Project Collaboration to Deliver Net Zero Part 2: Podcast Transcript

This is Collabor8, a Net Zero podcast brought to you by the ECITB. In this series we will talk to experts at the forefront of the energy transition. We will cover a wide range of topics from technologies that are key to unlocking industrial decarbonisation to regulation policy development and, perhaps most important of all, the skills needed to help industry deliver Net Zero. Thanks for listening.

Carol: Hello. Welcome to Collabor8: Transitioning to Net Zero. I'm Carol Sinclair, Net Zero Project Manager at the ECITB. In this podcast, the topic is Project Collaboration to deliver Net Zero. We are going to pick up on and continue that conversation with John Fotherby and Tony Maplesden. So if you missed that first podcast on this topic, you might be interested to listen to that as well. In this conversation, we plan to delve further into project management tools and techniques to support effective project delivery in that collaborative framework. The advantages of collaborative contracting, building diverse teams, drawing from the best talent and skills, and also the behaviours driving project collaboration and that vital role of leadership and collaboration champions. So, we're launching straight into it. Applying project collaboration to enable successful delivery of projects for Net Zero, it's going to drive change both in the way that projects are set up, and for their delivery. So what do you see as the greatest drivers for success, Tony?

Tony: Well I think Carol, to actually move in the direction of effective project collaboration, we need the project lead entities, the client owner operators, to actually take that lead and I agree that that's critically important. I?ve had conversations with people in the past, at the time we were creating the collaboration toolkit who suggested that well you can actually set off collaboration from any position within the, the project supply chain. Well, I don't actually subscribe to that. I think if you if you don't have the buy in from the client / owner / operator you're not going to really get very far. I think in terms of sort of forming the kind of collaboration that will make a difference in terms of the way that the projects delivered and the benefits that are accrued. So, leadership, I think, and leadership from owner / operators is very important. The critical need to effectively deliver Net Zero requires a new different approach.

As we said earlier, the issue is that we can't afford wastage. We?re going to be competing for resource, the number of experienced engineering construction, people that are available I think to support, the programme we're going to be competing for. And we need to make sure to make use of some of the new tools that John referred to earlier. I mean, I'll just mention one that I don't see an awful lot of evidence of, coming into wider use. The toolkit in phase three makes a reference to, a scheduling technique, which is called critical chain project management. We love acronyms, don't we? So, we'll call it CPPM as opposed to critical path project management. Now this is a, a technique that was developed in the US aircraft industry, with Boeing. But it's a collaborative approach to actually establishing a project schedule and it actually supported by a process, during the performance of the project, of all parties supporting the party that's actually delivering the activity on the critical chain at anyone particular time. Now I believe that that's having said that that the need to drive Net Zero to completion within very tight timescales, that scheduling technique has the potential to actually get people working together to share to serve scheduled time. And it's those kind of areas, alongside digitalization which John mentioned and advanced work packaging, we need to bring all of those tools together that might actually drag a difference in the way that the project successes is delivered and collaboration you can think of as the catalyst or the glue that holds all of those available tools and processes together.

So, collaboration will allow alignment of the project delivery stakeholders to a common set of goals and objectives and the available tools will actually help us to, deliver the elements of the Net Zero programme in a more effective way.

John: Yeah, I think that Primavera is probably the worst thing that was ever invented and I first came in contact with Primavera when I was starting the liner job back in the 90s. And, we had the French client at that time, and they expected us to use Artemis system for our planning on the project. But we were persuading it to use Primavera and the French project director said Primavera who is this fine lady? But for me it's one of those tools that is in principle was a good idea in practise it's abused and misused to mislead and is generally a disaster. So, I agree to on it needs these projects you can't forecast what's going to be happening activity by activity in three years time or whatever it happens to be, but over a sustained long period. And therefore, a need a process that is much more manufacturing oriented because at the end of the day if you think about it, what we're talking about to be able to alleviate some of the problems on the project is more and more offsite fabrication. We're looking at more modularization and such like which goes with that and so and much more involvement of the supply chain early on.

So, the traditional sort of planning and scheduling, processes don't fit with that but particularly well. So, you have to do something different anyway. But this industry is notorious for not wanting to change and yet it has to and this is where the problem lies, and there's always this or that won't work, we've been doing this for the last 30 years, but what they failed to add is yes, and badly in the main. So, there's a big problem in in getting people to shift. But I think that already with the renewables industry an opportunity has been lost. And I'm thinking about the offshore wind farm industry in particular, but also solar energy plants, which I've had some involvement in in the last few years.

And I'm thinking about the, I don't know if you saw it or not, Allen Leatt?s article in February, he's the International Marine Contractors Association CEO. And he's basically said the big contractors involved in these wind farms such as Saipem and Co, I'm not going to do these jobs anymore because the industry has awarded contracts that are so unfair and so out of sync on risk balance that that they don't do it anymore and it's cost them a fortune. And I know because I'm involved with some of the projects and there's a Net Zero in our part of the Net Zero industry that could have done things differently but hasn't and it's been so far as far as I can see an unmitigated disaster from a commercial output point of view and we've got to stop it.

There's a vast amount of work coming through now for all sorts of reasons. So Net Zero is going to be competing with conventional projects. They're going to go on for some time. We're not just going to stop using oil and gas. We can't. It's not a practical proposition. So, we're going to have a tension that runs between, we're Net Zero and this lot's conventional well that can't happen because the industry is not big enough to carry that. The industry both from an owner point of view, from the supply chain point of view is you have to learn to rub along with both the conventional and new simultaneously to get the best out that we can. And this is just another challenge, but it's a reality. It just has to happen.

Carol: Yeah, thanks, John. It does seem from what you say that changes require both for conventional and new Net Zero projects, that implementation of existing tools for more efficient project delivery supported by the project collaboration framework.

Bringing it back to the individuals. What changes, what impact does collaborative working have within the project team for the individuals and skills that are required by those people.

Tony: Yeah, that's a good question Carol. And I think, firstly I would, I would say John's experiences of course, in recent times delivering, training that people do like to collaborate and a lot of people do. Some people of course and it depends upon, personal traits and characteristics, some people will resist collaboration because they feel that in in working together with somebody else in some way may erode their personal power base. I mean, we've all heard the old adage?Knowledge is power?.well, some people unfortunately believe that collaboration is a is a way of eroding their own personal value and what they can contribute individually because they're being asked to work in partnership, or in a relationship, with other people.

So the answer to what we'll actually support collaboration in terms of, individual contribution well, technical skills in a project team will still be important and there may be a number of new technical skills that will have to train people in to ensure that they can use the range of tools, that are that are available for more, for more effective delivery. The kind of things that John was talking about earlier. But for me, the biggest area of, that we need to concentrate on, is the focus on, the so-called soft skills.

So, the ability to actually work in teams, the ability to build effective interpersonal relationships, kind of, the area of emotional intelligence and the other areas of, if you like capability individually and relationally that will actually, allow people to work more effectively. So big emphasis on soft skills associated with the collaboration.

Diversity needs to be mentioned because, the project team composition also needs to feature, a greater diversity of sort of skills and learn and other characteristics. I think if we try to build a team on technical skills only which has been the tendency in the past, then we will just end up in the situation where we'll think we can do things the way that we've always done them and that clearly won't work. So, teams need to be selected, I believe on the basis of gender, social, cultural knowledge and age diversity and then attracting that greater diversity in the building project teams, we're likely to sort of load the team for greater success I think in in terms of delivering against the Net Zero challenges.

John: Yeah, I think there's another aspect of this as well, Tony, I completely agree with that. When I've been talking to other people about collaboration, they've said to me you're looking at having the perfect team and having been able to select the perfect team and we never get that opportunity in our organisation. But my response to that is yes, but if you go with some a contract that is a multi-party contract of let's say it could be anything, couldn't it, let's say six or eight players. And then what you're doing by bringing those six or eight players in from which you will form the project delivery team, you're increasing eight times the potential for getting the best team because you'll be drawing people from the different members of that team organisations. And therefore, you're not looking at one organisation providing the best team on every project that, we all know, that's impossible. But if you look at a number of different project delivery stakeholders, or whatever we call them, contributing to that team, then you broaden in the catchment area. You slim the size of the team down for a start, and the number of players that you need, because you get rid of the man marking. But at the same time, you'll have people with experience that can contribute, that can be selected to positions within that project organisation from a much broader base. And therefore, the opportunity of getting good teams together is increased multifold. I mean, it's not really the case that you'll be looking at companies that are capable and there's a lot of experience out there and I think also there's a lot of experience and expertise that doesn't get used properly. And that's the other thing. By collaborative working you bring those people in and you can utilise that that experience and skills sets.

Tony: Yeah, I think, John the dynamics of an effective project team are interesting. Collaboration is all about relationships and behaviours. And I think I've seen, and you probably have as well in the past, people taking up roles on a project, where they exhibit the kind of behaviour that they think is expected of them. Now moving into sort of Net Zero I think the project teams need to be built on the basis of there will be led by people who will be capable of articulating exactly what kind of behaviours are expected of all members of the team. And that's going to be about, working together. It's going to be about building relationships based on trust and that's a big difference I think from, what we've seen in the past traditional ways of working weren't founded on trust, in fact probably the opposite. Whereas effective collaboration is built on trust and the ability of people to recognise that they are dealing with others in a team that they can actually rely on. People who are actually working with integrity who are actually recognised for being able to perform the rules that they've been selected to fulfil.

So, it is about this concept of sort of getting people to behave and leading them to behave the way that will actually allow the team to effectively deliver.

John: Yeah. I think that leadership aspect, Tony, as you mentioned previously, is absolutely fundamental. And I think what goes in sort of tandem with that the leadership is one thing, but it's very difficult to take people who've been doing things for the last 30 years or so in a completely different way and asking them to do this this collaborative working, which is it immediately alien to them. And therefore, when problems occur, human beings tend to resort to, go back into their shells or whatever. And therefore, the role of the collaborative collaboration champions I think on projects is fundamental and I think we've got some good examples of where that's worked. If you take Heathrow Terminal 5, the owners have a team of coaches to keep their project team on track throughout the project and people at the project management team could refer to and talk to about their problems about the issues that you're talking about. So, you've got to, you've got to have an infrastructure there for people to work with and if you want them to perform to their best, you've got to give them the structure that allows them to do it. And that means, small investment in a in a few people to have on each project of Collaboration Champions to keep them on track, keep them energised. And some of the feedback that I've had from people that have been working on projects that are truly collaborative, and there are a few about, is that they thoroughly enjoyed the experience and had a lot of fun doing it. And they didn't have the same pressures. They had a lot of work to do and all of that, and there were some challenges, but the pressures that are normally imposed upon project teams wasn't there because there, barriers were down and people were working together and finding solutions rather than finding excuses.

Tony: Yeah, I think you were asking Carol about what the innate behaviours are that drive collaboration. It's interesting. The Warwick University in 2017, conducted some, research on behalf of the Institute of Collaborative Working.

Very interesting piece of work, and it's available in the public domain. I think it goes under the title of understanding the psychology of collaboration, What makes an effective collaboration? So, if anybody's interested, they can just look it up. But I think the research concluded that there were probably around 100 different attributes of an effective collaborator. But when they actually sort of looked at top ten, they were able to actually group some of those attributes,

So just very briefly, first grouping was around what they called strategic and adaptive orientation. So, this is actually team members being strategically minded but flexible, being creative and innovative.

The second group was around, communication really. Effective information exchange. So, it was around being a good effective communicator, being open, being willing to share and being a good active listener.

And the third grouping was around, the importance of common values. So, collaborators, people who are in collaborative teams, it was orientation to teamworking, empathy. So being, having the characteristic of being empathetic towards other members within the team. belief in collaboration and what it could deliver and, some pretty basics around ethics and the way that business, and work, should be performed.

So, it's quite an interesting piece of work, I think. And for me, it just kind of underlines the importance of, individual characteristics and attributes, we're talking about putting people into effective collaborative teams.

Just recently, I delivered a pilot training course between ECITB and our accredited training provider Kingsfield Academy, in an Introduction to Project Collaboration. So, there are some further training being developed on this point of time based upon that I think. During the course of this year, we are hoping to have some more offering for training and development of people that are sort of moving toward collaborative projects.

Carol: Excellent and equally applicable for Net Zero focus projects. Yeah, and I suppose, that provides a good sign post in terms of personal development and preparation for, for collaborative working for individuals within the within the profession looking to sort of prepare and gear up for, the new era of project management.

Tony: Yeah, I think the association for project management, the APM, has a competence framework for, project managers but of course that's the UK leading body for project management and the competence framework divides into 3 categories and, one is technical competence, the second is behavioural competence and I think the third one, APM referred to as contextual confidence, I think which is about, if you like, the type of project environment that people are working within.

But it's always struck me that there's a fairly long list of technical competences within that framework and a relatively short list of behavioural competences.

I think we're actually at a point in time now where I would expect that to that list of behavioural competencies should probably be sort of increased in length to add some of the characteristics that we've been talking about today. Some of the important things that are required, for people to be able to sort of work in the collaborative project delivery strategies.

Carol: Just then maybe in and round up we've had a great conversation about project collaborative collaboration at that strategic level and the drivers and what's required for change and where we need to be challenging. And we've had a look at the benefits of collaborative working and the impact for the project teams and individuals in terms of skills and the tools that are available to make projects and project working more efficient, effective and meeting the original aims and goals of the projects. In roundup maybe can I ask you both just to share your final thoughts on project collaboration to deliver Net Zero and skills for the future. So, goodness, John, shall I throw that to you first?

John: Yeah, my view is that if you want to deliver Net Zero in the timescale that we're talking about and at an affordable price, then the conventional contracting doesn't work for a number of reasons that we've talked about.

And the only practical alternative is really collaborative contracting and collaborative working. And that's it in a nutshell. That shift has to take place if you want to meet this because the challenge is such that it requires it.

Tony: Yeah. I think my final thoughts Carol would be on similar lines to John's. So, I think our experience in creating and rolling out the project collaboration toolkit, working with pilot projects, captured within the case studies that are a range of benefits to collaborative working projects of some of the very significant savings in cost, in time they've created very innovative work environments. So that all parties to the project have been collectively solving problems and clearing out issues as they have arisen during the project lifecycle. So, a very wide range of, different benefits on different projects.

When we were preparing for the 2nd edition of the Toolkit, John and I recognise that not many of the pilot projects that we've worked with have actually taken a different approach in terms of the contracting framework that had been used.

I think the big exception to that was the and the case studies just recently been published that was the CNOOC Buzzard phase two project which was a major field development project. So big value project fairly sizeable in terms of the number of stakeholders involved and quite a complex project that project actually chose to go down the route of forming a delivery alliance working under the leadership of CNNOC to deliver the project. And the results, even though the project was impacted a little by COVID, so there was a schedule extension, even then that project could be viewed as a massive success in terms of benefits that were delivered including holding the revised schedule and holding the project to its budget. So in 2020, John and I recognised that there was probably something missing in terms of a form of agreement, a multi-party agreement that people could actually sign up to and use which followed the principles of collaboration that were set out in the toolkit.

And as John said earlier, we jointly created the Collaborative Working Agreement. It?s important I think to Net Zero and what's at stake here that we see the industry moving in the direction of agreements and contracts as the collaborative working agreement. Because I think expecting that we can get the benefits of collaboration while sticking to conventional contract types is probably a bit of a pipe dream. We need to see contracting frameworks with a balance of risk benefit, being used in support of the, the general movement towards, collaborative project delivery strategies.

John: And I think the importance here, Tony, is when things go well, they go well and it doesn't matter a damn what the form of contract is. The problem is when things don't go well and people revert to traditional methods of dealing with it not going well, which is actually to blame anybody but themselves for it.

Whereas in a collaborative contracting arrangement that is underscored and supported by the project collaboration toolkit, we don't pretend that there won't be problems. What we say is they have to be solved and they have be the solved by the project delivery stakeholders. And that's an entirely different proposition to conventional contracting because it stays with the joint shareholders of that project delivery team and they have to sort it. And I think that this is the shift. If you think about collaboration, when the wind is behind you and it's a sunny day and you're steaming on, everybody's happy. It's when you've got the wind against you,it's not a sunny day and there's troubles everywhere. How do we deal with them? Because they have to be solved for the benefit of the project and the benefit of those shareholders in that project.

Tony: I think you're right John. And I think the for people listening the collaborative working agreement includes some features around dispute avoidance. As you say the stakeholders themselves resolving problems as they arise. A culture of no blame. So if wind is against them and something does go wrong then the parties actually naturally up to the solution rather than look to apportion blame with sort of one party that may have been more involved. So, again for listeners the collaborative working agreement for me is a way forward. It matches intent that was written into the content of the Project Collaboration Toolkit,

And I think it's available through the European Construction Institute, John.

John: That's right, yes. And it's free to users,

Tony: As is the toolkit, of course, yeah, the toolkit and the case studies are available on the ECITB's website. They're available to download, or to view, but they are free of charge.

Carol: So, some good resources there for people to follow up after podcast. We've got European Construction Institute and the Collaborative Working Agreement, the ECITB Project Collaboration Toolkit and case studies and, also that report that you referenced Tony from the University of Warwick on understanding the psychology of collaboration.

Tony: Yes, that's right.

Carol: Thank you so much John and Tony. Well goodness. Thank you so much, John. Tony, I'm really enjoyed this conversation again today. I have maybe got rose tinted glasses but it just seems like so much more of a positive way of working for everybody involved that has the potential really to help us to achieve what we want to achieve in the Net Zero targets going forward. So, we thank you both very much for lending your wisdom and experience. I've thoroughly enjoyed the conversation.

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