Our duty to build trust, collaborate and make better decisions: Insights from the FIDIC Global Infrastructure Conference

ACE Chief Executive Helen Davidson travelled to Cape Town, South Africa, in September for the International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC) Global Infrastructure Conference. It brought together industry leaders from around the globe – including our own Board member and Tonkin + Taylor New Zealand Chief Executive Penny Kneebone – to discuss the future. The conference theme "Building equality, resilience and innovation together" highlighted the importance of fostering solidarity, equality and sustainable development. She shares her key takeaways.

“I was struck by the synergy between the key themes that emerged from these global conversations – an imperative for strong and consistent governance, trusting and collaborative relationships, and resilience – which echo our own conversations here in Aotearoa New Zealand. This reinforces that while nuances in our challenges may differ around the world, we are not walking this path alone.”

Global challenges are our challenges

“The conference shed light on several profound challenges facing the global infrastructure sector that are, or have significant potential, to impede societal progress – many of which we've experienced here in Aotearoa over recent years:

• Public finances: Governments worldwide are struggling with public finances and are ill-prepared to address the financial implications of climate change and the geopolitical environment. With responding to climate-related events and increasing security investments, there is little left in the kete to do what is necessary, leading to price pressures and late payments. As the race to the bottom happens, the crisis will only deepen.
  
  
• Unstable governance: Many countries are experiencing unstable governance and political influence. The instability of governance manifests from widespread corruption to the politicisation of infrastructure and lack of a clear vision and leadership, all of which impact our ability to deliver the infrastructure we need efficiently and effectively.
  
  
• Lack of trust: Commercial values prioritising profit have eroded trust, and without trust we can’t move forward effectively together.
  
  
• Pace of change: AI and digitalisation are crucial for progress, but equitable access to these technologies is lacking globally. While technology offers significant opportunity it also brings risks, such as data security and sovereignty, and a clear understanding about what AI and digitalisation mean for future skills and careers.
  
  
• Skills shortages: The global industry faces a shortage of skilled professionals. The skills shortage reaches beyond consulting professionals into the skills and capabilities sitting within our client organisations.”
  
  

We were called to action

“The prevailing ethos at the conference was that all great changes are preceded by chaos, and like many global challenges before us it is now our duty to turn turbulence into momentum. Several examples were shared where this has been done before, at a local level such as when the Japanese town of Kamikatsu was forced to rewire its habits and become Japan’s first zero-waste town, through to the global level such as the global response to COVID-19.

“The message was that progress will be enabled through action, not perfection, that it will cost us more to do nothing, and that sustainability is about intention, not scale.”

What can we do in Aotearoa to respond to the global call for action?

“Whether we were talking about the politics of infrastructure, equality, climate change, nature-based solutions, integrity and quality, financing infrastructure, AI and digitalisation, what good looks like, or vision in uncertain times – key themes emerged that we could harness in New Zealand today to help us turn our own turbulence into momentum.   

• Mindset: Many recent conversations I’ve had include the sentiment that we’ve lost an element of our innovative, action-based New Zealander mindset, becoming increasingly siloed and paralysed by the complexities we face. The conference focused strongly on mindset – of embracing our responsibility not just to deliver projects, but to deliver progress; to not just be problem solvers, but to be systems thinkers; to show leadership and to walk this path together with trust rather than alone and defensively. We need an action-based mindset, because doing nothing is the most expensive option.
• Economies of scale: We are a small country, and our market is complicated by our large number of local and regional authorities. In smaller markets like ours, we need to think about scaling up our efforts. Fragmentation reduces competitiveness. Acting big and pooling resources can create a significant impact.
  
  
• Investing in resilience, urgently: Resilience must be embedded from the earliest stages of a project, through nature-based risk assessments and stakeholder engagement, and it must be a core performance measure not an afterthought. When it comes to designing for resilience, we need to incorporate and draw from indigenous knowledge because, as one speaker put it, ‘tomorrow’s resilience begins with yesterday’s wisdom’. In Aotearoa, this means drawing on Māori knowledge as a matter of strategy and science.
  
  
• Collaborative, trusting relationships: Building trust and collaboration with clients and stakeholders is crucial because the complexity of challenges we’re facing means we can’t progress alone. We can take a leadership role in bridging the gap in the silos across our system. This includes early engagement between public and private sector and the communities we are serving to align our vision goal and success measures, and then embedding those throughout the project lifecycle, measuring and evaluating them and ensuring environments for honest and open conversations to solve problems as they occur – with collaborative contracts being a core underpinning of this approach.
  
  
• Community trust: Trust within a project design and delivery team is one thing – trust from the communities we are serving is another critical pillar for successful infrastructure delivery. Engaging local communities early builds confidence in infrastructure investments and paves a smoother way forward. This can include open data sharing, turning data into understandable and actionable information, and creating opportunities for communities to have a voice and to enable an honest and constructive exchange of ideas, such as through multi-stakeholder groups.
  
  
• Procurement: The predominant way we deal with procurement is no longer fit for purpose – historically procurement processes have served as a compliance function, but there is an increasing understanding that procurement is an enabler to address our increasing challenges. This requires us to embed ESG considerations into procurement processes through early environmental and societal impact assessments, so we understand ESG risks upfront, including ESG KPIs in tender documents, requiring ESG management plans in tenderer proposals, monitoring and knowledge sharing. Procurement driven by quality-based selection, not solely cost, is leading to significant downstream sustainable value for communities (taxpayers). And standardisation and collaborative-based contracts were a key theme for positive change here too.
  
  
• AI and digitalisation: Using AI to enable equity, ensure safety and enhance decision-making is vital. Collaborative contracts can create an environment for harnessing AI opportunities.
  
  
• Investing in people: Enhancing the culture within our organisations and uplifting client intelligence and capability is crucial. This means we need to lean into the human perspective of what we do and always remember that our people are our greatest asset.

“There was a reminder of our duties to always lead with ethics and integrity, and to proudly and boldly use our voice to build trust with communities, and to inform and influence decision-makers by sharing the challenges and using our systems thinking to shape and deliver solutions.”  
 

ACE New Zealand's role

“I’m proud of the work we have done over the last few years to lean into these challenges and opportunities. We’ve provided a strong voice for members and opened communication with decision-makers on the core issues that affect our businesses and overall progress in infrastructure design and delivery, leaning into our systems view and putting solutions on the table. We’ve been a strong voice for members on the need for standardised contracts, quality-based selection and procurement reform.

“We’re leading conversations about the critical role of collaborative and trusting relationships for efficient and effective delivery through our six engagement principles for consultants and clients. 

“We’re showing leadership in putting people first through our Mindspace initiative and commitment to The Diversity Agenda. We’re elevating the critical need to embrace our unique cultural heritage and embrace indigenous knowledge.

“We’re sharing insights and learning on harnessing AI in your businesses and leaning into the future of consulting. And we’ve invested in economic research that will help us articulate the unique value our consultants bring to their clients and communities. 

“There’s a lot of work to do, but when I reflect on our local challenges in the context of these global discussions, I believe we’re on a good track. If we bring our best mindset and solutions to the table, speak boldly with clients and decision-makers, build trust and foster collaboration, we will make better decisions and lead our organisations and our communities to thrive through future uncertainties. As simply stated at the conference, this is our duty.”