Shah Hussain
A chartered project professional with a background in civil engineering working on major infrastructure projects
LinkedIn https://uk.linkedin.com/in/shahhussain
Twitter https://twitter.com/shahhussain_
Location United Kingdom
Activity
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Q1
-low range
-limited changing facilities
-slow charging
-expensive to buyQ2
-get people out of vehicles, so for local travel, walk or take public transport
-cycling for short/medium distances
-selling health benefits of walking & cycling
-incentivise cycle uptake such as cycling to work schemes, reduced cost to buy a cycle/vouchers... -
Shah Hussain made a comment
Having reflected on the Pendleton and Cowell model, the following qualities are my strong points;
*'building and sustaining relationship' – I prefer to build long-term relationships and trust with people I work with, this is especially true as I will be working closely with them on a regular basis and want to move beyond just a transactional relationship....
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I would suggest the workplace has both the 'manager' and 'leader' types independently from the other, perhaps what is required is a synthesis of the two types within an individual so that the individual has both set of skills, experience and knowledge at hand to tap into.
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Transactional leadership is very much alive even today! My view of it is that it doesn't inspire trust, respect or indeed a belief in such leaders who espouse this type of leadership.
Bonuses and rewards are given if KPIs/targets are achieved or exceeded - and even then the bonuses are spread out as a 'bell curve' distribution, ie the top 5-10% will get...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I do think there is a strong argument for situational leadership - and that leaders should be malleable and able to 'read' the situation and adapt to their surrounding and lead by example.
I have personally led at times in a more democratic fashion when the situation had required 'out of the box' thinking and abstract ideas to be explored and generated,...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
• So what is leadership? Is it a noun or a verb? A concept or a process?
I would put forward that leadership is a 'verb' as it describes an action state ie s/he has led/is leading this team.
I wouldn’t describe leadership as a 'concept' otherwise it makes it sound abstract – I don’t believe that’s what leadership is; it can be a 'process' as it is a series... -
Shah Hussain made a comment
Leadership is the ability to create a vision and a common cause and galvanise support around it.
A leader is confident in their ability, is self-aware, shows empathy, and wants to make a difference.
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Hi All,
My name is Shah Hussain and I am a Project Manager on a complex infrastructure scheme worth c.£1b.
I deal with various people, clients, designers, contractors, engineers, stakeholders, government officials, members of the public - all from various backgrounds and varying degrees of influence.
I lead large teams and this means I have to make...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Roy’s style of management is autocratic, no wonder his staff have revolted as he is not one to listen to their views.
Roy needs to understand the team dynamics within his workforce, to do that he has to be able to really listen and allow his staff room for open and honest conversations. He won’t be able to do this if he does not change his autocratic...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Leadership requires a strong vision, binding consensus for the masses to galvanise behind a common purpose and steering the ship through changing circumstances while motivating these looking to you for answers.
Sounds deceptively simple, yet leaders get it wrong most of the time. Why do most projects fail, run over budget, are delayed, employees...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Danial Kahneman’s System 1 and System 2 was a great concept to learn – I will certainly reflect on this while making decisions in the future.
I must say I was aware of Kahneman’s ‘Thinking, fast and slow’ book and had put it on my reading list, but for whatever reason I just didn’t get round to reading it. I certainly intend to read the book to get better...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I selected "System 2" because I am very deliberate when it comes to decision making and risk taking and consider myself to be very much risk-averse.
Although, upon further reflection, I must hasten to add that in my personal life, I do not take risks (i.e. don’t impulse buy, won’t take out a loan to get the latest in-thing or flavour of the month - yep I...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
One example of me managing risk in my daily life is when I take my 2-year-old child out of the house.
Once outside, I become extra vigilant and cautious, and I am always scanning my environment as I let my child walk ahead and even run as is his wont. I am always assessing the situation and making sure he does not walk or run into the road and in front of...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
What I took away from reviewing KPMG’s risk website was that 'Risk Management' is not the responsibility of a single department, it is the responsibility of everyone from CEO down. And yes, I agree with this sentiment, indeed, it’s a collective responsibility to manage and mitigate risk exposure to the business.
Here’s where it gets fascinating for me:...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
A potentially risky situation I found myself in recently and how I mitigated the risk (or tried to):
I was going to be off work for a week, there were several activities that required my attention to complete before I went away, however, due to an already stretched commitment I had not managed to complete any of these.
The most critical was for me to...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
The benefits of General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) for the ordinary citizens include;
•The legislation places limit on what organisations can do with personal data.
•Specific data such as race, political opinions, religious beliefs, genetic and biometric data, health information, gender and sexual orientation are given greater protection under the...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
The term 'fake news' is used all too often to discredit an opponent. Yet for the average person this term doesn't help confirm or deny a particular news story as “fake” or otherwise.
It is important for individuals to be very discerning and question the intent of an opinion piece or news item. Widen the net when it comes to consuming news for example....
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Three Opportunities.
• Allows for smoother and efficient on-line shopping experience
• Provides targeted promotions, ads and results based on your search habits
• Information at the touch of your fingertips.Three Threats.
• Improper data profiling – keeping your personal data and mining it to businesses for profit without your knowledge
•... -
Shah Hussain made a comment
Scenario 1:
I would consider this to be a risk rather than uncertainty on the following assumptions. It is a construction project. The contractor and the client have/ will agree a value for the project, and this sets the basis for the contractual terms between the contractor and client. The duration of the construction is known, and health and safety risks... -
Shah Hussain replied to Nishi Vora
@NishiVora here is an example of a 'risk' and an 'uncertainty' from my field of work;
Scenario 1 - Risk.
A new road will cross over a mineral extracting quarry. It will cost to mitigate. Mitigation could be,
• avoid quarry completely;
• avoid quarry partially;
• buy the quarry;
Each mitigation option carries significant commercial and financial... -
Shah Hussain made a comment
We live in a data-driven data-rich environment. So, the question for me is 'how do we sift through all this data we have amassed as a collective to arrive at informed decisions?'
Many of us talk about 'facts' as if facts are gospel. So why is it with so much data at our disposal we still make mistakes?
This reminds me of the saying 'we have too much...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
During the pandemic, working from home became the norm, and for me, still is as I have not been back in the office since formal lockdown in the UK started on the 23rd of March of this year.
I realised that I now had more time on my hand because of not traveling to and back from work. I gained at least 2hours daily – this I decided I needed to utilise in a...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
What do you understand by the term consciousness?
As I understand it, consciousness is about being aware of our inward (ie my thoughts, feelings, emotions) and the outward (ie others, surrounding, environment, place etc).
What is the opposite of consciousness?
I suppose the opposite is unconsciousness, a state of being unaware – does the mind...
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@IngridK. ME stands for Middle East and SME stands for Small to Medium Enterprises.
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Shah Hussain made a comment
If the Mind is about free will, the ability to choose, distinguish from right and wrong, feel and display emotions, then I’d argue computers don’t have this innate ability.
After all, we can switch of a computer or smartphone. Technologies deal with algorithm, zeros and ones, are coded to perform functions and are based on 'facts' rather than...
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Shah Hussain replied to Kelvin S
Interesting observation on advertisement and mind manipulation Kevin, I'd say you could expand this into entertainment, movies, music, media as well perhaps? This begs the question 'do we truly think for ourselves' or are we easily swayed and influenced by others?
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I would be very much interested in the connection between 'mind' - what is it, what it isn’t - and the 'soul/ spirit', the 'ego', 'consciousness' and where is it located, and ultimately 'who am I' (?)
If the body is the carrier, am I the ‘soul’ or ‘mind’ (?)
What remains after death/decay of the body (?)These questions probably intersect, weave and...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
This is a great workbook to get you to think and take positive action! For me, I intend to do as follows:
Stop -
Having undertaken this course, I am satisfied that I have been doing the right thing, and the course has cemented my position and certainly crystallised my thoughts on ethics, so now I am more confident I can link my practical application to... -
Shah Hussain made a comment
Certainly agree that there is a need to have the conversation around and about ethics.
In my experience, companies do have workshops that focus on, for example behaviours – where groups of people from different organisations coming together on a project, participate in discussing about trust and respect, collaboration and what it looks like, and so on....
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Shah Hussain made a comment
A lot of the time there is constant pressure to progress at pace and get the job done, this in turn does mean the “thinking space” just isn't there and everything feels like a rush job.
Here is a recent example from my work environment - I was at a workshop and colleagues at all levels and differing roles and responsibilities joined from several...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
1. What do these results reveal to you?
Overall, positive results suggesting majority of organisations do have an ethical conduct in place and employees do know where to find them. Mixed results when it comes to individuals following these conducts and therefore there is a disconnect between having a code of conduct and individuals not following through....
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Shah Hussain made a comment
For me this scenario brings out a number of ethical concerns, namely;
• The clients brother can certify, already a COI
• Two stage fee, direct to client and his brother, sounds like bribery
• Bid for work ahead of others, unfair advantageIf I was in this position I would politely thank the client and decline. I would then seriously consider would I...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Scenario A: He has assumed that she works in the office because she is a lady, there is an underlying assumption on his part that as a woman, she shouldn’t or wouldn’t be a site engineer. If I was in her shoes I would correct him;
Scenario B: Having a lewd calendar in the office, irrespective of it displaying male or female content, is not an acceptable...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Yes, regulations may change – but the industry and the companies involved in construction should not view such changes as business risks but rather opportunities.
For example, changes in H&S has meant that companies had to act in a way to ensure their employees, workforce and the public are kept safe during construction, which has reduced deaths and...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Problem of modern slavery, in all its forms is all too real, exacerbated by the poor families in developing countries having no choice but to comply. Child labour and exploitation particularly is acute.
We, as consumers, can no longer be passive and must vote with our conscience and wallet. As long as we demand for cheap cloths, for example, companies will...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I suspect, and I have no data to prove this, just based on my anecdotal experiences, SMEs don’t discuss ethics and by extension values and behaviours with their employees. Especially with a size of less than 13 employees, the company boss(s) is too busy trying to make sure when and how the next pay check is coming in.
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Conflict of interest is potentially a very big (‘grey?’) area which can lead to unethical behaviours.
We don't have to look far - here is a very recent example of COI involving the Housing Minister and a party donor who he appears to know and who lobbied him to approve a housing development site. (Source: BBC, June 2020 -...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I had a quick review of the CIOB Code of Conduct and compared it to my professional organisation’s (APM) Professional Code of Conduct and noted they were very similar in their articulation of conduct: using words such as integrity, honesty, trust, respect, professional duties, protecting public interest.
These values are important in construction to ensure...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Reviewing my personal values, I would make the link between these and the values needed in construction as follows:
• Information sharing and open communication would fit into my personal values of ‘caring’ and ‘commitment’ – for me building and maintaining relationships at work is at the heart of trust and if we get this right then it is easier to share...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Several factors motivate me linking into my values:
• Engaging with colleagues, peers, stakeholders and having great conversations where I am learning and passing on my own experiences while building long-term relationships and forming trust;
• I want to do a great job by contributing to the successful delivery of infrastructure projects and leaving...
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The findings suggested the values the industry is calling for included: open communication, more accountability, employee recognition, leadership development and work/life balance.
None of these results comes as a surprise to me as I have heard these values being expressed in some shape or form in the past.
The question for me would be "how do we get...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I did a quick review of my full week from last week and would summarise it as follows:
1. Due to the covid pandemic I am working from home but making sure I am balancing my time between work vs home-life (professional vs personal).
2. Throughout the day where I had gaps I caught up with people I care about through video chat.
3. I did daily exercises in... -
Shah Hussain made a comment
Having undertaken the Personal Value Assessment, I noticed on the ‘Barrett Seven Levels of Consciousness Model’ I had nothing in ‘Self Esteem’.
On reflection this aligns with my underlining fear of having not achieved enough and feeling like an imposter - I took a course recently on imposter syndrome which really opened my eyes to why such feelings occur,...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Values are very important to me personally, I could say they are my 'red lines'.
The most important value I hold dear is 'Integrity' - not bending my principles, being honest and keeping my promises, and building trust is central to my integrity.
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Low cost tendering to win work has led to Contractors getting a heavy workload and stretching themselves too thin and suffering as a consequence - a certain Tier 1 Contractor went bust not so long ago (easy to find out through google!) while other Tier 1 Contractors have gone into administration and many more have had profit warnings and stocks and share...
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@RobertWalton you raise a really interesting point, personally I think both have their flaws, design/quality is too expensive for the Client who in most cases simply can’t afford it, conversely lowest bid wins the work and cutting corners leads to disasters such as Grenfell.
A happy medium would be 50/50 as you suggest, but does that also work I wonder,...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Childhood upbringing has a huge impact on a person’s character, his or her view and place in the world – I was brought up by my parents to always be truthful, not to be harmful to others and respectful of others rights before mine.
I agree that religious beliefs also inform ethical behaviour. One of the values instilled in me was the importance of service...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
‘Ethics’ to me means having integrity and principles at all time and showing moral behaviours, so if you say something then you must follow through with your actions. Actions should reflect honesty.
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Shah Hussain made a comment
The tendency to feel like an ‘imposter’ in my leadership position doesn’t come as a surprise as I am constantly trying too hard.
I will set myself the following goals and actions to break this cycle:
(a) Not be afraid to show vulnerability, it’s not a sign of weakness and incompetency – communicate more often with my team, express my fears and talk...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I came out as someone having a Growth Mindset in the interactive quiz. I do push myself and constantly find I am outside my comfort zone - perhaps one reason why I feel like an 'imposer' yet I continue to stretch myself.
I have a love for learning so do relate to the belief that I can improve through practice.
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Shah Hussain made a comment
One observation I made while doing this exercise was that it was very easy to list all my weaknesses and 'shortfalls' quickly, but then I struggled with listing my positives and strengths! Similarly I had no difficulty listing out threats but didn't see much opportunities.
Converting weaknesses into strengths and threats into opportunities doesn't come...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I scored 75/100 on the Clance Impostor Phenomenon Test vs. 71/100 on the Imposter Syndrome Test which I completed earlier.
I was surprised at how high my score was when I undertook the first test, but now understanding a bit more about this phenomenon and looking at this result, which is almost similar with 4-points difference between the two, I am not at...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I have notices, within my working environment, others going through the "imposer phenomenon", and yes I have noticed this with my female and BAME colleagues far more often then not - in fact we have spoken quite openly about this within the team I am responsible for, which felt quite liberating as we all felt comfortable in each others company to discuss this...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I got a 71/100 which is quite a bit of a surprise, didn't expect it to be that high! May help explain why I feel like I have not "achieved" much in life.
Out of the 5 common signs from the article I recognised myself in all of them:
- I'm a perfectionist, for example I will write an email then rewrite it several time and keep reading it until I feel...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I certainly have felt anxious when beginning a new task, indeed I will procrastinate for days on end while worrying about it. Then put pressure on myself as I'm working against deadline.
I've also noticed I get uncomfortable when being praised - almost as if to say "don't praise me too much or you may find out I'm an impostor" (!)
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Both the moral and economic arguments are valid and can be easily harmonised to form a strong cohesive argument to protect and conserve our natural environment.
It is important that we look after our world, the rich natural resources within it, and protect all the variety of the wildlife and species – not doing so has led to the current global...
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@EngrUsmanMuktar by way of an example a critical activity may be to sign a major contract to bring in a new supplier to build a complex bridge by a particular time-frame.
However, in order to sign this contract between the parties, approval is required as millions of taxpayer monies is about to be tied into this contract.
At times this approval may not...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
'Quality' needs to be set upfront when the scope is being developed and agreed, as it is intrinsically linked to 'Cost' (will cost £x million more vs £y million if premium mat'l is used for example) and 'Time' (will take 2 wks longer for an extra pedestrian footbridge for example).
A set procedure must be in place to understand, recognise and control...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Disagree with the following two statements:
• Quality problems should be hidden from customers and possibly also managers.
The concept of a right-first-time approach will lead to client/ customer satisfaction, redoing/ recalling work because client/ customer isn’t satisfied will impact on reputation and bottom line.
• Team members do not produce...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Some example of circumstances where success criteria other than time/cost/quality is important would include:
• Stakeholder alignments – do all parties understand and agree on a common scope; is it well defined to allow project to deliver to time/cost/quality;
• Environmental considerations – carbon neutrality, biodiversity, air quality, cultural...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Pressure points:
• Understand each of the team members; either their MBTI personality type or Insights colour energies, this will then allow me to identify which roles I would like to put them into to get the best out of them;
• Build a consensus on what our vision, goals, milestones and deliverables look like, so everyone can play their respective...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Managing and dealing with people is always messy and difficult.
For me being a line manager, task manager and a project manager, and combining these roles and then to also undertake performance reviews, monthly 1-2-1s, administrating leave requests and making sure not everyone goes on leave at the same time can be quite gruelling and tiring at times when...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I think the more complicated and complex a project is, the more it requires experience at the helm.
So, if we take ‘risk management’ as a real example, to give this workstream to a less experienced member of the team, in effect, has meant that I have found myself spending more time sorting out risk mitigation rather than letting the inexperienced member...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
There are many ways a newly formed team can build trust and discover each other’s merits:
Take the MBTI test and discuss the results, understand who is an 'introvert' and who is an' extrovert'; what makes them so and look at the roles and responsibilities and agree where to put each member, i.e. an 'extrovert' may well be better at stakeholder engagement...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I do think diversity of thoughts and viewpoints are a great trait that avoid ‘group think’ – this old adage of "this is how we have always done it" stifles innovation, allows for the same pitfalls and mistakes to happen again and again, leading to the same cost over-runs, programme difficulties, and not doing it 'right first time''.
Having a diverse team,...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Tuckman's model of 'forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning' is very reflective of how projects are started up, delivered and decommissioned in my organisation.
Looking at one of my current projects, we went through the 'forming' phase, great eagerness, excitement, everyone making their contributions, creating the vision and goals, and moved...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Seldom have I ever had a chance to select my own project team, or even a project that I really wanted for that matter!
I have always been handed a project to deliver and a team to go with it.
When it has come to team members, I always interact regularly with these working full-time on my project, to get a sense of their area of expertise and also their...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
The biggest challenge is to get all individual team members to agree on a common purpose, a common cause that they all can believe in.
This then allows the team to have goals, both short and long term for the project, depending on its duration.
All this requires a project manager showing great leadership qualities by getting the wider team to buy into,...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
What makes a great project team is everyone sharing a common vision, understand what success looks like at the end, and have similar goals and aspirations; creating a great team culture, communicating a common set of data and narrative that makes it easy for team members to work to and celebrating successes, no matter how small or trivial they may seem.
It...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
My project environment is complex, there are a lot of interdependencies, not just within the organisation and our supply chain, but also external, for example local highways authorities upgrading and improving their roads which converges onto our network, or local planning authorities developing local plans for house-building, which interlinks with our road...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
One of the stumbling blocks for my organisation has been around Brexit volatility uncertainty impacting on several large-scale projects.
My organisation isn’t agile enough to respond quickly, partly because it deals with larger complex infrastructures, which take years to plan, finance, procure and deliver, and partly because it is a g’ment owned company...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
The industry I’m in is undergoing a massive transformation from:
• Technological development and advancement - i.e. drones for surveys/ AI-led software for data analysis/ BIM and a common data environment/ automation and ML removing labour; to
• Political uncertainty - i.e. Brexit and impact on businesses/ what are future projects/ HS2 being questioned;...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
There are five organisational values where I work;
• Safety – we take care of ourselves and our colleagues, our partners delivering for us and our customers using our network;
• Integrity – we do what we say;
• Passion – we care about what we do;
• Teamwork – we work as a team to succeed;
• Ownership – we take responsibility for what we do and...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Working in an environment where my stakeholders vary from internal to external, from small groups to large groups, from g'ment depts to MPs, public, LEPs, supply chain and so on, the advice about tailoring communications style holds true for me, as I have had to sit in one extreme at meetings of very complex technical nature with one communication style, to...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
Based on my previous Stakeholder Map, I would engage with the stakeholders I identified as follows:
LEAD: lead on engagement with Environment Agency to bring them into viewing the project positively as they can derail it by objecting on environmental grounds;
OWN: my engagement with the licensing authority will be to get them to own the responsibility...
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Shah Hussain replied to Shah Hussain
Ah managed to figure out how to upload document! Done
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I've completed the stakeholder mapping exercise but am unable to upload for some reason
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Shah Hussain made a comment
stakeholders for staging a large sporting event would include:
* spectators attending the event
* athletes participating at the event
* local authorities and sports organisations involved with the event
* water regulation authority
* environmental authorities
* client (who's requested the water)
* emergency services esp. fire services
* sponsors of... -
Shah Hussain made a comment
Emanuele's point about putting yourself outside your comfort zone to really get the learnings resonated with me.
When I reflect on this I can see that where I have been uncomfortable due to pushing myself and being outside my own comfort zone, I have actually learnt as I am really thinking about the situation, process and the interaction I need to...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
As a civil engineer I consider all of the six project management skills to be important, although some may take precedence over others.
This is more so because communication is vital for the successful delivery of road improvements I undertake, and I am communicating with multiple stakeholders all across the social spectrum. So being able to convey...
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Shah Hussain made a comment
I'm A civil engineer and a project manager and wish to update and refresh my skills base and also learn new tools and techniques within the field of project management in a complex and ever changing environment
