Practice the Contract, Protect the Relationship: The Art of Commercial Leadership (EP 276)

When we first chatted, you mentioned that kind of you've always enjoyed the, in inverted commas, "difficult final accounts," right? Just talk to me about why that is.

Well, I, I think, uh, I'm a Libra, so, you know-

[laughs]

... apparently I'm inclined to find balance in things, so [laughs] I think-

Love it

...

I think that's, that's probably it, but, um-

Is that it? Just that's it.

Well, I, I, you know, I enjoy the process of establishing the facts-

Yeah

... applying the contract to the facts to get an objective answer to things.

And ultimately, I enjoy helping, uh, parties to construction contracts resolve disputes, which is the whole reason really why I, I, I went down the route of starting my own consultancy in the first place.

Yeah.

And I mean, it's interesting because my background and kind of my experience was subcontract commercial management and, you know, particularly in the back end of my projects career, let's say, like, I was working for large tier one subcontractor, and quite often it felt like I was thrown a, a project which was at final account stage but was kind of stuck.

So that, like, I was wedged into, like, what we were trying to achieve was a commercial outcome as opposed to a legal outcome from a, a final account.

And so I personally enjoyed the process as well of ...

And, and it was less legal at that stage.

It was just trying to kind of understand where we were at, where the client was at, and trying to find a happy medium, and, like, that was a process that I really enjoyed.

Obviously, you're kind of perhaps more involved when things get to a, a legal outcome, right? Just having seen disputes from, from every angle, what, what do you kinda think most people still misunderstand about construction disputes?

What caused it in the first place.

[laughs]

You know, I think often it wasn't the disagreement that caused the dispute.

It was either a misunderstanding of the contractual terms or a failure to spot something, um, that was ambiguous, that gave perhaps an opportunity for a misunderstanding.

So, for example, you know, a clause, um, or the priority of documents or errors in the contract documents, you know.

I think it all ...

When we first chatted, you mentioned that kind of you've always enjoyed the, in inverted commas, "difficult final accounts," right? Just talk to me about why that is.

Well, I, I think, uh, I'm a Libra, so, you know-

[laughs]

... apparently I'm inclined to find balance in things, so [laughs] I think-

Love it

...

I think that's, that's probably it, but, um-

Is that it? Just that's it.

Well, I, I, you know, I enjoy the process of establishing the facts-

Yeah

... applying the contract to the facts to get an objective answer to things.

And ultimately, I enjoy helping, uh, parties to construction contracts resolve disputes, which is the whole reason really why I, I, I went down the route of starting my own consultancy in the first place.

Yeah.

And I mean, it's interesting because my background and kind of my experience was subcontract commercial management and, you know, particularly in the back end of my projects career, let's say, like, I was working for large tier one subcontractor, and quite often it felt like I was thrown a, a project which was at final account stage but was kind of stuck.

So that, like, I was wedged into, like, what we were trying to achieve was a commercial outcome as opposed to a legal outcome from a, a final account.

And so I personally enjoyed the process as well of ...

And, and it was less legal at that stage.

It was just trying to kind of understand where we were at, where the client was at, and trying to find a happy medium, and, like, that was a process that I really enjoyed.

Obviously, you're kind of perhaps more involved when things get to a, a legal outcome, right? Just having seen disputes from, from every angle, what, what do you kinda think most people still misunderstand about construction disputes?

What caused it in the first place.

[laughs]

You know, I think often it wasn't the disagreement that caused the dispute.

It was either a misunderstanding of the contractual terms or a failure to spot something, um, that was ambiguous, that gave perhaps an opportunity for a misunderstanding.

So, for example, you know, a clause, um, or the priority of documents or errors in the contract documents, you know.

I think it all ...