Yearbook 2022/2023

19 Sep 23

Maybe it’s the realisation that since 2008 we’ve experienced at least 10 years of turmoil within that period, that we wouldn’t recognise a benign year if it knocked on our door and asked to borrow a cup of sugar.

Well that was the year that was.

Welcome to Iceni’s 2023 Yearbook, a lookback on another eventful year, both for us and the country at large.

The year just gone was surely the denouement of satire becoming reality. At times, you literally couldn’t make up what was happening. From the shifting geopolitical plate tectonics of the Ukraine War to the self-imposed economic suicide of Trussonomics, we’ve seen it all. Armando Iannucci had better find a new way of making comedy.

But in spite of everything – the cost of living crisis, strikes, inflation, disposable PMs, planning reform turmoil, Covid, SNP implosion and arrests, NHS waiting lists, climate change signals – the country, our clients, and our people, show a remarkable sense of fortitude. At what point do we stop calling something disruptive, and rather just the norm? Maybe it’s the realisation that since 2008 we’ve experienced at least 10 years of turmoil within that period, that we wouldn’t recognise a benign year if it knocked on our door and asked to borrow a cup of sugar.

There is clearly a risk that stoicism becomes institutionalised despondency, which damages innovation, productivity, and positivity. I’m pleased to say that at least on our small corner of the earth, Iceni has refused to let that be so over the past 12 months. As we’ve said through this platform before, innovation is the mother of necessity, and we’ve accelerated a lot of our plans, particularly in digital this year. We formalised our investment in Urban Intelligence, and we have oodles of ideas in the making, both with UI but also on our own footing, for how we can bring the benefits of digital working into the planning and property sphere. And there is a clear paradox in how mind-numbingly slow and sclerotic many of the analogue ways of doing things are versus the avalanche of change – both society at large and within our professions – through the application of tech. To put that into context, were many of us talking about Chat GPT this time last year? Now we have planning inspectors asking for confirmation from witnesses that their evidence has been crafted by themselves and not a bot. Truly groundbreaking, and at a speed we struggle to countenance. Progress on digital is likely to be accelerated by the challenges in recruitment across the public and private sector, as there simply aren’t the people entering the workforce to keep up with demand.

I am pleased we can highlight the work we have done on apprenticeships and work experience over the past year, which again talks to the carrot and stick of our times: would we, or anyone else, be so focused on recruiting people from inner city schools and colleges if we had (as was the case when I started my career) 200 graduates applying for every career grade entry role at Iceni? The opportunities this is creating will make us a more diverse, inclusive business, precisely at the time when London in particular is becoming a closed shop for resident Londoners and financially assisted incomers. We live in a time of bemusing paradoxes.

And a final comment on how tech and lateral thinking on staff recruitment combine: we have seen a 17-year-old work experience student walk into our office this year and in the space of a couple of days devise a series of algorithms to help our planners do some of the background work on planning research more efficiently, shaving hours of low-value time from the inbox of our team. So whilst we live in an era of disruption, it’s a heartening reminder to celebrate that change is, and always will have, the means to be good.

Enjoy the Yearbook, and see you in ’24.

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