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A project I have been closely involved in is the regionalisation of the companys locations Australia and New Zealand into a single Oceania region. The project involved redesigning structures, aligning processes, integrating systems, and creating a more unified way of working across both countries. The goal was to achieve greater efficiency, consistency, and collaboration while maintaining local business needs.

Looking back, several IPD principles could have further improved the outcome. One key principle is the early involvement of all stakeholders. While leaders were involved in designing the regional model, broader employee involvement earlier in the process may have helped identify practical challenges around role clarity, workload, and communication before implementation. This could have reduced some of the friction points later identified during the refinement phase.

Another useful IPD principle is shared ownership of outcomes. Rather than functional teams focusing only on their own priorities, a stronger focus on shared regional goals and measures of success may have encouraged more collaboration across Australia and New Zealand. For example, teams could have jointly owned regional efficiency, employee experience, and process improvement targets.

Finally, IPD promotes continuous collaboration and transparent decision making. More structured cross functional workshops and feedback forums throughout the implementation phase could have improved communication, reduced duplication, and helped teams adapt more quickly to new ways of working. This would likely have strengthened employee engagement and increased the speed at which the regional model became fully embedded

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Trust is essential in IPD projects because it allows people to work openly, share ideas, and solve problems together. When trust is strong, decisions can be made faster and with less conflict. Project leaders can build trust by involving key stakeholders early, communicating honestly, sharing information openly, and following through on commitments. This helps create a cooperative team focused on achieving the best outcome for the project.

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The shared risk and reward model helped the project succeed because everyone benefited from achieving the best outcome. By sharing both risks and savings, the team worked together to control costs, solve problems quickly, and improve efficiency. In technology projects, this model can be harder to apply because success is difficult to measure, priorities can change, and organisations may be hesitant to share risks and financial information.

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In my work developing TAFE learning and assessment resources, IPD principles could have improved the process. For example, teachers, subject matter experts, instructional designers and compliance staff could have been involved from the beginning.

Regular collaborative meetings could have identified mapping, assessment and resource issues earlier. Shared digital tools could also have allowed everyone to review documents and provide feedback in one place. This may have reduced repeated changes, improved communication and produced resources that better met the needs of teachers and students.

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Trust is important in Integrated Project Delivery (IPD) because stakeholders must share information, make joint decisions and solve problems together. Without trust, people may hide problems or focus only on protecting their own interests.

Project leaders can build trust by:

Involving stakeholders early.

Clearly explaining roles and expectations.

Sharing information openly.

Making decisions fairly.

Holding regular meetings.

Addressing problems early.

Recognising each stakeholder’s contribution.

Following through on commitments.

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The shared risk/reward model encouraged the architect, builder and subcontractors to work together to control costs and avoid mistakes. Part of their profit depended on the project’s overall success, and any savings were shared. This meant everyone benefited from making efficient decisions.

In technology development, this model could be difficult because costs, timelines and results can be uncertain. Team members may also disagree about success measures, ownership of intellectual property or how rewards should be divided.

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I participated in a CRM implementation project and was one of the user groups within the client organisation purchasing the new system. The key participants in the project were the client organisation, the CRM developer and the IT services contractor for the client organisation. The CRM project followed a more traditional project methodology, with a scoping phase, testing/pilot phase followed by staged implementation. Costs were based on a fixed price contract, with some contingency. Additional work that was deemed to be outside the scope and not part of project contingency was then held over to a 2nd or 3rd phase of CRM implementation, as further funding was made available, beyond the initial budget.

Improvements through use of an IPD approach:

a)      Develop a risk/reward mechanism that applied to the two IT service providers, tying payment partly to achievement of project milestones and outcomes.

b)     MS Teams channel was used by the client organisation and the CRM developer but the level of communication was restricted and not used as a project site. The IT service provider was not included in the MS Teams channel. In an IPD approach all major participants would be included in the project site.

c)      The IT services contractor was not sufficiently connected to the project – often brought in to fix an issue that the CRM developer could not solve. Through IPD this contractor would be identified as a major sub-contractor, with particular expertise needed to ensure successful implementation.

d)     Replace blaming with trust, ownership of issues and joint problem solving.  This occurred within participant teams as well as in the cross-participant project team. In a IPD approach there would be early work to set up these principles, with consistent modelling and reinforcement by leaders.

e)      Early recognition of stakeholder needs in project planning – many of these needs were left unsaid and then disrupted later stages of the project. Through an IPD approach time and energy would be given to drawing these out. The location of many of the CRM programmers overseas heightened the risk of inadequate communication and understanding.

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Trust is crucial for a successful IPD. It provides the context that enables the team to embrace transparency, shared risk, collaborative design and flexible decision-making throughout the course of the project. Trust allows architects, builders, engineers, and subcontractors to work in a fully integrated environment, where information is openly exchanged and decisions are made collectively rather than in silos. Trust accelerates decision-making, lowers defensiveness and reduces conflict, with team members having confidence in each other. Trust reduces waste, increases efficiency and the achievement of project outcomes, with a risk‑pool structure and shared incentive model. The deep level of trust is reflected in the sense of accountability to the team and contribution to collective performance.

Actions leaders can take to build and maintain trust among all stakeholders in IPD projects:

a. Establish early involvement and shared incentives

Leaders ensure all key participants, including major subcontractors, are selected early and included in shared risk/reward mechanisms, signalling equitable treatment and aligned interests from the beginning of the project.

b. Promote transparent communication and co‑location

Implement frequent Core Team meetings, open-book financials, shared BIM models and a project website accessible to all participants. These structures remove information barriers and promote honesty and openness.

c. Empower decision‑makers at all levels

Allow participants to problem solve and resolve issues together without bureaucratic delay. Leaders need to demonstrate trust in their teams, reinforcing reciprocal trust.

d. Encourage collaborative problem‑solving and respect

Leaders promote a culture where participants approach issues with multiple solutions rather than blame, fostering psychological safety and joint ownership of outcomes.

e. Maintain rigorous, shared programming

Ensure there is a thorough early programming phase in the project. Make certain that all stakeholder needs are recognised, reducing later conflict and demonstrating respect for the expertise and contribution of each discipline to project success.

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The architect and builder sacrificed a portion of their normal billing rates, taking on the risk of a share in profits based on the achievement of project outcomes. This was part of the IPD contract, plus a formula to split funds remaining in the contingency pot at the end of the project. Four of the major subtrades signed joining agreements and participated in the financial incentives scheme. In total, the at-risk parties accounted for more than 60% of the work. The architects were given detailed unit costs during design – the early provision of cost information helped design decisions to be based on reliable data and avoided the additional costs of redesign. The risk/reward model encouraged all parties to make decisions based on outcomes for the overall project, not just their own interests.

Challenges in a different industry:

1.      The model requires a major cultural shift to a collaborative mindset, understanding the whole and how the parts fit together to deliver the project outcomes.

2.      Some other sectors have yet to embrace this approach and so it is difficult to see and learn from examples – technology projects are an example of this.

3.      The reluctance of parties to openly share information.

4.      How to appropriately define scope changes vs contingency.