the benefit framework and now writing down value management office piece, whole team is trying different things. 362 00:41:31,970.6663333 --> 00:41:33,520.6683333 They are bringing in different concepts. 363 00:41:33,520.6693333 --> 00:41:46,120.6643333 They are saying, "Hey, Umar, by the way, you know, we were thinking about, we have 60,000 projects, or six, sorry, 6,000 projects identified, but we don't really know how much of them have a direct impact on our compliance status." 364 00:41:47,170.6713333 --> 00:41:52,860.6723333 Do you think we should create a register where we start tracking them?" I said, "That is a great idea. 365 00:41:52,870.6683333 --> 00:41:58,790.6733333 Let's call it a project attribution exercise, and let's not limit ourselves to those compliance projects. 366 00:41:58,790.6733333 --> 00:42:00,310.6743333 Let's expand it further. 367 00:42:00,800.6763333 --> 00:42:24,710.6673333 What is of public health? What is of, uh, organizational safety? What is for operational safety?" And in six months we got the only register in the organization that maps all these projects to the other collectual reasons for the project, which is very difficult- Yeah to be mapped down to a very boring corporate investment triggers or these words, but they have a different purpose as well. 368 00:42:24,750.6703333 --> 00:42:30,420.6723333 These projects have a life and a soul, and trying to track them down in a, in a different, uh, understanding. 369 00:42:31,10.6653333 --> 00:42:34,340.6763333 And believe it or not, that, uh, the whole conversation piece started. 370 00:42:34,730.6763333 --> 00:42:42,512.6743333 Because of the psychological safe environment, somebody came to me in my team with this idea We take this onward. 371 00:42:42,752.6743333 --> 00:42:46,652.6743333 My manager, my director created psychological safety for me to present it. 372 00:42:47,72.6743333 --> 00:42:58,392.6743333 I presented it, and slowly and slowly it grew so much that it is currently sitting at, at, at a backbone of whole investment decisions, that little piece of work. 373 00:42:59,192.6733333 --> 00:43:03,442.6743333 And it starts, it starts with that safe space for someone to say, "I've got an idea. 374 00:43:03,442.6743333 --> 00:43:04,292.6733333 I wanna try it out. 375 00:43:04,292.6733333 --> 00:43:04,922.6743333 Could fail." 376 00:43:05,202.6733333 --> 00:43:05,382.6733333 Yeah. 377 00:43:05,382.6743333 --> 00:43:07,152.6733333 And you said, "Yeah, go for it, man." 378 00:43:07,422.6733333 --> 00:43:07,732.6733333 Yeah. 379 00:43:08,162.6743333 --> 00:43:08,972.6743333 Take it, take it on." 380 00:43:08,982.6743333 --> 00:43:09,2.6743333 Yeah. 381 00:43:09,122.6733333 --> 00:43:12,992.6733333 And then it, and then that was the seed, and then it grew. 382 00:43:13,562.6733333 --> 00:43:20,112.6713333 I'm so curious, just to loop back on one thing you mentioned that I would love to hear your thoughts on, uh, which is I... 383 00:43:20,162.6733333 --> 00:43:22,982.6723333 let's say I've got a big ego, I'm approving these projects. 384 00:43:23,112.6743333 --> 00:43:26,342.6743333 Uh, maybe I have some political aspirations, I don't know. 385 00:43:26,892.6723333 --> 00:43:32,992.6743333 But, uh, your benefit framework is kinda helping see, like this has 100-year value. 386 00:43:33,372.6713333 --> 00:43:34,692.6713333 And just to kinda, it... 387 00:43:34,922.6703333 --> 00:43:48,432.6673333 Like an example I remember is I saw a startup with a guy, he had invented a sleeve that you put on telephone poles, and this sleeve, you, when you put it in the ground, it made the poles last an extra 50 years. 388 00:43:48,432.6673333 --> 00:43:48,687.6688333 Wow. 389 00:43:48,687.6688333 --> 00:43:54,362.6703333 And so, you know, they last 100 years now, or 80 years, and this would get you to that, like 130. 390 00:43:54,382.6733333 --> 00:44:03,572.6723333 So it had a amazing ROI, but he was having trouble selling it because, you know, everyone's gonna be dead by the time you're capturing that ROI on your telephone pole. 391 00:44:03,962.6703333 --> 00:44:06,982.6703333 And there were other benefits, like it didn't leach chemicals in the ground or whatever. 392 00:44:07,332.6733333 --> 00:44:29,442.6793333 But, I think my question, back to the question did you find a way to give those executives political capital that they could believe in for those long horizon values in your sort of benefit matrix? So when I was working with Australian Defense and Transport for New South Wales, that was the most interesting thing I was exposed to. 393 00:44:30,222.6773333 --> 00:44:39,132.6803333 Definitely our shareholders are, when you're working in a mega major project space, your shareholders are really politicians. 394 00:44:39,632.6813333 --> 00:44:41,902.6803333 They are government officials or bureaucrats. 395 00:44:42,632.6813333 --> 00:44:49,962.6863333 And they have, they love photo- photograph opportunities, and they love things written about them on the newspaper. 396 00:44:50,92.6723333 --> 00:44:50,672.6853333 They love that. 397 00:44:51,662.6793333 --> 00:44:53,562.6793333 We have to create those opportunities. 398 00:44:53,882.6803333 --> 00:44:58,582.6843333 We have to identify the milestones in our, in our program and schedules at that point. 399 00:44:58,692.6833333 --> 00:45:10,682.6733333 Now, sitting in a portfolio space, funny enough, the whole direction of investment is actually, the birthplace of that is the politics need, political need. 400 00:45:11,222.6823333 --> 00:45:18,382.6823333 In a democratic structure, the s- people of Sydney are voting for a clean drinking water. 401 00:45:19,706.6803333 --> 00:45:29,466.6803333 And that is the mandate of the minister, and that minister has passed on the mandate to the board of directors, and the board of directors are talking to the managing director with the same mandate. 402 00:45:29,466.6803333 --> 00:45:37,766.6793333 And managing director is talking to the five EGMs, and five EGMs are talking to my director, and my director is talking to me with the same mandate. 403 00:45:38,466.6793333 --> 00:45:47,798.6803333 So it is the same in trust Some, sometimes yes, um, some projects could be of a very critical nature. 404 00:45:47,808.6803333 --> 00:45:55,318.6803333 For example, there could be one desalination plant we kickstart in Sydney, and I'm sure everybody would like to have a name on that project. 405 00:45:55,318.6803333 --> 00:45:57,178.6803333 It's going to be a $3 billion project. 406 00:45:57,178.6803333 --> 00:46:01,188.6803333 It's going to transform the water, drinking water supply line for us. 407 00:46:01,548.6793333 --> 00:46:01,848.6793333 Yeah. 408 00:46:02,488.6803333 --> 00:46:11,678.6793333 But I think politics, politicians, and the political interest people are smart enough to understand that if the project started to get late, then they are to blame as well. 409 00:46:12,678.6793333 --> 00:46:15,278.6803333 So now they are sticking with the initiatives. 410 00:46:15,428.6793333 --> 00:46:19,358.6773333 They're sticking with, we're going to have a clean drinking initiative, and we're gonna make sure we do that. 411 00:46:19,998.6793333 --> 00:46:24,128.6793333 And it's very easy for us to align ourselves with them, and that's, that's it. 412 00:46:24,138.6783333 --> 00:46:25,68.6773333 We are a very... 413 00:46:25,78.6773333 --> 00:46:37,918.6753333 E- every major project globally, unless it's a private entity, which even I think they are also going to be regulated by someone, every major project is a reg- is operating in a regulated environment. 414 00:46:38,468.6733333 --> 00:46:38,488.6733333 Yeah. 415 00:46:38,498.6723333 --> 00:46:40,328.6793333 There are rules around, uh, labor. 416 00:46:40,388.6793333 --> 00:46:42,418.6733333 There are rules around cost escalation. 417 00:46:42,428.6723333 --> 00:46:46,848.6773333 There are rules around h- how much fast speed you can do this project or not. 418 00:46:47,268.6763333 --> 00:46:51,358.6783333 So we all operate within that framework, and that can, no one can change that. 419 00:46:51,938.6753333 --> 00:46:58,78.6773333 So it's a tough luck if someone is not going to get a, a political credit out of it or not, but yeah, not our job. 420 00:46:58,178.6763333 --> 00:46:59,678.6703333 We, we work on a mandate. 421 00:46:59,778.6693333 --> 00:47:08,268.6703333 Mandate is if I'm in a private sector organization, if I'm in an oil and gas, if I'm working for Microsoft, Apple, my mandate is very different. 422 00:47:08,388.6703333 --> 00:47:11,168.6683333 When I'm sitting in a public office, my mandate is very different. 423 00:47:11,978.6743333 --> 00:47:20,918.6693333 My mandate is to make sure the, the board that they have decided we're going to go in this, direction of investment, or we're going to deliver projects with this speed. 424 00:47:21,398.6713333 --> 00:47:22,138.6723333 We stick with that. 425 00:47:23,558.6743333 --> 00:47:25,928.6753333 Okay, let me shift gears on you a little bit. 426 00:47:25,938.6713333 --> 00:47:34,198.6803333 But given that we probably have a lot of engineers on the podcast, maybe we should throw some quantitative red meat for them. 427 00:47:34,588.6883333 --> 00:47:43,698.6793333 And, uh, it's a good bridge 'cause you're right that every billion-dollar project's unregulated, but I would actually argue there might be one that's an exception, which would be technology. 428 00:47:43,708.6843333 --> 00:47:43,988.6883333 Mm-hmm. 429 00:47:44,38.6773333 --> 00:47:54,778.6593333 I bet you we're spending hundreds if not billions on training the next neural networks, and it is largely unregulated capital project going on right now. 430 00:47:55,48.6603333 --> 00:48:02,536.6703333 So there is this, like, interesting unregulated space probably the only one, which is, like, that high tech- Yeah for mega projects. 431 00:48:02,536.6703333 --> 00:48:13,446.6703333 But my question for you is, you know, just looking at the tech stack, because you are a brilliant mind when it comes to technology, and I really wanna get into learning a little bit from you about that. 432 00:48:13,456.6703333 --> 00:48:23,786.6703333 So what, what do, what does Sydney Water do on a tech level to manage all this? You must have tons of different like SAP and P6, all those things. 433 00:48:23,786.6703333 --> 00:48:37,536.6673333 Like how do you approach technology to make everything kinda click? So we use, uh, Coupler for an asset investment structure, Maximo for our asset data and asset breakdown and asset health conditions. 434 00:48:38,16.6703333 --> 00:48:43,706.6713333 Then we have SAP for our finances, Primavera, the good old Primavera for our scheduling management. 435 00:48:44,286.6703333 --> 00:48:50,896.6703333 So yeah, we have, uh, and then for risk we have a, we have a bunch of other tools for qualitative and quantitative, uh, risk management. 436 00:48:51,856.6703333 --> 00:48:55,116.6673333 Now these, we have all the good tools. 437 00:48:56,76.6673333 --> 00:48:57,46.6703333 We have the best tools. 438 00:48:57,46.6703333 --> 00:49:16,226.6703333 They're, they're churning out so much, uh, so much information, and- They're creating so many reports, but most of them, and mostly what I see is reports don't really provoke a decision. 439 00:49:17,416.6703333 --> 00:49:32,746.6703333 A very beautiful dashboard is a beautiful dashboard, but it's not providing-- if it's not provoking a thinking process, if it's not triggering a question, if it's not giving you a trend insight, it's, in my opinion, not really useful. 440 00:49:33,206.6713333 --> 00:49:38,436.6703333 So in Sydney Water or in my space, in my function, what we do, we pull these data points. 441 00:49:38,606.6713333 --> 00:49:44,86.6723333 We get these at least, uh, from the last count, about 16 different systems and applications. 442 00:49:45,176.6713333 --> 00:49:49,76.6713333 We take them up, and then we start developing every month. 443 00:49:49,426.6713333 --> 00:49:51,6.6693333 We have a monthly reporting structure. 444 00:49:52,326.6683333 --> 00:49:56,946.6703333 We collate all these, all these data points, all these trends, and we build a story. 445 00:49:57,776.6733333 --> 00:50:14,656.6733333 Now, the story is that our all our-- for example, as an example, the story is all our major projects in wastewater are progressing as per the deadline associated by internal or external. 446 00:50:15,616.6723333 --> 00:50:22,846.6733333 Now, if these projects are late, we can say that all of them are progressing as per the deadline with an exception of two or three. 447 00:50:23,456.6683333 --> 00:50:27,576.6663333 These two systems are going to be impacted by the delayed performance, reasons. 448 00:50:27,776.6633333 --> 00:50:30,716.6653333 The trend line is very clear in the history. 449 00:50:31,166.6623333 --> 00:50:37,196.6633333 We have had an inter-intervention discussion with the delivery team, and they have come back with this mitigation. 450 00:50:37,946.6613333 --> 00:50:40,116.6633333 Now, that is the closer. 451 00:50:40,366.6673333 --> 00:50:49,266.6593333 So a beautiful application and a beautiful AI-enabled tools or anything, as someone said long time ago, is, a fool with a tool is still a fool. 452 00:50:49,906.6643333 --> 00:50:56,226.6593333 I add something- on top of it always that now he's a dangerous fool because he's got a fancier tool. 453 00:50:56,336.6653333 --> 00:51:22,816.6643333 And we have this as a human being, we have this tendency to get attracted towards something that is very beautiful, graphically appealing or visually appealing, and we get distracted by that, something shiny But we always need to go back to this fact that a business is driven by a value decision, not by having fancy reports, unless that's your business to produce- Yeah. 454 00:51:23,86.6643333 --> 00:51:32,86.6633333 But in a, in a simple construction environment, in a simple hardcore infrastructure environment, a report should be very clearly provoking a thought decision. 455 00:51:32,396.6633333 --> 00:51:35,196.6633333 It should not be just a, a number diary on a sheet. 456 00:51:35,366.6623333 --> 00:51:37,666.6643333 It should be very clear what it's trying to say. 457 00:51:38,36.6633333 --> 00:51:40,386.6663333 It's not a performance appraisal document. 458 00:51:40,846.6643333 --> 00:51:50,336.6623333 If your team has worked really hard and there are 60 different reports that they produce, you don't have to summarize 60 different reports onto a singular page and submit to an executive. 459 00:51:50,376.6633333 --> 00:51:50,856.6633333 No. 460 00:51:51,736.6643333 --> 00:51:53,136.6643333 Executive does not... 461 00:51:53,366.6653333 --> 00:52:00,266.6623333 At, at an executive level, first of all, they shouldn't be the one integrating the information for themselves. 462 00:52:00,476.6653333 --> 00:52:07,186.6653333 They should be getting- Mm-hmm integrated information, and the information should make what's invisible, visible. 463 00:52:08,636.6653333 --> 00:52:10,416.6653333 That is the most- Ooh, tell me about that. 464 00:52:10,426.6623333 --> 00:52:10,446.6623333 Yeah. 465 00:52:10,476.6653333 --> 00:52:17,286.6673333 What's invisible, visible? Projects tend to stick to their milestone, finish milestone. 466 00:52:17,346.6613333 --> 00:52:26,896.6643333 We all know that, uh, in terms of cost performance, we can see that they have spent literally 20% of, uh, what was the plan, 50%. 467 00:52:26,986.6603333 --> 00:52:28,946.6633333 So there's 30% delay. 468 00:52:29,516.6593333 --> 00:52:41,606.6643333 But since the project is a five-year-long project, everybody's hoping that there's gonna be some other mega change, and under that change, we're going to envelop this extension of time and then extend the whole timeline. 469 00:52:41,956.6613333 --> 00:52:46,886.6683333 No one is ready to make the call that the project is going to have a cost blow and a time delay. 470 00:52:47,926.6623333 --> 00:52:57,406.6713333 Now, this is the job of, uh, of us of engineers and project managers and controls people to understand that and, and bring it to the surface. 471 00:52:57,926.6723333 --> 00:53:00,306.6773333 So we have formed, we have developed something very smart. 472 00:53:00,316.6793333 --> 00:53:05,406.6753333 Again, psychological safe environment, teams start trying innovative ideas. 473 00:53:06,96.6773333 --> 00:53:10,186.6763333 So someone in our team, they came up with this portfolio cost index. 474 00:53:11,96.6773333 --> 00:53:14,766.6733333 So it is the total duration of the project and the total cost. 475 00:53:14,916.6693333 --> 00:53:24,256.6803333 If the projects is less than 80% of its duration, which includes its business case, not only the delivery duration, the whole lifecycle duration of the project. 476 00:53:24,906.6753333 --> 00:53:39,546.6783333 If the project is before its 80% of this duration, and somehow it has spent more than 40%, there's going to be a cost escalation coming in So it's a very s- so we created an indicator out of it. 477 00:53:39,896.6783333 --> 00:53:42,206.6783333 So if it's, if it's one, it's going all right. 478 00:53:42,206.6783333 --> 00:53:43,946.6783333 It's less than one, there's something coming in. 479 00:53:44,996.6783333 --> 00:53:47,986.6793333 And the same way, created one for portfolio schedule index. 480 00:53:48,406.6793333 --> 00:53:50,956.6793333 A, a very simple one-point indicator. 481 00:53:51,356.6783333 --> 00:53:54,216.6793333 Just looking at that number, we can say that this project is going to have delays. 482 00:53:55,566.6793333 --> 00:54:06,626.6793333 So yes hundreds of reports, hundreds of applications, but the one that is useful for anyone is the one that provokes a thoughtful decision. 483 00:54:06,766.6803333 --> 00:54:11,46.6803333 That does not mean that we need to stop producing all those other reports. 484 00:54:12,576.6823333 --> 00:54:18,716.6803333 So if all the other progresses, uh, functions are progressing the way they should be progressing, so there's no news, the bad news. 485 00:54:19,126.6813333 --> 00:54:23,476.6813333 Here's another idea, right? So there was a time in our portfolio, everything was going good. 486 00:54:25,306.6783333 --> 00:54:28,266.6813333 We were hitting the cost, we were hitting the milestones. 487 00:54:29,636.6803333 --> 00:54:34,936.6793333 Then the reports started to pull out something very interesting. 488 00:54:35,816.6803333 --> 00:54:37,526.6793333 They started to look into the efficiency. 489 00:54:38,746.6803333 --> 00:54:52,346.6823333 Then we started to look at, oh, for a very particular project we spend, if a project is about, let's say 10, 10 months, out of this 10 months, we spend about six months or four months in just business cases. 490 00:54:53,206.6803333 --> 00:54:59,26.6793333 How can we fast-track that? So then we started coming up with an intervene, uh, intervention ideas. 491 00:54:59,76.6853333 --> 00:54:59,916.6793333 So then we start... 492 00:54:59,936.6783333 --> 00:55:05,656.6833333 That's where we started pulling in the governance, then we started pulling in, uh, these, uh, approaches. 493 00:55:05,696.6803333 --> 00:55:07,926.6793333 The sys- the processes needs to be broken down. 494 00:55:08,956.6823333 --> 00:55:23,76.6823333 Probably we need to see something smarter, something quicker, an early intervention of a contractor into the table, or having the past lessons learned on the similar business cases, considering that as an anchor point and pushing this business case faster. 495 00:55:23,436.6783333 --> 00:55:48,770.6843333 How can we make it quicker? So when there was no bad news, now the job is, how can you make the process efficient? So there is, that's what the purpose of the reporting structure is That's what our job is one thing you mentioned there too that's really cool, like one is that once you get to a moment of saying all the lights are green, that doesn't mean that the work is done. 496 00:55:48,780.6833333 --> 00:55:48,810.6833333 Yes. 497 00:55:49,210.6843333 --> 00:55:52,280.6843333 It means you get to start looking at making it even better. 498 00:55:52,860.6843333 --> 00:56:01,60.6833333 The other that I like about your indicator that you mentioned is it didn't point out what was wrong, it just said that something's wrong. 499 00:56:01,520.6843333 --> 00:56:12,30.6843333 But what if some indicators tell you that there's going to be a problem- Yeah but the answer is, okay, this might be in trouble, there's some trouble, but it's not necessarily saying what. 500 00:56:12,90.6843333 --> 00:56:13,260.6863333 Kind of like a stethoscope. 501 00:56:13,260.6863333 --> 00:56:20,210.6843333 You listen to someone's heart and you're like, maybe you can identify immediately a problem, or you could just be like, "This heartbeat's kinda wrong." 502 00:56:20,260.6853333 --> 00:56:22,880.6843333 We need to go in and do some tests and sort it out. 503 00:56:22,880.6843333 --> 00:56:36,660.6863333 And I feel like sometimes these dashboards, like kinda what you were saying there with your analytics, is like you're flagging things, not necessarily giving too much information over to the executives, so that they can- Yeah make good decisions basically. 504 00:56:37,260.6883333 --> 00:56:42,190.6823333 So we use those indicators so that we don't miss on a project. 505 00:56:42,980.6843333 --> 00:56:44,430.6843333 We don't pass it on to the executive. 506 00:56:45,300.6833333 --> 00:56:45,560.6833333 Ah. 507 00:56:45,570.6883333 --> 00:56:51,890.6803333 So that indicator is for me to see out of those 2,000 projects which one is the bad news. 508 00:56:53,512.6863333 --> 00:57:14,2.6858333 And I need to start escalating them, but am I going to just escalate them? Do I have enough response consolidated? Am I just a downer betting the organization always giving away bad news or I'm also I've identified the six projects, they are horrible, and they are all less than $10 million. 509 00:57:14,2.6858333 --> 00:57:36,42.6873333 So they are minor projects, small projects, right? So if I push this to an executive, it's just a waste of his time, unless one of them is a business critical, license critical, environmental critical project that could create an open court hearing for the executive to appear and defend the infrastructure capability. 510 00:57:36,942.6843333 --> 00:57:46,22.6833333 So that's where I would be straight away escalating it, and coming up with a steer co and coming up with a whole workshop and fixing it. 511 00:57:46,672.6833333 --> 00:57:49,802.6823333 Now, the trick is, you know, we're talking about trick. 512 00:57:50,382.6853333 --> 00:58:05,412.6893333 We have all been to a magician's shows, and magicians are trying to make us look at that red, uh, handkerchief revolving around a a hat or something, while with the other hand he's, uh, he's stealing in a whole pigeon into the hat. 513 00:58:06,82.6903333 --> 00:58:10,602.6863333 In a, in a, in a major project space, everyone is looking at a one big milestone. 514 00:58:10,612.6893333 --> 00:58:12,452.6893333 They're looking at three big projects. 515 00:58:12,462.6873333 --> 00:58:15,692.6873333 They're looking at six big systems or subsystems of delivery. 516 00:58:16,502.6883333 --> 00:58:27,547.6853333 They forget that the reason we are able to achieve, or the only way we are able to achieve those big major projects is because we are, we're really good in doing small jobs on time. 517 00:58:27,597.6903333 --> 00:58:28,917.6878333 It's Success is a pyramid. 518 00:58:28,967.6888333 --> 00:58:35,977.6898333 You need to have small habits as, uh, as the book of, uh, Atomic Habits says, right? It's not your failure, it's a system failure. 519 00:58:36,587.6888333 --> 00:58:39,627.6928333 And the system failure indicators happen at a very low level. 520 00:58:40,367.6958333 --> 00:58:42,897.6928333 That's where we need to p-pick up what's going wrong. 521 00:58:43,247.6928333 --> 00:58:51,377.6858333 So the purpose of those indicas- uh, indicators is for us to early identify the trends where things are going wrong. 522 00:58:51,957.6918333 --> 00:59:13,917.6838333 And if an organization or portfolio has more than, let's say, 20, 30% of their projects delayed or cost over, overspend, or unable to deliver the value they're trying to deliver after post, uh, post project value realization exercises, then the, the conversation is not on an individual, the conversation is on the process. 523 00:59:14,507.6868333 --> 00:59:17,647.6878333 Something is broken in the process, so that needs to be fixed. 524 00:59:18,297.6948333 --> 00:59:20,897.6938333 So that's the purpose, again, the portfolio. 525 00:59:21,227.6878333 --> 00:59:23,197.6818333 And I think you're gonna go into the governance at this point. 526 00:59:24,303.6928333 --> 00:59:39,983.6918333 And so one of my questions for you on this then, just, uh, kind of a governance question is you talked a little bit about building a dashboard and building executive intelligence, right? And then governance is that intelligence layer, but you have some passionate feelings about that. 527 00:59:39,983.6918333 --> 00:59:46,203.6918333 And then I also wanna tease, 'cause I think we're gonna talk a little bit about artificial intelligence since we're using the word, throwing it around. 528 00:59:46,673.6918333 --> 00:59:57,183.6928333 What is the difference for you between a dashboard and executive intelligence? And then you can riff on AI as well if you think there's a difference there or it comes into play somewhere on that. 529 00:59:58,83.6918333 --> 00:59:58,663.6918333 Yeah. 530 00:59:58,733.6898333 --> 01:00:00,873.6898333 I think, a dashboard is... 531 01:00:01,153.6918333 --> 01:00:04,153.6918333 We, in this time and age, information is cheap. 532 01:00:05,613.6908333 --> 01:00:06,763.6908333 It's not telling me anything. 533 01:00:06,823.6908333 --> 01:00:07,743.6928333 That's a dashboard. 534 01:00:07,773.6908333 --> 01:00:16,443.6948333 That's a dashboard for a subject matter expert, just like all those, portfolio cost indicators and, portfolio time indicators we talked about. 535 01:00:16,933.6958333 --> 01:00:20,623.6918333 They are for a subject matter expert to identify the pulse. 536 01:00:21,723.6968333 --> 01:00:29,953.6898333 For an executive, for someone senior in the organization, the, it needs to be a very simple what is happening. 537 01:00:30,783.6938333 --> 01:00:46,145.6948333 Is the portfolio going good or bad? If it's going good or bad- What does it mean? So what? First part is what this organization is, what the portfolio is, is, is going as per plan. 538 01:00:46,405.6948333 --> 01:00:47,395.6938333 Let's say it's not. 539 01:00:48,135.6948333 --> 01:00:54,745.6948333 So X, Y, Z programs or wastewater treatment facilities are not progressing as they should be progressing, as an example. 540 01:00:55,305.6938333 --> 01:01:15,655.6978333 So the so what part is, so what does it mean? Should they be progressing as per the plan? What is the risk appetite on that? What is the asset conditions on those areas? Are there any water overflows? What's-- why we are even doing that project to start with? So that's where you start scratching your head, and then the dashboards go out of the picture. 541 01:01:16,5.6968333 --> 01:01:20,25.6988333 Dashboard only work the first part of the canvas, which is giving you the what. 542 01:01:20,955.6968333 --> 01:01:31,355.6998333 Now for so what, you look at the value proposition, you look at the enterprise objectives, and then you see, okay, so bad news was the projects are not going on time. 543 01:01:31,515.7008333 --> 01:01:34,285.7008333 Well, the good news is we don't need them anytime sooner either. 544 01:01:35,785.7008333 --> 01:01:51,925.7008333 So the deadlines we identified, we have had operational intervention while we kickstarted the project, and those operational interventions are going to hold the whole facility very good for way beyond the delay time. 545 01:01:53,285.6978333 --> 01:01:53,565.6978333 Good. 546 01:01:53,685.6988333 --> 01:01:54,875.6988333 So that is a so what. 547 01:01:54,995.6968333 --> 01:02:08,335.7088333 Now, last part is now what? Now, the direction for an executive or an advice to an executive is, it needs to be written there that no action, standby, only for endorsement. 548 01:02:08,855.7048333 --> 01:02:11,395.7038333 Now, if, if we need an executive to intervene... 549 01:02:12,145.7058333 --> 01:02:20,995.7048333 For example, the operations facilities were not ready, so then we would say the intervention required to discuss and, uh, alert the operational facility. 550 01:02:20,995.7048333 --> 01:02:30,495.7028333 So now this general manager will talk to the other general manager and put-- make sure that this concern is on their list and they are not, uh, waiting for a surprise on their end. 551 01:02:30,835.7088333 --> 01:02:33,935.7068333 So that is a difference between a dashboard and an executive report. 552 01:02:35,445.7018333 --> 01:02:39,305.7028333 So dashboard is a very subject matter expert, very primitive. 553 01:02:39,915.7028333 --> 01:02:45,575.7038333 People will be laughing when I say primitive, but yeah, dashboard could be primitive depending on where you're sitting in the organization. 554 01:02:46,85.7088333 --> 01:02:53,621.7078333 It could be something meaning nothing to someone I have a question on this 'cause I, I absolutely agree. 555 01:02:53,621.7078333 --> 01:03:05,81.7068333 I think what you're pointing out is that, dashboards and executive intelligence are two different things, and the dashboard gets you the first part of the sword, maybe the holster. 556 01:03:05,261.7068333 --> 01:03:05,411.7068333 Yeah. 557 01:03:05,411.7068333 --> 01:03:16,921.7068333 And then to build out the rest, you need to contextualize everything from the executive's point of view to help them understand the impact, and then frame up this piece. 558 01:03:16,981.7068333 --> 01:03:28,681.7088333 So now my question, is AI going to help with governance or not? First we need to go to the governance. 559 01:03:29,491.7078333 --> 01:03:29,781.7078333 Yeah. 560 01:03:30,441.7088333 --> 01:03:32,341.7078333 So I used to be... 561 01:03:32,341.7078333 --> 01:03:37,111.7068333 I'm gonna admit, I used to be the one who always thought governance is an overhead. 562 01:03:38,821.7058333 --> 01:03:40,301.7068333 It's just another template. 563 01:03:40,431.7068333 --> 01:03:43,251.7048333 It's just another meeting or workshop we have to sit in. 564 01:03:44,201.7068333 --> 01:03:55,581.7098333 But as I said, over the last five years where my horizon of expertise expanded and my thinking expanded, man, oh man, I'm in love with governance. 565 01:03:55,581.7098333 --> 01:03:59,811.7058333 Governance is basically the medium in which we operate and we make the right decisions. 566 01:03:59,951.7068333 --> 01:04:06,371.7038333 As, as per the book of Atomic Habits, it talks about the system, and your system defines your success. 567 01:04:06,721.7038333 --> 01:04:08,451.7018333 That is what governance is. 568 01:04:09,431.7028333 --> 01:04:13,181.7008333 It is building that system which is going to define your success or failure. 569 01:04:14,241.7008333 --> 01:04:21,851.7058333 And if in your business you think your governance is not good, well, that is actually, you should be feeling because most likely not good. 570 01:04:22,731.7058333 --> 01:04:29,571.7008333 Bad governance creates a red tape, bureaucratic kind of environment, and a good governance creates clarity. 571 01:04:30,871.7058333 --> 01:04:32,261.7038333 That is number one. 572 01:04:33,131.6998333 --> 01:04:33,311.6998333 The... 573 01:04:33,381.7028333 --> 01:04:39,831.7108333 i'm a recent convert and a firm believer of governance, and I think with the role of AI... 574 01:04:40,511.7038333 --> 01:04:43,711.7098333 Now, machines are machines, right? They are not accountable. 575 01:04:43,901.7108333 --> 01:04:45,361.7058333 They can't be held accountable. 576 01:04:46,431.7088333 --> 01:04:52,1.7042333 AI is, we ha- we all have used, I think it started, uh, how long ago? I think only four years ago, five years ago at least. 577 01:04:52,51.7042333 --> 01:04:58,821.6952333 ChatGPT was launched, and we have seen the miracle of it doing so many things, and now we've gone lazy. 578 01:04:58,871.6962333 --> 01:05:01,491.7052333 We are asking ChatGPT to write our emails even. 579 01:05:02,881.7092333 --> 01:05:05,421.7082333 That's the reality for most of us, but that's... 580 01:05:05,661.7072333 --> 01:05:18,631.7132333 Machine is not accountable, so when you sign an email written by a ChatGPT to someone completely giving away a very different message, well, no one is going to come back and ask ChatGPT why they did that. 581 01:05:18,831.7062333 --> 01:05:21,1.7182333 You are responsible and accountable for it. 582 01:05:21,371.7142333 --> 01:05:46,479.7152333 The same way in an organization Every decision that a governance needs to kick off, every clarity, every bottleneck, every new process, every investment decision, every progress review, anything that needs to be signed off or reviewed by s- any individual that had to be a human because a machine cannot be set accountable. 583 01:05:46,899.7152333 --> 01:06:26,765.7182333 Now, where would AI be helpful in that picture? AI would be helping that person who is going to sign a sign off to, again, as we said, from a plethora of data points Pull out a trend, give that governance, uh, sign-off, manager to identify, yeah, if I'm going ahead with this, what are the possible scenarios that it can go? So it can quickly churn that down, it can quickly develop those, those Monte Carlo scenarios or, uh, now, i- it's so surprising in ChatGPT or in Claude, you can upload a data and run a Monte Carlo analysis with 100 simulations. 584 01:06:26,765.7182333 --> 01:06:30,655.7162333 You don't even have to install those, uh, big softwares- Yeah that we used to do long time ago, remember? Mm-hmm. 585 01:06:31,255.7172333 --> 01:06:33,515.7162333 So those things are becoming easier. 586 01:06:34,75.7172333 --> 01:06:42,55.7172333 But again, we can only do that because we learned how to use the other tool long time ago, so it's easier for us. 587 01:06:42,385.7172333 --> 01:06:45,455.7162333 If you know what you are looking for, it's easier. 588 01:06:46,15.7182333 --> 01:06:59,145.7152333 But if someone is sitting on an AI or at a governance position and have no idea how to use the either of the two, is number one, bad at governance, number two, horrible in using an AI, well, that is a recipe of disaster. 589 01:07:00,375.7152333 --> 01:07:02,155.7162333 So we'll be gone. 590 01:07:04,45.7132333 --> 01:07:09,755.7142333 Well, and you mentioned, so you mentioned that you are, were a recent convert to believing in governance. 591 01:07:09,755.7142333 --> 01:07:09,805.7162333 Yes. 592 01:07:09,805.7162333 --> 01:07:11,125.7192333 I think that's not uncommon. 593 01:07:11,125.7192333 --> 01:07:17,175.7132333 I think many people don't really see it as an important piece of a functioning organization. 594 01:07:17,175.7182333 --> 01:07:39,105.7212333 What changed your mind? Yeah, when I started to see, when I was in the board role, and, uh, I was, working through developing the board, writing up the bylaws, a- and trying to understand how a very well put together governance structure can transform the whole, the operations completely. 595 01:07:39,985.7222333 --> 01:07:42,335.7202333 The reason operations are failing is because of governance. 596 01:07:42,935.7192333 --> 01:07:46,175.7242333 Governance, ensures a clear accountability. 597 01:07:46,425.7182333 --> 01:08:01,295.7242333 It gives an ownership, and it's, uh, believe it or not, it creates that psychological safety in the organization because that, one of the key component of a psychological safety is clarity that who is responsible for it. 598 01:08:02,115.7212333 --> 01:08:08,875.7262333 If, uh, if Orion is responsible to find a solution for a delayed project, Orion is going to figure it out. 599 01:08:09,515.7222333 --> 01:08:18,975.7142333 But if no one is responsible for it, then no one's going to figure it out, or it's just going to be a passing of the, "Oh yeah, we all need to, six of us sit together and discuss how we should resolve this." 600 01:08:19,25.7142333 --> 01:08:36,497.7182333 So- Yeah when the accountabilities are clear, now Orion is going to get six people in the room, and Orion is going to identify an agenda for these people to discuss what the outcome they want to do is going to drive results So that's how governance very simply, simply put, uh, achieves. 601 01:08:36,717.7182333 --> 01:08:39,427.7182333 And I saw it firsthand, implementing in the board. 602 01:08:39,497.7182333 --> 01:08:44,227.7182333 Secondly, when I came to Sydney Water, our governance team, he's my colleague, he's doing amazing job. 603 01:08:44,317.7172333 --> 01:08:48,667.7172333 And whenever I see what we could achieve with the better governance, oh my God, I was... 604 01:08:49,487.7182333 --> 01:09:01,447.7192333 Every, every time I'm shocked by looking at things, all those board reports, how they go, how the state goes, how the decision points coming across, uh, for business cases, how governance is providing this as a filter. 605 01:09:01,667.7172333 --> 01:09:05,87.7172333 It's literally the median the whole organization is progressing in. 606 01:09:05,807.7162333 --> 01:09:13,307.7162333 Previously when I was working in, even in major projects, I was not exposed to governance the way I am exposed to it, and I am, uh... 607 01:09:13,507.7142333 --> 01:09:15,407.7132333 Yeah, so that's, that's my reason for convert. 608 01:09:16,687.7142333 --> 01:09:19,107.7132333 That makes a lot of sense. 609 01:09:19,227.7152333 --> 01:09:21,847.7152333 You call it the median of the organization. 610 01:09:21,847.7152333 --> 01:09:30,357.7102333 It is a truly, I like how you tie it back to psychological safety, because I do think that clarity is necessary because someone gets blame. 611 01:09:30,667.7132333 --> 01:09:34,267.7172333 Like blame is a currency that, that finds people. 612 01:09:34,607.7152333 --> 01:09:45,737.7122333 So if you don't have clear roles and responsibilities, you create this sort of blame debt that seeps into the organization somehow, can be really problematic. 613 01:09:45,757.7102333 --> 01:09:51,777.7062333 True creating that structure that org- that people can pour themselves into can be really helpful. 614 01:09:51,787.7082333 --> 01:09:56,477.7102333 Um- And that's how it links with AI, right? You cannot outsource accountability. 615 01:09:57,667.7102333 --> 01:10:00,557.7082333 You cannot outsource accountability into, particularly to an al- algorithm. 616 01:10:01,557.7082333 --> 01:10:16,127.7082333 So will AI improve decision-making then, do you think, ultimately just by pulling in more information? But the problem is which decisions and how we're going to ask AI to run that analysis, that's not clear. 617 01:10:16,157.7072333 --> 01:10:26,737.7082333 The, the prompt engineering part of a decision-making of or anyone who's using AI, how articulate they are into throwing in a good quality prompt. 618 01:10:27,397.7072333 --> 01:10:31,117.7072333 The use of AI between you and I is very, could be very different. 619 01:10:31,737.7062333 --> 01:10:33,7.7062333 Your AI is going to be... 620 01:10:33,207.7072333 --> 01:10:48,697.7062333 I can already tell it will be very much geared towards how to get a very successful podcast structured, right? Mine is geared towards all about, executive decision-making point and how portfolio management links with, uh, upstream and downstream in an organization. 621 01:10:49,527.7062333 --> 01:10:58,517.7062333 Now, the decisions you're going to be asking for an AI is going to be always skewed towards your interests, and my answers will be towards my interest. 622 01:10:59,57.7052333 --> 01:11:09,337.7112333 So it is now more than before a bigger responsibility on, per se, governance that they identify that framework. 623 01:11:10,127.7042333 --> 01:11:28,747.7132333 So if we are going to use an AI, what parameters are going to be? What is going to be the mirroring that they're going to pick up, AI is going to pick up? What kind of, decisions it's going to outlist and then how we come about choosing what we're going to be doing with those answers that we get from AI. 624 01:11:29,197.7152333 --> 01:11:30,617.7172333 That need to be documented. 625 01:11:30,867.7132333 --> 01:11:32,277.7142333 That need to be clearly recorded. 626 01:11:32,837.7142333 --> 01:11:35,247.7122333 I have already kickstarted this, within my team. 627 01:11:35,397.7122333 --> 01:11:42,207.7162333 If they use AI and they create an artifact, don't save the artifact alone, also save the prompt. 628 01:11:43,337.7152333 --> 01:11:43,817.7172333 Mm-hmm. 629 01:11:44,197.7152333 --> 01:11:50,937.7142333 Because that is going to help you understand in future what you did, because that output is based off that prompt. 630 01:11:50,997.7112333 --> 01:11:53,577.7162333 That prompt is a scope of work for AI. 631 01:11:55,377.7172333 --> 01:12:02,697.7172333 Well, and, and this gets into something you talk a lot about, don't automate a process that's broken with technology. 632 01:12:02,797.7172333 --> 01:12:11,587.7172333 So here's my question: garbage in, garbage out has been the mantra from the tech space for a long time, right? You can't put garbage into a dashboard- Yeah make it pretty. 633 01:12:12,17.7162333 --> 01:12:26,767.7182333 But with AI, it almost turns into like garbage in, super tasty looking cookies out that poison you, right? Because it's so good at convincing people that the presentation it's giving is factual and true. 634 01:12:27,357.7162333 --> 01:12:28,117.7192333 Is it this... 635 01:12:28,227.7192333 --> 01:12:39,747.7172333 Are we looking at some sort of false confidence at scale problem here when AI is starting to work its way into the boardroom and governance layers with bad data feeding it? 100%. 636 01:12:40,837.7202333 --> 01:12:42,247.7172333 That is the biggest risk. 637 01:12:42,977.7192333 --> 01:13:08,517.7162333 So the, I was reading this book, Rapid Transformation by Catriona Wallace, and she's, uh, referring to Toby Ord, a gentleman who wrote this piece that the use of or reliance on AI could result in, uh, catastrophic declines in this, uh, civilization that may result to an extinct of the civilization, one in 12 chances or something like that. 638 01:13:09,287.7212333 --> 01:13:13,727.7192333 For us, of all of us dying from a nuclear attack is about one in 5,000 chances. 639 01:13:14,577.7222333 --> 01:13:17,37.7222333 So that is the biggest fear. 640 01:13:17,297.7152333 --> 01:13:24,755.7202333 And I think you have pointed out very correctly AI produces beautiful data information. 641 01:13:24,905.7202333 --> 01:13:29,375.7202333 It articulates it so well, but it's all sometimes garbage. 642 01:13:30,475.7192333 --> 01:13:42,815.7182333 I think by the time we are-- we release this podcast, maybe everybody has come across that, famous online meme where a gentleman is asking AI, "I'm going to get my car for a car wash. 643 01:13:43,345.7182333 --> 01:13:45,465.7192333 It's only 200 meters from my house. 644 01:13:45,715.7192333 --> 01:13:52,475.7192333 Shall I walk or drive?" AI recommends to drive And provides very good reasoning. 645 01:13:52,545.7192333 --> 01:13:54,35.7202333 "It's only 200 meters. 646 01:13:54,495.7202333 --> 01:13:56,135.7202333 You have a health goal in your life. 647 01:13:56,155.7202333 --> 01:14:00,775.7182333 You were talking to me the other day about taking those pills, about, uh, reducing your cholesterol. 648 01:14:01,295.7192333 --> 01:14:04,435.7192333 So I think it's really good if you, if you walk to the car wash." 649 01:14:04,985.7202333 --> 01:14:09,745.7182333 And very articulate, very sensible- Mm-hmm and very very influential. 650 01:14:09,745.7182333 --> 01:14:10,365.7182333 Very wrong. 651 01:14:10,495.7182333 --> 01:14:10,925.7182333 Yeah. 652 01:14:11,845.7172333 --> 01:14:17,835.7172333 And, uh, but again, we are smart enough to understand what-- and we, we knew what we were trying to chase. 653 01:14:17,865.7172333 --> 01:14:31,65.7222333 Imagine asking a very complex question, which you are yourself not, not so clear about it, asking it to, to solve a mathematical equation or probability of consequences of five million people living in a city. 654 01:14:31,735.7202333 --> 01:14:39,475.7192333 So that's not really an ideal place to put that kind of trust in AI or per se any system. 655 01:14:41,305.7202333 --> 01:14:47,175.7222333 We need to develop a very stronger understanding on how and for what we're going to be using AI. 656 01:14:47,525.7212333 --> 01:14:52,375.7192333 AIs have definitely earned a spot in our workplaces, in our individual lives. 657 01:14:52,725.7182333 --> 01:15:03,545.7192333 We are using everything and anything with AI, but it is heavily dependent on, again, f- fool with a tool is still a fool, but it's a dangerous fool. 658 01:15:04,725.7182333 --> 01:15:15,685.7202333 A decision using-- with garbage data, you're throwing it in AI, it's going to output an absolutely convincing garbage out, which you may be convinced to use. 659 01:15:15,685.7202333 --> 01:15:19,405.7212333 So once again, human in the loop is becoming more important. 660 01:15:19,445.7202333 --> 01:15:21,455.7182333 People think AI is going to steal their job. 661 01:15:21,575.7242333 --> 01:15:24,255.7122333 I think that AI is going to redefine what you do. 662 01:15:25,519.7222333 --> 01:15:28,949.7222333 It's going to take the boring part of your job Yeah. 663 01:15:28,949.7222333 --> 01:15:36,69.7222333 What do you think people are gonna need to do over the next five years to change It's going to be a lot of critical thinking. 664 01:15:36,369.7222333 --> 01:15:39,199.7222333 It's going to be a lot of psychological safe environments. 665 01:15:41,699.7222333 --> 01:15:47,49.7222333 It's going to be a lot more of this, uh, governance, uh, and critical thinking. 666 01:15:47,69.7212333 --> 01:15:48,819.7212333 AI is going to make things easier. 667 01:15:48,949.7212333 --> 01:16:00,359.7212333 I'm pretty sure in a month or a year or two there's going to be a widget from one of those AIs that speaks with SAP, P6, and contract, and churns project reports like an expert. 668 01:16:01,339.7222333 --> 01:16:20,59.7192333 But again, was the contract drafted carefully? Is the schedule, when someone built the schedule, it was built on the site conditions or not? The SAP work breakdown structure and cost breakdown structure is linked appropriately enough so the lender of financier's confidence remains intact. 669 01:16:20,459.7172333 --> 01:16:25,869.7192333 So all those questions is- Going to be very much human dependent to make sure that we do that. 670 01:16:26,309.7162333 --> 01:16:40,116.3819 So the job of a, per se, a project manager, controls manager, is not going to be working on these formats, uh, Excel or, I think Excel will outlive any one of us, but, uh, it's not We've been calling for the death of Excel for a while now. 671 01:16:41,206.3809 --> 01:16:42,466.3839 No, it's never gonna die out. 672 01:16:43,96.3809 --> 01:16:43,236.3809 Yeah. 673 01:16:43,236.3809 --> 01:16:55,676.3799 So the other systems, uh, which we extensively use, and we spend a lot of time in, in loading this information and, and making it presentable or palatable, that will be done by someone else, which is going to be an AI. 674 01:16:56,316.3819 --> 01:17:09,916.3769 How do you- Yeah how do you check it? How do you build your controls around it? For example, I see so many people talking about, "Oh, Claude is going to make all those mobile phone applications, and, uh, all those coders are going to be jobless." 675 01:17:10,46.3779 --> 01:17:11,616.3769 Well, no, excuse me. 676 01:17:12,948.3829 --> 01:17:20,38.3829 So you mean if I need an application, I just go to Claude and create an application? Well, I'm a civil engineer, I'm dumb in that area. 677 01:17:20,628.3829 --> 01:17:27,298.3829 Claude can create anything for me, and I'll be using it and trusting it to produce an outcome that I want it to. 678 01:17:27,588.3819 --> 01:17:27,958.3819 No. 679 01:17:28,218.3819 --> 01:17:32,708.3819 It is going to only help a coder to achieve something quicker. 680 01:17:33,898.3819 --> 01:17:40,218.3819 The same way before the, the biggest transformation we had with letters, construction sites. 681 01:17:40,238.3809 --> 01:17:44,288.3819 My dad used to tell me the story that in his table there used to be two baskets. 682 01:17:44,678.3829 --> 01:17:45,38.3799 That's it. 683 01:17:45,878.3799 --> 01:17:57,88.3809 I said, "What do you mean?" He said one basket had in written on it, and the other basket had out written on it, and that was the inbox and outbox of the email, of the, of the letters. 684 01:17:57,218.3799 --> 01:18:01,338.3799 So before all these different computers and everything, that's how they were communicating. 685 01:18:02,358.3799 --> 01:18:12,288.3819 A letter, he would, he would write a letter response to a letter and put this in an outbox and somebody would come every 30 minutes, collect everything from the outbox and give it away and distribute it to... 686 01:18:12,318.3819 --> 01:18:17,548.3769 And one message will take, I think, six, seven days to be communicated across. 687 01:18:18,258.3839 --> 01:18:26,58.3799 So that communication time has reduced to almost immediate with Teams, with emails- Yeah with everything. 688 01:18:27,18.3789 --> 01:18:28,268.3789 And now look at a Zoom call. 689 01:18:28,278.3809 --> 01:18:34,948.3819 We are sitting continents apart, and we are communicating effectively, and that has made the things faster. 690 01:18:35,618.3769 --> 01:18:38,318.3829 The pace of things are, is way, way, way quicker. 691 01:18:38,998.3819 --> 01:18:41,108.3799 This is what AI is essentially going to do. 692 01:18:41,228.3779 --> 01:18:45,788.3789 It's going to change this perception of time a bit different for us. 693 01:18:45,848.3769 --> 01:18:52,118.3729 So if you and I, we have to develop a schedule from scratch up, we will still go old school. 694 01:18:52,398.3729 --> 01:19:12,648.3749 We would create a work breakdown structure, identify some key milestones, and start connecting dots, look at the resource constraints- Yeah the cost spending constraints, and we build something around that, right? But in the future, control people would be just using, getting that draft output straight away from AI and they will be just fine-tuning it. 695 01:19:13,38.3779 --> 01:19:21,28.3819 And there needs to be a different curriculum that needs to be taught to these kids, which is going to- Mm-hmm make them smart in identifying what's wrong in it. 696 01:19:21,858.3809 --> 01:19:23,258.3829 And I think it's gonna be... 697 01:19:23,348.3709 --> 01:19:29,218.3769 If, if it was going to take you and me 14 days to develop a schedule end to end, new generation is going to take 14 minutes. 698 01:19:30,98.3739 --> 01:19:30,388.3739 Yeah. 699 01:19:30,468.3689 --> 01:19:30,948.3689 Simple. 700 01:19:31,378.3719 --> 01:19:32,768.3809 So that's the biggest impact. 701 01:19:34,28.3839 --> 01:19:45,358.3829 And what's exciting about that is the economic principle that is so counterintuitive that if you bring the the cost of production down, demand goes up. 702 01:19:45,368.3839 --> 01:19:45,388.3839 Yeah. 703 01:19:45,868.3839 --> 01:19:46,678.3839 So people are always... 704 01:19:46,918.3839 --> 01:19:57,558.3829 Sometimes you think if you squeeze something, like you can create sugar cubes, and it used to take hand, putting them together, whatever, and now we can produce them like a billion sugar cubes a second. 705 01:19:57,958.3839 --> 01:20:03,768.3819 But demand for sugar cubes went absolutely through the roof as the per unit cost went down. 706 01:20:03,808.3829 --> 01:20:03,878.3829 Yeah. 707 01:20:03,908.3819 --> 01:20:22,228.3859 So similar with project controls if what we do as a profession gets squeezed so that the value we currently create can be done in 14 minutes rather than 14 days, the demand for that work will actually go up because there's so much more that we need to be doing anyhow. 708 01:20:22,228.3879 --> 01:20:23,218.3879 So I think there is this... 709 01:20:23,678.3849 --> 01:20:45,78.3809 Yeah, I think the fear is unfounded that people won't be involved, and I think you're, I think what we'll see is people sort of elevating the craft- Correct so that we're not stuck in PERT charts and, traditional project management sinkholes of our time in Excel, um, and focusing more on value and planning and thinking through scenarios. 710 01:20:45,158.3829 --> 01:20:50,148.3869 It's gonna be really, it's gonna be a really good time to become a project controller, I think. 711 01:20:50,318.3869 --> 01:20:53,928.3829 Controller and project manager and a project leader is gonna be so interesting. 712 01:20:53,938.3819 --> 01:20:56,88.3859 And this is, I think, where the opportunity is for... 713 01:20:56,168.3849 --> 01:21:05,78.3819 And I, I, believe it or not, for the last six month, this thought has crossed my mind multiple times to kickstart a small startup on this area. 714 01:21:05,748.3869 --> 01:21:26,428.3869 How can we transform and how can, how can we hand hold this transformation of project controls and project management into the AI world? Yeah while we remain, while we keep the existing curriculum intact and creating some, some interim methods and processes and standards that people can utilize. 715 01:21:26,788.3819 --> 01:21:29,238.3819 So that's, uh, yeah, that's I think something going... 716 01:21:29,278.3869 --> 01:21:32,258.3819 If I'm not gonna do it, somebody else will do it 100%. 717 01:21:32,998.3819 --> 01:21:35,228.3819 That is, that is the hour of the need at the moment. 718 01:21:35,318.3829 --> 01:21:39,288.3749 I hope you do it 'cause I will be first to line up for some of that advice, 'cause it is. 719 01:21:39,338.3799 --> 01:21:46,518.3849 We're in a period of transition it there will be an old world and a new world that we're moving through that space right now. 720 01:21:46,688.3849 --> 01:21:48,428.3769 Um, it can be kind of scary. 721 01:21:49,218.3839 --> 01:21:49,848.3859 It can be. 722 01:21:49,888.3819 --> 01:21:50,148.3819 Yeah. 723 01:21:50,328.3849 --> 01:21:57,62.3849 But forewarned is forearmed, right? So if you prepare yourself better, you can face it better. 724 01:21:58,12.3849 --> 01:21:58,692.3849 That's right. 725 01:21:59,732.3849 --> 01:22:03,32.3849 And l- and there are limitations to AI, and that's where your strength is. 726 01:22:03,652.3849 --> 01:22:10,522.3849 And then when all the weaknesses that you had previously, um, we need to exploit them and convert them into an opportunity. 727 01:22:11,412.3839 --> 01:22:12,542.3839 That's what it is all about. 728 01:22:14,192.3839 --> 01:22:14,852.3839 I have this theory. 729 01:22:14,852.3839 --> 01:22:22,562.3849 It's probably totally wrong, but you know that quadrant where it's like you know what you know, you know what you don't know, and you don't know what you don't know. 730 01:22:22,572.3849 --> 01:22:22,932.3849 Mm-hmm. 731 01:22:22,932.3849 --> 01:22:27,682.3879 I think with AI, the people that focus on minimizing the... 732 01:22:27,882.3899 --> 01:22:36,642.3879 Understanding the things that they don't know is, the more that grows, and then they can minimize this don't know bucket, 'cause I think that's where AI can take advantage of you. 733 01:22:36,642.3879 --> 01:22:43,132.3869 Like, da Vinci is maybe, like, the most successful picture of someone I would see in the AI era. 734 01:22:43,232.3879 --> 01:22:52,722.3899 Like, sort of really knows what they don't know, doesn't have this as much of a gap because that's where we, where AI is gonna magnify our troubles. 735 01:22:53,122.3869 --> 01:22:57,622.3829 AI is not a sentient being whereas, as far as I understand, it's not. 736 01:22:57,782.3829 --> 01:23:03,492.3829 It's basically as a librarian of a very big library. 737 01:23:04,362.3779 --> 01:23:06,312.3779 If you ask anything, they're going to go... 738 01:23:06,312.3819 --> 01:23:09,402.3789 this is why they're called LLMs, right? Large language models. 739 01:23:09,942.3789 --> 01:23:18,152.3849 So if you ask anything, they're going to go through and shuffle through 10,000 or a million books and come back and compile an answer in a palatable form and dish it out to you. 740 01:23:18,932.3799 --> 01:23:23,282.3809 But they're not going to be able to know something which they don't know either. 741 01:23:23,462.3809 --> 01:23:36,422.3719 So the creativity part, the innovation part, and I think there's gonna be way more research required in future because AI need to be fed with something to churn out- Yeah better, more intelligent outputs. 742 01:23:37,92.3789 --> 01:23:38,812.3819 So I think they, they... 743 01:23:39,412.3819 --> 01:23:44,142.3729 I have people think that all the research will be, be impaired now because AI can give any answer. 744 01:23:44,242.3719 --> 01:23:44,732.3719 No. 745 01:23:45,22.3709 --> 01:23:46,872.3719 AI is actually looking through the research papers. 746 01:23:47,132.3719 --> 01:23:49,292.3709 AI is not creating their own research. 747 01:23:50,172.3799 --> 01:23:50,462.3799 Yeah. 748 01:23:50,472.3829 --> 01:23:53,992.3749 So I think that's where education needs to happen as well at a mass level. 749 01:23:55,60.3829 --> 01:24:09,650.3829 Well, and I do think this is a valid critique of AI and one that we're going through two transformative moments in, at the same time, which is, in 2000 when the internet came out, people were like, "Oh my God, all of the world's information's gonna be at your fingertips." 750 01:24:09,700.3829 --> 01:24:13,510.3819 But then copyrights came in and said, "No, that's not true." 751 01:24:13,520.3819 --> 01:24:18,280.3829 Like, Google can't spider every known book and give you the answer. 752 01:24:18,300.3819 --> 01:24:23,410.3829 So we ended up kind of never getting that information at your fingertips moment. 753 01:24:23,730.3829 --> 01:24:28,190.3809 But with AI, it's almost like a sneaky end around on copyright. 754 01:24:28,210.3799 --> 01:24:31,980.3809 So it can ingest all these books and actually give you all this information. 755 01:24:31,980.3809 --> 01:24:42,420.3829 So we're having this moment that we thought we would in the 2000s today, along with this sort of odd autonomous agent thinking thing to also go with it. 756 01:24:42,630.3819 --> 01:24:45,760.3809 So it's sort of like two things happening at once. 757 01:24:45,910.3809 --> 01:24:53,470.3829 Access to the Alexandria Library and the sort of autonomous robotic intelligentsias, uh, floating around. 758 01:24:53,470.3829 --> 01:24:58,810.3849 And, and also to give a perspective on the unknowns, right? How much unknowns we have in life. 759 01:25:00,240.3829 --> 01:25:09,750.3819 For the entirety of a human civilization, even before I think we were not human, we were something else, we knew how to run, right? We have been running. 760 01:25:09,760.3839 --> 01:25:09,790.3799 Mm-hmm. 761 01:25:09,800.3849 --> 01:25:19,830.3779 A man has been running for billions of years, and it has been studied, it's been identified how you can learn longer, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. 762 01:25:20,760.3839 --> 01:25:28,210.3749 So it was in 1982, there was a Westfield, is a, is a developer for shopping malls and other things in Sydney, uh, Australia. 763 01:25:28,710.3819 --> 01:25:33,650.3739 They had this competition, a race between Sydney and Melbourne, about 870 kilometers. 764 01:25:34,900.3759 --> 01:25:38,240.3749 And whoever wins this race, they're going to get this handsome amount of money. 765 01:25:38,570.3739 --> 01:25:40,770.3689 So all the top racers participated. 766 01:25:40,770.3689 --> 01:25:42,350.3679 It was a global marathon situation. 767 01:25:43,20.3709 --> 01:25:50,950.3679 People came up with their, literally entourage and the crew with the doctors and the physiotherapists and running therapists, et cetera. 768 01:25:51,690.3699 --> 01:26:00,630.3679 And there come a 70 or 60-year-old gentleman called Cliff Young, you can look it up, his story, wearing, uh, farmer's gumboots. 769 01:26:01,440.3729 --> 01:26:02,940.3749 To the starting line and started running. 770 01:26:03,0.3739 --> 01:26:12,800.3739 No, sorry, he changed his gumboots to the sneakers, and everybody was looking at him like, "What is he going to do?" And he had no one, no sports system, no doctors, no physiotherapists, no one with him. 771 01:26:14,360.3769 --> 01:26:15,360.3869 And he started running. 772 01:26:15,460.3829 --> 01:26:27,740.3789 So the protocol everybody else was using through a known way of running was we're going to run for certain hours, then we're going to rest for certain nights, and then we run, we drink water, we have this kind of diet, blah, blah, blah. 773 01:26:27,770.3799 --> 01:26:28,980.3799 They were all protocols. 774 01:26:29,610.3769 --> 01:26:36,98.3839 This gentleman had no protocol He just started running in a shuffle manner, a slow run. 775 01:26:36,168.3839 --> 01:26:43,678.3839 Actually, it was called Cliff Young Shuffle, that's the name now, and he finished the race, which was anticipated to be finished in 10 days, in five days. 776 01:26:44,758.3839 --> 01:26:45,378.3839 Wow. 777 01:26:45,388.3839 --> 01:26:53,508.3829 He didn't stop for five days, because the way he was running was not consuming enough of his body's energy, and he had so much energy to keep on running. 778 01:26:53,508.3829 --> 01:26:54,178.3839 So look it up. 779 01:26:54,608.3829 --> 01:26:58,828.3829 It's an amazing YouTube, thing you will find, and that became a whole new... 780 01:26:58,968.3819 --> 01:27:01,18.3819 That was, at that moment, global. 781 01:27:01,178.3809 --> 01:27:03,378.3829 People identify, oh, there's a new way of running. 782 01:27:05,388.3819 --> 01:27:09,978.3809 Although we've been running for billions of years- Yeah we didn't know there was a new way of run. 783 01:27:11,378.3799 --> 01:27:25,518.3819 So taking that example, that's the, that's the miracle of a human being, that we have just so much possibility of endless creativity that AI would never be able to meet, keep up with that. 784 01:27:26,48.3819 --> 01:27:28,148.3799 We're gonna get on a list having this conversation. 785 01:27:28,958.3819 --> 01:27:31,838.3849 So I hope, uh, AI is that good. 786 01:27:31,938.3849 --> 01:27:33,578.3879 It just makes life easier for everybody. 787 01:27:33,588.3869 --> 01:27:47,358.3819 AI should be able to treat cancer, should be able to treat all the babies, should be able to bring in peace and green energy and all those things, and strengthen global economy, elevate property, pro- poverty, trafficking, everything. 788 01:27:47,558.3839 --> 01:27:58,598.3869 So it should be able to do that, I really hope, but at the moment, it just appears to be a very eloquent tool that we use to analyze and do things that some- sometimes we would take months to do. 789 01:27:58,988.3899 --> 01:28:00,458.3889 We just do it in a couple of hours. 790 01:28:00,798.3869 --> 01:28:01,268.3849 That's it. 791 01:28:01,408.3829 --> 01:28:05,588.3819 We'll have to have the 2027 podcast edition where we can come on. 792 01:28:05,588.3819 --> 01:28:11,58.3779 We'll either be recording it in a cave, hiding from, robots, tracking us down or, we'll be able to follow up on this. 793 01:28:11,398.3819 --> 01:28:13,428.3829 But Hopefully we'll do it face to face, sitting together. 794 01:28:13,428.3879 --> 01:28:13,978.3879 Yeah. 795 01:28:15,38.3809 --> 01:28:18,508.3859 I really appreciate you spending so much time taking us through this.

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