Fast facts: Commercial advisory

Q What’s a myth about commercial advisory?

Commercial advisory isn’t just about claims, that’s a myth! Commercial advisory services are provided across the whole project lifecycle.

Q What’s a new trend in commercial advisory that's exciting?

Traditional contract forms (construct only or design and construct) have made way for more collaborative contract forms. These additional contract forms include Alliancing, Incentivised Target Cost (ITC), and the New Engineering Contract (NEC4). They offer greater flexibility and more appropriate risk apportionment – this minimises disputes and delays. These forms promote collaboration and transparency, provide efficient dispute resolution mechanisms, and include performance incentives. 

Such collaborative arrangements now share risk much more equitably with the constructors, and as a result they provide better outcomes. These forms have opened the market and provide the commercial advisory team with different considerations when advising our clients. 

Risk apportionment is even more critical than ever in today’s market. To advise our clients on the best contracts means we must be across market movements and changes and be ahead of the game – this keeps us on our toes and ensures we continuously develop our skills in our areas of expertise.

Q Career vs reality: what’s commercial advisory really like?

When you step behind the curtain of commercial advisory, you’ll discover that there’s a lot more to it than you might initially consider. Our work and expertise extend across the entire project life cycle – from delivery strategy to contract development, and due diligence support to dispute and claims advisory. We certainly don’t just turn up towards the end of a project to ‘clear up a mess,’ – in fact, our core function is to implement strategies for success.   

The work across commercial advisory is diverse and with an ever-changing market our specialists are constantly on the move and keeping pace with industry trends. Commercial advisory requires agility, flexibility, and openness as part of the role sometimes requires the team to rethink their ideas and strategies based on a client preferencing a different project outcome. Above all, as with any advisory service, regular and relevant communication remains paramount.

A typical day consists of… 
On a typical day we get to engage with contractors, sub-contractors, suppliers, and clients. Through those interactions we develop innovative strategies for delivering our clients projects. 

Every day is busy, but enjoyable. We work hard, but we also celebrate success by taking the time to recognise and acknowledge one another – that applies to our clients too. 

The greatest challenge is…
Keeping abreast, and on top of, changing market conditions is the greatest challenge – but we look at ways to find opportunities and leverage those shifts in the industry. There are also additional challenges related to funding, the supply chain, interest rates, inflation, material costs, skills shortages, and contract forms. In a nutshell, nothing stays stagnant for long in construction and major infrastructure projects.

Q What’s surprising about working in commercial advisory?

Working in commercial advisory is like being the problem-solver for our clients. We help clients navigate complex commercial and strategic challenges, offering insights and solutions to improve their project outcomes.

Working in commercial advisory requires us to have an open mind and be flexible: our clients can tend to ask us to consider alternative, and sometimes left field ideas, and we need to be able to adapt to such requests and changes whilst keeping the project on track.

Q Why work in commercial advisory?

We get to support the capability and delivery of our clients’ projects from the earliest phases, operating across diverse sectors ranging from transport infrastructure to renewable energy. This requires us to unlock innovative ideas and make smart decisions. 

The diversity and inclusive culture within the commercial advisory team helps us to bring more robust ideas to the market. The team dynamic enhances our strategic thinking and market engagement, and gives us a competitive edge. It also makes RPS a great place to work with diverse viewpoints – we are an engine for facilitating creative problem-solving.   

Working in commercial advisory provides an opportunity to contribute to the development and management of commercial agreements and mechanisms which are relied upon to shape the success and outcomes of projects.