Atkins Goes Around the World in Foggy Times

WS Atkins is certainly no stranger to delivering on the international stage – this year millions of people around the world will watch Olympic events in venues designed by the engineering consultancy. But nevertheless they're working on further developing themselves as a truly global company, one who can carry out projects crossing global boundaries without breaking into a sweat.

Prof Eddie Obeng contributed to a one-week programme (Orchestrating Exceptional Performance) for 13 project managers from the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, India, Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Eddie discussed how to run programmes even as the world changes around them – he compared it to trying to run on a treadmill that's constantly speeding up. The programme and project managers explored how to overcome their fears of, and discovered the joy of, uncertainty. In particular they liked the idea of “foggy change”: not giving up even when the next step is unclear. Hopefully Atkins will span the globe in spite of the fog of change.