9 minute read
The big interview
NICK SMALLWOOD
Andrew Saunders meets the CEO of the UK’s Infrastructure and Projects Authority, who’s clear that the difference between success and failure for a project comes down to getting the basics right. What can be so difficult about that?
Photography: Will Amlot I t’s hard for anyone, whatever their political stripe, to accuse the current government of lacking ambition when it comes to major projects. Levelling up, ‘build back better’, net zero – the key planks of Prime Minister Johnson’s agenda for wholesale economic recovery, reform and sustainability are all dependent to a great extent on rolling out a new generation of big-ticket infrastructure projects fit for the 21st century and beyond.
But, as every good project manager knows only too well, bold promises are one thing, making them happen quite another. And the man tasked with making sure that the UK has the project capability required to match the scale of its national vision is Nick Smallwood, CEO of the Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA).
It’s probably the most influential job in UK infrastructure, and one of the toughest. It’s no secret, after all, that the vast majority of major projects across the world bust schedules and budgets almost as a matter of course. Some never get finished at all. “Globally, the benchmarks will tell you that around 75 per cent of projects over £2bn or so are typically over on cost and schedule, and typically by a large amount. I would call those train wrecks,” Smallwood cheerfully admits.
But, characteristically undaunted by the scale and complexity of the 130odd multibillion-pound projects in the Government Major Projects Portfolio (GMPP), which he oversees – including controversial headliners HS2 and Crossrail – Smallwood is adamant that the picture of overruns painted by those global figures is very far from inevitable. “The counter is also true – that 25 per cent are successful.”
The difference between success and failure is plain, he adds, and while major projects remain inherently challenging to deliver, the needle can be moved in the other direction. “When you look at the 25 per cent that do deliver on their outcomes, you will see some very clear and obvious information. Successful projects really get the basics right. They have competent people – strong programme and project delivery managers. They are very clear on the outcomes they are trying to achieve, and they are ruthless in their pursuit of those objectives – they are not swayed from their path by late changes, ‘good ideas’ or stakeholder changes of mind. They really stay the journey.”
It’s an observation borne out by Smallwood’s 37-year career delivering complex projects for Shell (culminating in the role of VP project engineering – de facto global head of the project discipline), the world’s fourth largest oil major, and one that he immediately brought to bear at the IPA when he joined as CEO in August 2019. “I had the very strong view that we needed to step up the performance of the GMPP, focusing more on benefits and delivering better outcomes than we had before. If you have the right capability and the right capacity, you can do more.”
Central to building both capability and capacity is ensuring that the right
THE BIG INTERVIEW
people have the skills they need to do the job, hence the recent launch of a major new skills initiative, the Government Projects Academy (GPA). Building on the existing success of the Major Projects Leadership Academy in developing world-class project leadership, the GPA aims to bring the same rigour to bear throughout the mass of the government’s 14,000 project professionals, spread across multiple departments and functions. “The MPLA’s project leadership programme is second to none, but it’s only a very small percentage of
project professionals who get to that level.
“The academy is a huge step forward. We can finally focus attention on four levels of project professionalism, from the foundation level, where we need to ground people’s understanding of the profession, through to practitioners, senior practitioners and ultimately masters,” he says. He believes that the qualifications and assessments provided through the GPA will bring a new level of quality and consistency to government project teams, helping to address the criticism that, while some departments clearly represent pockets of excellence, there is too much variation in project performance across government as a whole.
This is something the past year has thrown into sharp relief, with highs like the vaccination roll-out and furlough schemes on the one hand, and lows like Test and Trace on the other. “The projects that have been successful have been those that have leveraged professional project skills, and expertise from the private sector, and brought resource and capacity to bear in a very short time.” Following these good examples, the GPA will also make use of established private sector expertise. “We’ve been very clear about what already exists in the marketplace. At senior practitioner level, for example, we have said that we want chartered status or equivalent, so we’re looking to APM as the chartered body in the UK.”
Ultimately, Smallwood believes it will boost the performance and credibility of the profession in government and ensure more successes, and fewer failures. “Being clear in what skills are needed at each of those four levels, and assessing and accrediting people in them, will help us to deploy the right people in the right places and give us a much more consistent lens on professional development.”
For Smallwood, consistency – like charity – begins at home. Hence the IPA Mandate, published in January, which formally lays out the IPA’s dual remit as both gatekeeper/adviser for major project decisions and promoter of best practice across the profession in Whitehall and beyond. The mandate was prompted, he says, by the discovery when he joined that, although there were letters from a couple of prime ministers and at least one chancellor, there was no single primary source for what the government wanted the IPA to do.
“I like clarity,” he says simply. “I don’t think a good project or programme manager wants to be vague or leave optionality on what they are going to deliver. I felt it was very important to pull all those notes together so we could be clear about expectations – what governance and assurance the IPA can provide around major projects, but also the service, support and advice we can give.”
It draws on Smallwood’s cast-iron track record of managing multibillionpound projects in the private sector, the fundamental principles of which are universal, he believes. “A road bridge in the public sector doesn’t look very different from one in the private sector. The only thing that changes is the stakeholder management and the politics around the position.” But he concedes that the cost/benefit analysis also tends to be more challenging. “The public value framework brings a dimension of complexity that you don’t always have in the private sector. But it’s right to have those conversations about the benefits that you are bringing to society, because public sector projects are for the citizens of the UK.”
True to form, the mandate is a model of clarity and sets out the role of the IPA in the GMPP in five key areas: it has the final decision on projects entering the GMPP, it tracks and monitors them, it will intervene early to ensure they are set up for success, it ensures they are deliverable and it is responsible for systemic improvements in project delivery across government.
After a year of managing most of the IPA’s 200 or so professionals remotely, you might expect that a practical project guy like Smallwood would have had enough of technology, but far from it. “I’ve worked more months remotely than I did face-to-face with my team. We’ve had to step up to deliver numerous pandemic-related projects as well as progressing with massive existing ones like HS2. I’ve been blown away by how quickly people have adapted. I’m hugely proud of them.”
And in terms of the profession, remote working is just the tip of a coming tech revolution, he believes. “We are still doing some large projects in the same way we have for 40 years, but times change and we have to change with them. There are huge opportunities for robotics, AI and automated software that we really need to embrace in the public sector. We’re going to be able to work in ways that we never have before, but I’m not concerned that this will eliminate people’s jobs; I think it will
CV: Nick Smallwood
1981 Joins Shell as a mechanical engineer at the giant Stanlow refinery in Cheshire. Spends time in South Africa, Canada and the US managing – and turning around – a string of significant refinery and construction projects for the firm. Becomes an increasingly experienced and expert major projects director. 2012 Appointed vice president of project engineering at Shell, and head of project discipline, across the entire upstream and downstream businesses. Develops the firm’s Global Project Academy skills programme. 2018 Retires from Shell, becoming an independent major projects consultant. 2019 Joins Infrastructure and Projects Authority as chief executive and head of the project delivery function for the UK government. 2021 Launches Government Project Academy skills initiative. “There will be some really challenging choices to be made in terms of energy and how we wean ourselves off fossil fuels”
free up capacity and help make us more productive.”
So, tech-related productivity improvements will have a role to play in tackling the IPA’s extensive to-do list, growing apace thanks to that aforementioned trio of levelling up, building back better and – perhaps the greatest challenge of all – the race to get to net zero by 2050. This has been given even greater urgency by the recent pledge to cut emissions by 78 per cent by 2035.
“The prime minister is right that infrastructure provides a fantastic opportunity to restart the economy, jobs and skills up and down the country. And building a low-carbon future will bring a whole raft of challenges, not only in terms of the type of projects we will be doing, but also in the ways that we do them,” says Smallwood. “There will be some really challenging choices to be made in terms of energy and how we wean ourselves off fossil fuels. We’re looking at four schemes across the UK right now that link carbon capture and storage with power generation, for example, and hydrogen production. These are things that will impact society and the way that we live and work every day.”
But, ultimate test or not, it’s clear that he relishes the prospect of getting to grips with it and making sure that bold official commitments are backed by the world-class project skills that will be needed to deliver them. “It’s a fantastic moment to be involved in projects in the UK. We’ve got a very ambitious government with a oncein-a-generation strategy. I can’t think of a better time to be helping deliver projects faster, smarter and greener. Working with a team at the IPA who are so dedicated to making a difference is an opportunity I wouldn’t have missed.”
