As investment in data centers and digital infrastructure accelerates, the challenge is shifting from ambition to execution. Capital and demand may drive growth, but delivering infrastructure that is resilient, bankable and built for long-term performance depends on decisions made much earlier.
In this Risk Capital Insight episode of the On Aon podcast, Mary-Catherine Hamill, Head of Construction, Australia, and John Berven, Growth Director, discuss why successful digital infrastructure projects depend on connecting decisions across risk, capital, people and operations from the outset.
Their conversation explores how site selection, power and utility readiness, workforce planning, governance, cyber resilience and operational readiness can influence delivery long before construction is complete. These interconnected decisions can help organizations manage execution risk, protect capital and build infrastructure that performs reliably over the long term.
This directly reflects Aon’s wider Reliable by Design approach, where risk decisions move upstream and resilience, bankability and insurability are considered across the digital infrastructure lifecycle rather than addressed only once assets are operational. Aon’s published digital infrastructure material uses this same lifecycle framing.
Key Takeaways:
Experts in this episode:
Key Moments:
(2:00) Why the most significant drivers of project outcomes are often determined during planning and design, well before construction begins.
(7:30) How workforce strategy has become a defining leadership priority as organizations compete for specialized talent across construction, technology and operations.
(13:12) Why organizations that anticipate change, understand dependencies and make informed decisions early are better positioned to deliver with confidence and stay ahead.
Soundbites:
Mary-Catherine Hamill:
“Success does not depend solely on having the most capital, the biggest site, or the fastest program. It depends on understanding the risks and dependencies across construction, utilities, workforce, cyber, capital, and operations, and using that understanding to make better decisions throughout the life cycle.”
John Berven:
“Digital infrastructure doesn't lack demand, investment or ambition. The challenge is turning those ingredients into assets that are delivered successfully and perform reliably. Reliable by Design began with the idea that risk is shaped before placement. The next step is recognizing delivery outcomes are shaped early too.”
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Success does not depend solely on having the most capital, the biggest site, or the fastest program. It depends on understanding the risks and dependencies across construction, utilities, workforce, cyber, capital, and operations, and using that understanding to make better decisions throughout the life cycle.
Intro:
Hello and welcome to this week’s episode of On Aon. Successful delivery of a digital infrastructure project happens when decisions around risk, capital, power and utilities, workforce, cyber, operational resilience and delivery are all considered together.
And it’s in the construction phase of a project where uncoordinated decision-making often becomes visible.
We’ve got two great Aon experts to discuss how digital infrastructure projects can avoid unexpected interruptions and rising costs. Joining John Berven, Asia Growth Director for Aon, is Mary-Catherine Hamill, Aon’s Head of Construction for Australia is. Here’s John to get the conversation going…
John Berven
Welcome to On Aon.
Demand for digital infrastructure remains strong and investment continues to flow. But having the ambition and capital to develop an asset doesn't necessarily mean it will be delivered successfully.
Today, we're going to be looking at what separates projects that move successfully from ambition to operation, from those that encounter delays, disruption or escalating costs.
Joining me today is Mary-Catherine Hamill, Aon's Head of Construction in Australia.
M-C, when you speak with our digital infrastructure clients today, has the conversation shifted — especially around growth to delivery?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
The growth opportunity remains significant, but clients are now focused on the ability to execute.
The energy you feel when talking to data center developers is different to other construction projects. There is this real urgency, like it's a race to the finish line. We continue to see new entrants to the sector, and that puts pressure on existing developers to deliver in order to retain their market share.
So yes, I do feel like it's actually moving. The conversation is becoming a lot more practical. Can projects be delivered on time and to schedule? And are the right people and capabilities available?
To me, this is a real big one. The more data centers Australia builds—and I'm sure it's the same elsewhere—the more thinner quality resources are spread. Can supply chain and utility dependencies be managed? And will the asset transition successfully into operation? As more DCs are entering the operational phase, the risk question is shifting. So, execution is becoming a strategic leadership issue, not simply a project management issue.
John Berven
So, the question has evolved. It's no longer simply “can we build it,” but can we deliver it with confidence?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Exactly. And that confidence depends on how much wider the set of decisions and dependencies are than the physical build itself.
John Berven
Okay, so let's explore those dependencies then. Because construction may be where a problem becomes visible, but it isn't necessarily where the problem has started. When a project experiences delays, cost pressures or disruption, people naturally describe it as a construction problem. But in your experience is that usually where the underlying issue began?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Issues that emerge during construction often originate much earlier. If you think about all the elements that go into the planning phase before soil is turned, each and every one of those, if not done right, can lead to issues. So if you sort of break that down a little bit, site selection and site readiness — asbestos and other environmental hazards often cause delay when not identified early, as an example. You've got power and utility assumptions. Design choices, one of my favorites — far too often do we see tender designs at only 60 or 70%. Then post-signing issues are identified. And that translates into additional costs and delays. You've got capital allocation and contingency planning. What gaps exist between financing requirements and contractual conditions that can be passed down to the contractor? We're seeing a lot of question and focus on that at the moment.
The workforce availability we spoke on just before, governance and decisions, and then stakeholder and regulatory engagement .
Ultimately, everything is all about early assumptions that can become difficult and expensive to change once delivery is underway. So that early planning is absolutely critical.
John Berven
So when we are brought in early to the discussion, is it one of the challenges that these early decisions are sometimes made separately? The finance team considers capital, the project team considers delivery, the technology team considers systems, and the operating team prepare for the handover.
Mary-Catherine Hamill
This is a really great question. My observation in dealing with many developers and contractors is that those organizations that have integrated project teams understand the interdependencies of each other's roles and can identify issues earlier.
So, every function has its own priority, sure. But those priorities cannot be considered in isolation. Optimizing one part of a project can create unintended consequences elsewhere.
So, if they're not talking to each other, it's going to cause massive issues. So, a few examples I'll give you: A low-cost design choice may reduce operational flexibility. An accelerated program may increase workforce and supply chain pressure. A procurement decision may create technology or cyber dependencies. And a commitment made to a customer or an investor may reduce delivery contingencies.
So, the objective is not to remove every risk. That'll be simply impossible. It's to understand the trade-offs while there's still time to make those decisions before hitting construction phase.
John Berven
Yes, that really feels like the next evolution of Reliable by Design. We've established that risk is shaped long before construction.
What you're describing is that delivery outcomes are shaped early too, right?
So what has made digital infrastructure delivery more difficult? Is it simply the increasing scale of projects or is it something more fundamental that's changing?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Scale matters, but complexity and interdependency are equally important. It's very easy to assume a data center is just a big shed, but it's much more than that. Projects involve more parties and more dependencies, and they have to work together.
So, timelines are ambitious and tolerance for delay is limited. So one thing I can tell you is absolutely categorically true for data centers.
So projects must address simultaneous pressures. If you take that into consideration, you've got your power, utilities, specialists. equipment. And then we get onto some of the newer risks like technology integration and cyber security.
This is a real game changer for the digital infrastructure compared to a typical warehouse build.
And then we go into things like financial conditions and operational resilience. So each of those needs to be addressed in conjunction with each other. A workforce issue can become a schedule issue as an example.
A utility delay can become a capital issue. And a systems decision can become an operational resilience issue. They are literally all connected.
So even when teams are managing them, there can still be issues if they're not managing them together.
John Berven
While power was explored in greater depth earlier in this podcast series, from a delivery perspective, how important is it to treat power and utilities as an integrated part of project planning rather than just a separate technical work stream?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Yeah, look, good question.
I'm not going to go into much detail here because the other podcast did a great job in explaining it. But a couple of comments for you. Power and utilities cannot be treated as an assumption sitting outside the project plan. They influence where an asset can be developed, how it's designed, how delivery is sequenced, and when it can become operational.
From an execution perspective, the important question is whether those dependencies are being addressed early enough and alongside the rest of the delivery strategy.
In Australia, we saw the connection to the grid challenges renewable projects encountered in their infancy due to a lack of early planning and regulatory engagement. There are a lot of lessons that can be learnt from these projects.
And I'm pleased to say I'm actually seeing that taking place at the moment in the digital infrastructure space.
John Berven
Absolutely. So let's bring capital into the discussion. Investors and lenders may see strong demand, but they also need confidence that a project can be delivered. How important is delivery certainty to the investment conversation?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Yeah, look, our capital providers understand that complex projects carry risk. The issue is whether the organization has a credible view of those risks and the ability to manage them.
So, confidence comes from realistic planning, clear governance and visibility of the dependencies that could affect cost, timing or performance. Investors not only are assessing whether an asset can be built, they're assessing how confidently it can be delivered.
The people behind a project and their approach to risk are important. Often a high-risk project can be the better one to invest in as it has had many eyes all over it and layers of risk management overlaid.
John Berven
Physical infrastructure receives enormous attention. Every stage of delivery and operation depends on people. Are workforce considerations being brought into the process early enough, do you think?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Workforce availability can directly constrain delivery.
Demands extend beyond just construction labour, though. I think it's really important to note specialist engineers, project leadership, technology and cyber specialists. Then you move on to your commissioning and operational teams.
No one wants the C or D-grade team. Far too often we see the same project director or lead designer named on a tender one after one.
Then one of two things happen. They either spread too thin across too many projects, or, post-award, they are replaced with someone less experienced.
The speed at which the digital infrastructure sector is growing is a challenge for the industry, with the need to reskill people from adjacent sectors.
The workforce required to build the asset will be different from the workforce needed to operate it. Some of the strongest organizations are involving operational teams much earlier.
So, the asset is designed and delivered with its future operating environment in mind.
So, workforce planning is a business and delivery issue and the business really needs to own it.
John Berven
Cyber is another issue that's traditionally been associated with operations and in the last month alone we've seen both the FBI and French supermarket falling foul to cyber attacks.
With increasingly connected and automated assets, does cyber resilience now need to be treated as a delivery consideration?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Cyber resilience cannot simply be added once construction is complete. Decisions about systems, vendors, connectivity, operational technology, they're all made through the design process. And then it rolls into procurement and delivery.
So, if cyber and operational teams enter the conversation too late, some of those decisions may already be difficult or costly to change. That's why cyber readiness increasingly needs to be considered as part of the delivery readiness.
John Berven
So, projects are naturally focusing on reaching completion and commissioning. Is enough attention being given to the transition from project delivery into reliable day-to-day operations?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
So, practical completion does not mean the construction team shakes their hands with the operational team and walks away. Nor should handover be the point at which the operational model is first tested.
The transition to operation needs to be considered much earlier, including who will operate the asset, how will it respond to disruption, whether the necessary systems, procedures, and capabilities are ready. Consideration of operational needs should form part of the design and planning phase before construction even commences.
A successful handover requires early planning around a range of things, including operational procedures, technology readiness, maintenance, incident reporting, business continuity — all the great stuff that we talk about when we talk about cyber risk. You come in and you get to that delivery phase. Delivering the physical asset is one milestone, but delivering an asset that performs reliably over time, that's the real objective here.
John Berven
It sounds like transitions are a core part of this. What comes through really clearly is that these aren't just separate risks occurring alongside one another. They're forming a whole delivery ecosystem and a weakness in one part of the ecosystem can really affect the whole project.
So, let's turn the conversation around. When you look at organizations that deliver well, what are they doing differently?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
I think the first observation is the strongest organizations are not necessarily those that encounter the fewest challenges.
I think I mentioned this earlier. Sometimes the higher-risk project is actually the better one to invest in. They are the ones that can see the challenges emerging, they can understand the implications and make decisions early enough to protect the outcome. They tend to have a really clear governance, better visibility of dependencies, and stronger collaboration across project finance, workforce technology, operations, and risk teams.
So, what do they do? They establish a fuller view of the risk, they involve each of those functions, they make decisions right and clearly accountable.
And they test them. They recognize them, they look at the trade-offs, they look at the life cycle, they create escalation points and ultimately they connect those delivery decisions to the operational outcomes.
There's a lot in that, right? That's not a small step. And I think those organizations that do it well, they invest in it early, they get the right people in the room, they're the ones that deliver the better projects.
John Berven
Yeah, I think that's absolutely spot on. An interesting point about the higher risk projects. Does that mean that they're better at managing individual risks or are they better at connecting decisions across the organization?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
It's usually the second. Strong technical capability remains essential, but it's not there on its own. The difference is the organization's ability to connect technical decisions with their capital, workforce, operational and resilience implications is the key.
John Berven
What does integration look like in practice? It can easily become a broad ambition that everyone supports, but an ambition relatively few organizations seem to know how to achieve.
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Yeah, integration should not create unnecessary layers or slow decisions. It does require the right people to be involved in the right points.
And that seems like a really simple statement, but it's absolutely critical. It's not about just ticking some boxes. You've got to have those right people there.
We've got to share views around some of those critical assumptions, not be afraid to share those views. The speed of some of these things, you just don't want to push through it too fast. You really want to stop, think, and make sure that the clear, right owners are owning those decisions. The assumptions are being assessed. There's visibility across the functions and there's timely escalation when circumstances need to change.
So, the focus should be on decision quality, not more meetings.
And I love that statement. Integration does not mean having every team involved in every decision. Absolutely not. Have the right people in the room to make the right decisions.
Bring those respective views together to get to the right outcome at the end of the day. It also means that when assumptions change, the business can quickly understand what that means. Through whether it be scheduling, capital, workforce, resilience, or operations.
John Berven
Fewer meetings sounds pretty good. What’s creating delivery certainty? It's not an absence of uncertainty, but the ability to see and respond to it?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Look, yeah, absolutely. Look, delivery certainty does not mean that nothing unexpected will happen. I think anyone who thinks they can completely de-risk a project is really naive.
It means the organization understands its critical dependencies, it recognizes change early and has the governance and capability to respond. You know, it means understanding the dependencies, maintaining realistic plans, preserving the options. And I can't stress more that responding quickly and decisively. All of this will support investor, customer and stakeholder confidence. That ability to adapt while protecting the intended outcome is becoming an important competitive advantage.
John Berven
So if a CEO, investor or digital infrastructure operator or owner listening today takes away one message, what should it be?
Mary-Catherine Hamill
I'd really encourage leaders to look beyond the individual project work streams and ask whether they have a complete enough picture of how the decisions connect. Successful delivery does not depend solely on having the most capital, the biggest site, or the fastest program. It depends on understanding the risks and dependencies across construction, utilities, workforce, cyber, capital and operations. And using that understanding to make better decisions throughout the life cycle.
The organizations that do that consistently will be better-positioned to turn ambition into successful, reliable infrastructure.
John Berven
That's a critical distinction. Digital infrastructure doesn't lack demand, investment or ambition. The challenge is turning those ingredients into assets that are delivered successfully and perform reliably.
Reliable by Design began with the idea that risk is shaped before placement. The next step is recognizing delivery outcomes are shaped early too. Bringing risk, capital, workforce, cyber, operational resilience and delivery decisions together is no longer just good project practice, it's becoming a strategic capability. M-C, thank you so much for joining us today.
Mary-Catherine Hamill
Thanks, John. It's been an absolute pleasure.
Outro
Thanks for getting all the way to the end of this week’s episode. Don’t forget to like, subscribe and share On Aon wherever you get your podcasts — and visit Aon.com to find out more about us.
We’ll be back next week with our Human Capital Insight, which will focus on what’s driving healthcare costs for employers.