Category: Delivery

AI – from ‘build, baby, build’ to ‘bust, baby, bust’?

Posted on by The Information Badger in AI, Business, Delivery, Information Technology, Leadership, Risk, Technology

Every Christmas/New Year period, the BBC’s Radio 4 Today programme invites well known individuals to guest-edit the programme. Each guest focuses on a topic relevant to their interests, experience, and society. Two of the Christmas 2025 guests were inventor, engineer, and businessman Sir James Dyson and the AI pioneer and entrepreneur Mustafa Suleyman.  The Badger was driving to visit relatives on the days they were guest-editing. He had the Today programme on the radio as background noise on both occasions. He turned the volume up when each man was interviewed because they were intelligent, impressive, and articulate individuals conveying enormous common-sense and objectivity, characteristics which seem in short supply today.

Their words resonated with the Badger. Sir James Dyson, for example, likes ‘doers’ rather than ‘talkers’, and Mustafa Suleyman spoke eloquently about AI and that it must be ‘a tool in the hands of and under the control of humans if it’s to benefit all of humankind’. There’s plenty of ‘talkers’ in the world, but it’s ‘doers’ like these two with vision, objectivity, commonsense, and a passion for humankind, rather than politicians, which have the greatest influence on the lives of most people. The Badger agrees that AI is a tool. There are plenty of ‘talkers’ concerned that humans would become subservient to AI, but if we let that happen then we only have ourselves to blame. There’s currently a huge ‘build, baby, build’ rush to construct new, giant, energy-hungry, AI data centres and to amass and use the chips and devices they need to function. Enormous sums are being spent around the world, the technology continues to advance way ahead of any regulation, and AI company stock market valuations are stratospheric. Having worked in IT during the dot.com era, the words of these two men made the Badger ponder more about the current AI ‘build, baby, build’ surge.

Four conclusions emerged. The first was that such surges often produce over-capacity and ‘bust, baby, bust’ outcomes (c.f. China’s property crash) with the bigger the boom, the deeper and longer the bust! The second was that AI is here to stay, but some huge AI companies will not survive even though the AI market bubble is not like the dot.com era when many companies with high valuations had no revenues. Inevitably, when investor appetite for speculative risk tightens for any reason, and it will, a painful correction will happen. The third was that eyebrows should be raised when tech companies arrange for the restart of shuttered nuclear facilities to provide electricity for their new data centres.   

The Badger’s last conclusion was that we should question whether the world’s leaders, including those of hyperscale global tech corporations, are the right kind of ‘doers’. Do they have objectivity, common-sense, and mankind’s well-being at heart, or are they just examples of Lord Acton’s 1887 line ‘Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely’? Whatever the answer, 2026 looks likely to be a troublesome year…

‘Do what’s necessary to fix this fast’ – Would you be up for the challenge?

Posted on by The Information Badger in Delivery, Information Technology, IT Project Management, Leadership, Learning

Here’s a situation. A contractor has a large fixed-price contract to develop a major system (hardware and software) that’s crucial to the client’s business. The project is in serious difficulty. Contracted deliverables to date have been of poor quality and late. Lots of software has been developed but there are severe test and integration problems. Hardware from a subcontractor is also late, exacerbating the difficulties. The client has constructed a new building which has been sitting idle for six months waiting for the new system to be installed. They are threatening punitive litigation. The project is causing the contractor significant, company-level, financial damage and resolving the situation has become a business-critical issue. Client and contractor executives have agreed that the contractor has one last chance to deliver the system and avoid litigation, ostensibly because unrelated matters within the client’s wider enterprise have delayed for some months when the building must become operational.

If you, an employee of the contractor not associated with the project, were asked to ‘Do what’s necessary to fix this fast’, what would your reaction be? The Badger once pitched this scenario and question to a group of IT sector project managers. Their responses were interesting. Most of those with cost-plus project management experience said they wouldn’t take on the challenge because being associated with a problem project might damage their career prospects. Others said they’d accept the challenge but only if it were accepted that their need to review the project, establish committees, and rebuild stakeholder management meant it was unlikely the project could be ‘fixed fast’.

Only one person, someone who had run a couple of modest fixed-price contracts, said unequivocally that they’d take the challenge. When the Badger asked them why, their response was – ‘If you’ve successfully run software and hardware intensive fixed price projects then you’ve learned that you’re a highly focused, demanding, disciplined and decisive individual with limited patience. You’ve learned that you need to be respected by your team and your client but not necessarily liked. You’ve learned the importance of dynamism, belief, team spirit, and having a positive attitude, and the importance of looking forward and taking speedy action to head off emerging threats to success. You’ve also learned that decisions must be good ones but not necessarily popular, and that ‘No’ is an immensely powerful word. Having learned all this, taking on the turnaround of a seriously troubled project threatening the company seems like a great personal opportunity rather than a foolhardy thing to do’.

The Badger smiled. Here was a kindred spirit! Fixing troublesome projects is always a challenge and a great opportunity to expand one’s capabilities. The contrast in attitude between those with cost-plus and fixed-price contract PM backgrounds was stark. If you were asked to ‘Do what’s necessary to fix this fast’ today, would you be up for the challenge?

Expect up to 20% of people on your project to be ‘problematic’…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Delivery, Information Technology, IT Project Management, Leadership & Management, Learning, Training

After completing a couple of IT project leader roles early in his career, the Badger’s employer sent him on the company’s 3-day residential Project Management training course. In those days, attendance on the course was seen as a stepping stone to career advancement within the company. The Badger, however, wasn’t convinced about Project Management as a career path. He’d also heard that the course focused mainly on ‘processes’ rather than leadership. His boss, however, was adamant that the Badger attend, and so reluctantly he complied and joined ten others drawn from across the company in a small hotel in the Chilterns. The course’s focus was, indeed, mainly on Project Management processes, but it was quickly apparent that its real value was in providing an environment for attendees to share their experiences and learn from each other.

At the end of one afternoon, a guest speaker – the company’s most senior and experienced Project Manager (PM) – gave a formal talk and then took questions. They stayed for an evening meal with the attendees and subsequently adjourned to the bar to continue conversations. They were impressive, relaxed, and keen to pass on their knowledge. They communicated many insightful nuggets gleaned from their experience, and the Badger’s found many of them to have been valuable reference points throughout every facet of his working life. Process is, of course, important in delivering projects of any kind, but the most significant  and memorable learning points from this particular course were not from formal sessions, but from this senior PM’s experience and the experiences of the other delivery people attending.

One insightful nugget from the senior PM was: ‘Expect up to 20% of those on your project to struggle, underperform, or have questionable capability and character. Act to reduce that percentage but recognise it will never be zero.’ From the Badger’s experience since,  IT projects operating well will always have ~10% of the project complement that fall into the senior PM’s categories. The reasons why range widely from personal crises, and character, personality, and behavioural flaws, through to poor skills, inadequate management, training, or simply mismatched skills for the specific role. These people can drain management time and impact project morale and so it’s essential to strive to keep this component of a project’s complement at a sensible level.

The senior PM’s insightful nugget embodies an underlying truth, namely that in any group of people there’s always a portion who are ‘problematic.’ This is as true for a project group as it is for a group of business managers, a group of politicians, and even a group of world leaders! The next time you observe,  engage with, or simply watch media content of a group of people, have some fun deciding what percentage are in  the ‘problematic’ category. It can be fun and therapeutic…but be warned, it can also be depressing if it’s a group of politicians…

Work-life balance…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Business, Delivery, Human Resources, Information Technology, Leadership, Life, Wellbeing

Work can be all-consuming. Organisations emphasise values like ‘employee well-being’ and a ‘people-first culture’, but most really operate with deliverables and timelines as their overwhelming priority. HR departments may advocate for ‘work-life balance’, but business leaders, project, programme, and service delivery leaders always push staff for huge effort and heroics to meet a deadline or milestone. In the IT sector, for example, do organisations ever willingly miss a deadline or milestone because of ‘employee well-being’ or their ‘people-first culture’? No.

The Badger’s just had some downtime in Morthoe on the UK’s North Devon coast. The apartment in which he stayed had wonderful coastal views, and it was while nibbling a scone on its balcony in the afternoon sun that thoughts turned to work-life balance. Life on the North Devon coast still provides access to all of today’s online services, but the sounds, the sea, the geology, the flora and fauna, and the local lifestyle forces relaxation and puts work-life balance into perspective. What did the Badger conclude about work-life balance? Simply that it matters. It isn’t just a trendy phrase. It’s a necessity for sustaining energy, protecting mental and physical health, and keeping one’s mind sharp. It matters because burnout reduces productivity and clouds judgement. Downtime helps the brain reset improving creativity, motivation, and decision making. It also matters because quality time away from work helps to build a broader perspective on life as a whole.

The Badger concluded years ago that there are three certainties regarding people. The first two are a) people and not machines, and b) they are all different. Some thrive on having really intense work periods followed by breaks of really deep rest, while others thrive with a daily structure of predictable routines, boundaries, and pressures interspersed with regular shallower rest periods. We are all different, and so the key to a good work-life balance is simply to adopt a personal rhythm that fuels and refreshes rather than drains your capability. Finding the rhythm that works for you within the terms of your employment contract is important. There’s a paradox, however. Employment contracts normally include a holiday entitlement to rest and recharge, and yet many people don’t take all their entitlement. The reasons for this are numerous, but sometimes it’s because a) the work culture rewards hustle more than rest, and b) that an individual misguidedly thinks that everything will collapse if they take a break. So, what’s the Badger’s third certainty about people? Simple. No one is irreplaceable.

If you accept these people certainties and find your rhythm for work-life balance then you will be healthier, sharper, more productive, and more resilient, and the organisation you work for will perform better too. So, use your holiday entitlement. As the Badger was reminded while nibbling scones in the North Devon sunshine, a break is good for you…

Fuzzy information? Still make decisions…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Business Continuity, Delivery, Information Technology, Leadership, Risk

Twenty years ago on the 7th July 2005, four suicide bombers targeted London’s public transport system during the morning rush hour. At 8:50am three bombs detonated within 50 seconds of each other on Underground trains at Aldgate, Edgeware Road, and Russell Square, and a fourth detonated an hour later on a double-decker bus in Tavistock Square. Almost 800 innocent people were injured and 52 lost their lives. The Badger remembers that day clearly. At the time of the bombing, he was attending a UK leadership meeting in his firms Great Marlborough Street office completely oblivious to unfolding events.

The UK CEO had started the meeting at 9:30am even though the UK Sales Director was absent and hadn’t called to say they’d be late. They eventually arrived at 10:20am,  perspiring heavily having walked from Waterloo because no Underground trains were running. They said ‘Something serious is happening. There’s sirens everywhere, the Underground isn’t running, and mobile phone networks aren’t working’. The room’s TV was tuned to a news channel, and everyone present scanned the internet, tried their Blackberry devices, and looked at their corporate emails for information. No one could connect to a mobile phone network. When news of the Tavistock Square bus explosion appeared on the TV  there was instant recognition that the meeting could not continue, not least because Tavistock Square was just a 4-minute walk from the company’s main London office housing some hundreds of staff.

The Badger, the company lead on business continuity crises, activated the company response to the unfolding event. The meeting room became a rudimentary crisis management centre. It’s tools were just a conference phone, laptops providing access to corporate email, the news channel on the TV, and Blackberry devices with, at best, intermittent mobile network connectivity. The Badger and a subset of his colleagues spent the next 10 hours in the room dealing with a maelstrom that involved monitoring the terror incident, mobilising business continuity contacts and processes, establishing the well-being of staff and visitors to the company’s London offices, ensuring the continuity of projects and services, making and communicating clear decisions relevant to clients, verifying the continuity of business operations, and dealing with the needs and well-being of staff.  

It was an intense day full of fuzzy, confusing, and often conflicting information. For the Badger and his colleagues, the experience reinforced the importance of having cool, unemotional heads to make decisions during crises, especially when information is highly fluid. It also reinforced that fuzzy, confusing, or conflicting information should not be used as an excuse for prevaricating on decision-making when there’s overwhelming pressure. Make a decision, move on, and change it if better information emerges was an important dynamic. We eventually went home exhausted having made many more good decisions than bad. It hadn’t been the routine day in the office the Badger had expected. It had been truly unforgettable….

Everyone is a salesperson…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Business, Delivery, Education, Information Technology, Leadership & Management, Sales, Technology

Good senior leaders and managers often enjoy being invited to speak to employees attending company training courses. The Badger certainly did. His sessions not only always delivered a message relevant to the training course but also provided an opportunity for attendees to ask questions about any subject close to their heart. Their questions were often diverse and required quick thinking to answer, but that’s what made the sessions fun! It was always rewarding to see attendees relax during the sessions, to hear their responses to the Badger’s answers, and to observe body language when the audience stayed silent. It was also pleasing when ‘light bulb’ moments spread across the attendees faces if an answer triggered a rush of understanding.

As a leader strongly focused on IT delivery, the Badger spoke mainly to training course groups from the business operation, delivery, and technical communities. Their questions were sometimes unusual. For example, on one occasion the Badger was asked ‘I hear senior people utter their favourite sayings frequently, but which of these have merit because they encapsulate a truth?’  The Badger gathered his thoughts for a moment before rattling off a string of common phrases in use in the company and signalling that they all had merit because they all captured a truth relevant in any company. The string included, for example, the following:     

‘What gets measured gets done…’

‘You don’t jump high unless the bar’s set high…’

‘If you bring problems then bring solutions too…’

‘Time is precious, get to the point…’

‘Decisions aren’t about making everyone happy…’

‘Everyone is a salesperson…’

This last one prompted an indignant response from a couple of attendees who were software engineers. They were contemptuous of  salespeople and unequivocal that  they were not, and never would be, a salesperson. On enquiring if they interacted with peers in their client’s organisation on their projects they answered yes. The Badger pointed out that they were actually representing the company when they interacted with external people, and that made them a salesperson of sorts regardless of their job title. He also highlighted that being ‘sales aware’ during such interactions was important because they were well placed to identify the early signs of potential avenues of further work which could be fed into the company’s main sales machinery for qualification and potential follow-up by others. They remained unpersuaded, and so the Badger pointed out that without sales the company would fail, and they would be out of a job! Their facial expressions changed as a ‘light bulb’ moment hit home on realising that even technical IT staff must be commercially and sales aware and acknowledge that ‘Everyone is a salesperson’ of sorts. ‘Sales’ is not a dirty word. It is at the heart of a company’s success and the employment of everyone within it. Remember, everyone is a salesperson…

Frustration caused by the plague of delivery vans…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Automation, Delivery, Driverless transport, Drones, Human Resources, Information Technology, Online Services, Public safety, Smart & New Technology, Technology, Transport

Life’s full of ups and downs, and some weeks are better than others! For the Badger, Easter week was full of frustrations, all ostensibly caused by society’s addiction to online shopping with home delivery. Like many, the Badger used his car to visit family, friends, and for errands over the Easter period. Every journey was delayed at some point by the stop, start, and illegal parking activities of vehicles that were part of the ever-growing plague of multi-drop delivery vans on UK streets.

Here’s one example that caused frustration. The Badger drove an elderly neighbour to their appointment at the local health centre, a journey which normally takes ~7 minutes with a route that entails driving through the town’s High Street. Well before reaching this busy street, traffic had slowed to a snail’s pace. This was because a well-known company’s multi-drop delivery van had parked on double-yellow (no-waiting) lines in the middle of the High Street. The driver had left the van to deliver a collection of packages to nearby residences. The illegally parked van caused havoc as car drivers tried to navigate around it against the constant flow of traffic coming in the opposite direction. Just as the Badger reached the High Street, the van driver returned, collected another armful of packages, and walked off with them in a different direction ignoring the obvious disruption their van was causing.

Just before it was the Badger’s turn to navigate past the van, the driver returned, drove off, and stopped again on double-yellow lines 50 metres further along the street. This made the disruption worse because another multi-drop delivery van had parked close by on the opposite side of the road creating a chicane for traffic in both directions. As a result of all this, the 7-minute drive to the Health Centre took nearly 25 minutes, making the Badger’s neighbour slightly late for their appointment. This, and similar experiences on other journeys over the Easter period, triggered some musing.

Online shopping with home delivery has revolutionised convenience, but one consequence is the plague of vans on our roads and the tendency of their drivers to ignore the rules of the road due to tight schedules, high delivery volumes, and the need for frequent stops. Since these van drivers seem to be immune to the rules of the roads, the Badger thinks there’s a need for an enforcement solution. If today’s digital tech can tell you when your online purchase will arrive at your door, then it’s clearly possible to use drone, satellite, and information technologies to a) detect in real-time when multi-drop van drivers park illegally on double yellow lines and b) automatically fine them and their employer for the misdemeanour. It currently seems that no amount of ‘company policy’ or ‘driver training’ makes a difference, but hitting them in their pockets probably will…

Uncomfortable meetings…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Delivery, Information Technology, IT Project Management, Leadership & Management, Learning, Meetings

When a signed contract is in its delivery phase there are normally regular progress meetings between the two parties involved. There are often ups and downs during delivery, but for most IT sector contracts these bumps in the road are normally ironed out through these meetings and associated follow-ups. Some contracts, however, experience major problems that cause strained relationships and lead to confrontational interactions. Meetings between client and contractor can then become quarrelsome, uncomfortable, and unproductive. When this happens, no matter what training you’ve had, it requires iron personal discipline, resilience, and control over one’s emotions to avoid wasting energy by getting angry. That energy is better channelled to turn the tables in your favour.

The Badger has experienced many uncomfortable meetings, but two in particular stand out as memorable because they were challenging from both a human dynamics, and a contractual, perspective. The first related to an IT contract for a system to computerise a manufacturing process in a new facility being constructed by a major US prime contractor. There were delays in constructing the facility, and the prime contractor blamed these on the IT contractor. In one important meeting, the prime contractor’s lead resorted to shouting, thumping the table, and angrily questioning the Badger and his team’s competence. The second related to a contract delivering business process operations (BPO) for a public body. There were service difficulties because the client and contractor teams had different understandings of their contractual obligations. The client’s lead convened a meeting and vociferously blamed the contractor’s team for all the difficulties and for being unprofessional. The lead was in aggressive, transmit-only, finger-pointing, bullying, and raised-voice mode, and they would not allow others to speak.

These were uncomfortable, tricky meetings. In the face of vitriolic verbal onslaughts, they were handled by not arguing, staying calm, listening carefully, maintaining civility and professionalism, and then acting decisively once the meetings had ended! The decisive actions, which the Badger isn’t expanding on here, forced both clients to face up to their own contractual obligations and behaviour and to take steps to repair relationships. In both cases, when things had settled down, the clients admitted not only that the contractor could ‘look after itself’ commercially, but also admiration and respect for the composure, resilience, discipline and professionalism they’d seen from the contractor’s staff.

The Badger mentioned the above meeting dynamics to a young IT project manager recently. They were horrified and commented that they wouldn’t cope with such unacceptable shouty meeting dynamics today. The Badger smiled and suggested that  since humans are all different, then exposure to volatile characters and shouty, bullying meetings can be useful for personal development. With a look of disbelief on their face, the youngster called the Badger a dinosaur. The Badger laughed. That’s nowhere near some of the things he’s been called in the past!

Smart Meters…again…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Delivery, Energy and Energy Markets, Information Technology, Smart Meters, Transformation

The UK Smart Meter rollout programme missed its original completion date of 2019 and new arrangements were established for the rollout to get, as a minimum, a smart meter installed in 80% of UK homes by the end of December 2025. That number‘s still a long way short of the original 100% ambition, and it’s since been watered down to ~75%. The Government’s Smart Meter Statistics reports for Q3 2023 and Q3 2024 show the numbers stood at 59% and 65%, respectively. Not all installed meters are operating in ‘smart mode’ so, in reality, the numbers where smart mode is in operation are ~10% lower. However, regardless of how you look at the numbers, progress of 6% over a full year doesn’t provide any confidence that the end of 2025 minimum target will be met. Perhaps the next government report for Q4 2024 will paint a more positive picture? Unlikely.

The UK government and the enterprises delivering the programme are, no doubt, already discussing the consequences of falling short of 2025’s minimum target. Two things seem certain. Firstly, the rollout will continue for years beyond 2025, with some kind of reset dressed up by spin that covers some difficult realities. Secondly, the consumer will continue paying for the programme through their energy bills for a long time yet. Remember, the benefit to the consumer is miniscule compared to the benefit to the energy supply companies.

If the 6% rise in on-premises smart meters between Q3 2023 and Q3 2024 typifies  rollout progress for the coming years, you don’t have to be a genius to see that achieving 100% this decade is questionable. The programme’s cost ~£13.5bn, has been running for  >12 years, and there are millions of meters still not operating properly in homes. It’s supposedly a national infrastructure programme vital for modernising the UK energy system, improving energy security and resilience, and supporting net-zero greenhouse gas ambitions. Public scepticism, however, is unabated. Programmes of this ilk are, of course, always challenging, but many countries in Europe have already achieved or surpassed 80% penetration with their own smart meter rollouts and so something fundamental must explain why the UK’s programme consistently underperforms.

Smart meter obsolescence will require the replacement of many meters installed in homes in the coming years, and a communication upgrade is necessary to deal with the demise of 2G/3G communication networks. There doesn’t appear to be a forecast cost to complete the meter installations needed to achieve 100% penetration and these upgrade issues in the public domain yet. The Badger thus concludes that consumers will be footing the bill for years yet, and that it’s right to be sceptical about the ability to deliver any new national energy programmes to time, budget, quality, and tangible consumer benefit…  

Looking into the eyes of…a politician…

Posted on by The Information Badger in Delivery, Human Resources, Information Technology, IT Project Management, Leadership, Leadership & Management, Project Management, Psychology

Most people in the UK workforce never get to look deeply into the eyes of a government minister. The Badger, however, first did just that some decades ago. The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry at the time visited one of the Badger’s employer’s offices for the type of ‘understanding what we do’ session that sometimes produce snippets on television news. At the time, the Badger was leading his company’s development of a key IT system at the heart of an important major programme within this minister’s remit. The day before the visit, the Badger’s boss told him to attend in case they wanted to discuss progress with the programme. The timing was inconvenient because the IT system was just a few days into a crucial testing activity, but attending was obviously the right thing to do.

The Badger duly arrived early the next morning at the office hosting the visit. The minister and their entourage arrived mid-morning, slightly later than expected, and the company CEO took them on a tour of the building and a number of demonstrations  prepared by local project teams. As they were shown around, the minister hardly smiled. They appeared distant and disinterested, and they spent more time talking to individuals in their entourage than those they were meeting. As the tour concluded, the CEO beckoned the Badger over and introduced him to the Secretary of State as the person delivering the key IT system at the heart of their programme. The Secretary of State shook the Badger’s hand, and while doing so, they locked eyes with the Badger’s and coldly asked ‘Will the system be delivered on time?’ without blinking. ‘Yes’, the Badger answered truthfully. They instantly turned away and asked the CEO about the arrangements for lunch! Immediately after this fleeting interaction, the Badger reflected on what he’d sensed from looking into the eyes of this politician.

Eyes are often called the ‘windows to a person’s soul’. If that’s the case, then this politician had no soul! There had been no flicker of interest, just a constancy of optical contact that was cold, uncomfortable, intimidating, and empty. While the Badger knew that politicians, like many business leaders, are often trained to maintain a certain demeanour, he concluded, right or wrong, that this individual’s personal attributes were unattractive and distrustful because they really didn’t have a soul!

Over the years since, the Badger’s often looked deeply into the eyes of politicians and business leaders. He’s come to realise that some do indeed have a soul, because their eyes broadcast confidence, competence, interest, inspiration, and trust. He’s observed that those with such attributes tend to have lengthy, successful, leadership careers, but those that don’t have tended to falter. So, never avoid direct eye contact with politicians and leaders because, as Al Pacino said in the movie Scarface, ‘The eyes, Chico, never lie’…