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In this article, Andrew Hobbs, Communications Lead at Pattle Delamore Partners, catches up with Tony Urquhart, Technical Director Infrastructure Advisory at PDP, and Andy Gibson, Director at ICS Consulting Ltd, to discuss what comes next.

The sector has come through heavy years, and change fatigue is real. As the planning haze begins to clear, a genuine opportunity is emerging to lift the quality of investment decisions and build the capability to deliver at scale.

Asset understanding, outcome-driven prioritisation, investment optimisation and delivery discipline are the foundations that will determine whether Water Service Organisations (WSOs) build confidence and deliver value, or struggle to keep pace as delivery pressure grows.

WSOs are at different stages of readiness, but all are approaching the same critical transition. Planning and delivery are running in parallel, as organisations move into a new operating environment.

The next 18 months represent a rare opportunity to set foundations. Decisions made now about priorities, capability, and how investment choices are made will shape outcomes for years to come.

Bridging the gap between funding and delivery

Funding is improving across much of the system. For many organisations, the more immediate constraint to success is capability. People, skills, and delivery capacity are likely to determine what can realistically be achieved.

This reality requires a fundamental shift in approach. Better outcomes depend less on access to funding alone, and more on how deliberately it is applied. Optimisation becomes essential. It is about making clear, defensible choices about what gets delivered, when it happens, and why it matters.

WSOs are balancing competing demands. Capital programmes must continue, and customers expect reliable services.

Confidence can erode quickly if programmes stall or get reset too often.

Continuity matters, even while organisations build the capability and systems needed for long-term efficiency.

Many are already shifting from asking “what can we afford to fund?” to “what can we realistically deliver well, in what order, and to achieve which outcomes?”

Tony Urquhart explains: “Across the sector, there’s still a significant gap between the scale of the plans and the capability and pace needed to deliver. We’re establishing new entities, but some legacy ways of working remain.

“The core challenge isn’t simply resourcing, it’s building the decision-making agility and delivery capability required for the future. Without lifting both, reform outcomes are at risk.

Scaling decision-making for what comes next

WSOs are being asked to operate at a scale that is new for many, with over $40 billion of investment anticipated over the next decade. Decision-making capability needs to lift quickly to match the volume and pace of work now coming through.

The gap shows up in decision speed, proportionality, and confidence in delegated authority. The challenge is not whether organisations care about good decisions, but whether they can make them at the scale their responsibilities now demand.

This is driving a move from project-by-project thinking toward portfolio-level decision-making. The focus shifts from working through a list, to understanding where each dollar delivers the strongest outcomes.

Investment decision-making maturity has always mattered. What has changed is the visibility of decisions, the scale of investment, and where the constraint sits. With funding improving, how decisions are made determines whether limited delivery capacity is directed efficiently toward the outcomes that matter most.

The WSOs making progress tend to treat regulation as an enabler rather than a hurdle. They use it to clarify expectations, align decisions with outcomes, and demonstrate to Boards and communities why priorities stand up to scrutiny.

Andy Gibson reflects on experience from the UK water sector: “In the best-performing UK utilities, investment prioritisation becomes a transparent portfolio process: define outcomes, value needs and options consistently, and make trade-offs explicit across risk, cost and deliverability. Customer and stakeholder engagement defines what ‘value’ means locally and nationally. Regulation then reinforces this by requiring evidence, audit trails and clear justification for funding choices.”

Four fundamentals that matter

At heart, this is not about reinventing asset management. It’s about returning to the fundamentals with sharper focus and intent.

Firstly, asset understanding must be fit for purpose. Progress doesn’t require waiting for perfect data or exhaustive analysis. It requires enough clarity to focus on what matters, and answer the questions that drive decisions. Where are the more significant risks? What would failure mean for public health, environmental quality, and service reliability? ‘Good enough to act’ beats ‘perfect but paralysing’.

Secondly, leading WSOs will keep intended outcomes for communities, the environment, and service resilience front and centre. What does success look like? Where does this investment contribute most?

That clarity helps when difficult choices need to be made, and not everything can be delivered at once.

Thirdly, optimisation should be treated as ongoing work, not as a one-off exercise or technical tool. It’s about making deliberate portfolio-level choices, and understanding risk across the system.

Sequencing work to unlock the maximum value with the resources available, will be invaluable.

Lastly, comes recognising that transition and transformation are not separate. Leading WSOs are building long-term capability through how they deliver today, balancing immediate delivery needs with longer-term ambition.

Learning from others

More mature regulated environments, like those in the UK and Australia, have worked through many of the challenges now facing WSOs in Aotearoa.

Andy, who has worked across New Zealand, Australia, North America, and the UK, notes: “They’ve developed the tools for portfolio optimisation, the frameworks for risk-based prioritisation, and the methods to demonstrate value to regulators and communities. Just as importantly, they’ve shown what doesn’t work. The opportunity for Aotearoa isn’t to copy overseas models, but to adapt proven approaches to local context.”

The collaboration between PDP and ICS reflects this mindset. It brings together international experience in regulatory economics and decision-support with local delivery knowledge and understanding of New Zealand’s operating environment. The intent is straightforward – to help organisations lift decision maturity using methods that are well tested and practical to apply.

Foundations for a generation

The decisions made over the next 18 months will shape water infrastructure for a generation. Not because reform will be complete, but because this is when operating habits, decision frameworks and delivery rhythms are established.

Organisations making progress recognise that transformation does not start after transition ends. The choice for WSO leaders is whether this period is treated as something to get through, or as foundational to building confidence, capability, and trust for decades ahead.