I talk about Personal Growth, Management, Infrastructure and More | 👇JOIN +2k readers 👇
I scored you many goals
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First week of “relax” and meetings to celebrate my well-deserved holidays. Having been for so long on the infrastructure world, logically I’ve been catching up and meeting people from banks, private equity firms and infrastructure investors, in general. In a coffee with investors talking about how I could help them in the future, I was asked something like… why would I be a good advisor for them. I was thinking that we were practising the art of conversation and coffee tasting and this caught me totally out of guard. “Because I scored you many goals” – without thinking. ​ Not the best answer, I’m afraid, but they loved it, and we could continue our coffee. And you know that I love coffee… Well… I correct. You know that I love good coffee… ​ And why did they like my answer? Well… This is a constant in business. ​ If you wonder, why the FBI uses hackers to protect their IT system or help them to “spy” on others’ computers… well… I’m sure you can guess. The best security guys can perfectly be former robbers. So, I guess that someone wanting to buy infrastructure, or any other thing would love to have a seller from the other site of the table advising them. I know where all the tricks and flaws could be in an asset. I’ve delivered many. It’s like buying a house… you would love to have a former real estate agent with you. Don’t you? ​ If so, and you want to learn a few tricks about infrastructure, you need to take a look to this. ​The 15 Top Lessons of a PPP Project Nightmare - The audiobook​ ​ 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
I talk about Personal Growth, Management, Infrastructure and More | 👇JOIN +2k readers 👇
Mega-projects don’t just overrun. They overrun lives. Ask South Africa. Medupi and Kusile were supposed to be the big solution. Two giant coal plants. Massive capex. Enough power to stop load-shedding and unlock growth. On paper? Glorious. In reality? A masterclass in how to blow up trust. Design issues. Rework. Delays measured in years, not months. Costs ballooning into the tens of billions of rand. Every extra year of delay? More load-shedding. More diesel. More businesses dying quietly....
Most governments treat their main airport like a toy.A prestige project.A political trophy.A place to cut ribbons and hire cousins. The perfect picture for LinkedIn. Egos don't get a better chance to shine. Bogotá did that for years.And the result was the "before" picture. Congested terminal.Old infrastructure.Chaos on peak days.And zero money to fix it properly. Then in 2007 they did something different.They gave El Dorado to people who actually had skin in the game... Crazy! A...
Most PPP programs don’t get into trouble because of corruption.Or bad engineers.Or lazy civil servants. Or big-mouthful politicians. They fail because people think risk is a philosophy. Not a number. And this has been a constant in my last PPP project in NZ. Everyone talked about risk. This is too risky, they said... but without numbers. You see... we ended with the highway operator not changing barriers because it was too risky... Anyway... another country that learnt about risk the hard way...