Ego vs execution war story


Dear project managers and executives
You are not paid to referee ego wars.
You are paid to protect outcomes.

I have seen this many times.

And doubts and concerns freeze you like a bunny looking at the two lights of the car moving to you.

Look.

If you're witnessing a standoff between two inflated egos, do everyone a favor:
Remove them both—or at least the one you can control.

Will it feel disruptive? Yes.
Expensive? Maybe.
Unfair? Possibly.

​
But trust me... it’s a bargain compared to the cost of keeping them around.

I've seen projects lose millions because someone had to be right.
I’ve seen teams break, timelines collapse, and reputations tank—
Not because of risk or complexity...
But because no one had the guts to pull the ego out of the room.

Leadership is about subtraction.

​
Sometimes, the best move is cutting the wrong person at the right time.

More wisdom? Check below.

$99.90

The 15 Top Lessons of a PPP Project Nightmare

Learn about:
The number 1 killer of Projects
Why this was not going to be just "another construction project, mate"... Read more

​

PD 1: If you liked this email, don't keep it in secret and forward it to a friend. They will thank you enormously one day.

PD 2: If somebody has sent you this email and you want to receive emails like this yourself, visit vicentevalencia.com

PD 3: If you want unsubscribe, click the link below.

Vicente Valencia

Weekly insights on how to perform when it matters | High-stakes decisions. Real situations. No BS. | 👇JOIN +2k readers 👇

Read more from Vicente Valencia

There was already a port. The quays were there. The railway was there. The channel was there. The cranes were there. More or less. What was missing was cargo. In 2003, Mozambique handed the Port of Maputo to a public-private concessionaire. Yes… You know. PPP are not just roads and hospitals… It was a BOT model… where the B was probably more R of Rehabilitation. Well… At the time, the port was handling approximately 5 million tonnes per year. Last year, it handled around 32 million. Six times...

Final bid phase. BAFO. Best and Final Offer. Beautiful name, by the way. And my favourite thing ever… It’s not just that people show their faces under their masks… It sounds clean. Professional. Almost elegant. Like everyone is now putting their best offer on the table, shaking hands mentally, and preparing for a fair final comparison. Cute. Then a few smart guys decided to be very smart. Too smart. They started sneaking small changes into the agreement. Nothing dramatic. Nothing that looked...

Dakar–Diamniadio. A toll road. It reduced a journey of around 90 minutes to approximately 25. It opened on time. Within budget. Traffic exceeded expectations. And it became one of Africa’s best-known PPP case studies. So, naturally, “experts” looked at the contract. The financing. The risk allocation. The concessionaire. All important. But many were missing the secret sauce. Senegal spent around ten years preparing the project before the road opened. Ten years. Not ten PowerPoint...