Jan 19, 2026 | News and insight
At ResoLex, the way we work matters as much as what we deliver. Our Associates play an important role in shaping that – bringing challenge, insight and experience that help create the conditions for effective delivery in complex environments.
While our 25in25 anniversary marked a moment to pause and reflect, our focus now is on what continues beyond it. In this spotlight, Matt Barnes-Smith reflects on how he first came to work with ResoLex, what’s kept him connected over time, and why consistency, care and integrity in how people show up makes a real difference.
I was first introduced to ResoLex around nine years ago, at a point when I was actively searching for people in the construction sector who were prepared to name, and do something about, the patterns that make projects harder than they need to be: poor collaboration, adversarial behaviours, and leadership that too often defaults to control rather than trust.
What drew me in, and what’s kept me connected ever since, is how the ResoLex team show up. They bring the same care, curiosity, and integrity to their work with each other as they do to their work with clients. That consistency really matters to me. It creates a way of working that feels honest, thoughtful, and genuinely supportive, not just in theory, but in practice.
Working with ResoLex feels like being part of a group that is willing to look at itself as well as the system it’s operating in, and to lead by example. That ethos aligns closely with how I approach my own work, and it’s why ResoLex continues to be a team I value and choose to work alongside.
We value Matt’s contribution, and the contribution of all our Associates, not just for what they know, but for how they work – their willingness to reflect, to challenge patterns that get in the way, and to lead with intent.
As we move beyond 25in25, we’ll continue to share the voices of the people who shape our work and our thinking, and who add to the ongoing ResoLex story. The culture that Matt describes is part of what’s led to ResoLex being recognised as a Great Place to Work in 2024 and UK’s Best Workplaces in 2025 for Consulting & Professional Services. As that culture continues to grow, we’re actively welcoming new people into it – we’re currently hiring for an Associate Manager role and always open to hearing from potential Associates who share our values.
Dec 23, 2025 | 25 in 25
Throughout 2025, as part of our 25 in 25 campaign, we’ve taken time to look back at the moments that have shaped who we are today. As the year closes, it feels right to bring those reflections together and trace the journey that has carried ResoLex from its earliest roots to the work we are known for now: enabling collaborative delivery in some of the UK’s most complex programmes.
Our name is part of that journey. Combining Reso, for resolution and Lex, Latin for law, it reflects our founding belief – resolution before law. While our work has evolved far beyond dispute resolution, the principle remains: progress happens when people are aligned, relationships are strong, and teams have the capability and confidence to deliver together. Today, our role sits a step before conflict – helping our clients build delivery environments where decisions move at pace, challenges are addressed early, and collaboration is not an aspiration but a practice.
Early foundations
Our first major milestone came in 2001 with the Jersey Airport Alpha Taxiway project, the debut of our Contracted Mediation approach. It reinforced a truth that has guided us ever since: relational dynamics fundamentally shape outcomes. When teams understand each other, communicate effectively, and work through tension constructively, delivery accelerates. When they don’t, even straightforward issues can become blockers.
In 2004, Edward Moore became Chief Executive and steered ResoLex into a broader role, moving from resolving disputes to strengthening the conditions that prevent them. By 2007, this evolution led us to develop tools to help teams understand behavioural risks. X Tracker, the early version of what became RADAR, was first used during the enabling works for the London 2012 Olympics. It gave teams visibility into the behaviours, relationships and system dynamics influencing performance – an insight that has since become central to our approach.
Building capability and expanding our thinking
As we entered the 2010s, new contexts broadened our understanding of collaboration. In 2011, we began supporting peace-building charity Concordis International, helping facilitate dialogue in some of the world’s most challenging humanitarian environments. Despite the scale of difference between these settings and UK infrastructure, a consistent theme emerged: sustainable outcomes depend on trust, alignment, and shared purpose.
By 2013, RADAR had formally launched and was supporting projects such as the Enterprise Centre at the University of East Anglia, then one of the UK’s greenest buildings. Over the years that followed, RADAR became embedded across major programmes including Clapham Park and Crossrail East, helping leadership teams quickly understand the behavioural landscape and make better-informed decisions.
Between 2016 and 2017, Tony Llewellyn distilled many of the lessons from our work in two of his four books, helping share our thinking on high-performance teams, collaboration and leadership across the wider industry.
Supporting collaborative delivery at scale
From 2018 onwards, our work expanded across many of the UK’s most complex and high-profile programmes – including HS2, the Department for Transport, the New Hospital Programme, Thames Water, Defra and organisations within defence and nuclear. Across these environments, one insight has been repeatedly reinforced: technical excellence alone is not enough. What determines whether a programme succeeds is the strength of relationships, the clarity of decision-making, and the ability to navigate complexity as a cohesive system.
During this period, our role continued to mature. Moving beyond tools and assessments, we increasingly acted as a Collaboration Partner – a navigator helping clients chart complex delivery landscapes; a relational integrator aligning teams and breaking down silos; and a trusted partner providing independent perspective and constructive challenge at the moments that matter most.
In 2024, we strengthened our industry reach through new partnerships with Bloom Procurement Services, Bramble Hub and Perfect Circle, and were proud to be certified as a Great Place To Work – a reflection of the culture we’ve built internally and the behaviours we champion externally.
2025 in focus
This anniversary year has been both celebratory and forward-looking. We revisited the projects and people that shaped our early thinking, welcomed new colleagues, and deepened partnerships across government and industry. We contributed to sector-wide conversations on mobilisation, behavioural risk, conflict avoidance and collaborative contracting, and refreshed our suite of ResoLex Explainers to provide accessible, practical guidance for project teams.
Across every milestone, our work in 2025 has reflected the core of what we do today:
- co-creating solutions with clients rather than imposing predetermined answers;
- building capability and confidence within project teams;
- strengthening relational dynamics across complex systems; and
- helping organisations translate strategy, contracts and intentions into operationally effective delivery environments.
Looking ahead
Marking 25 years has given us space to reflect on how far we have come, from our origins in contracted mediation to our role today supporting the collaborative delivery of major infrastructure programmes. But it has also reinforced the constants: our belief in the power of strong relationships, our commitment to strengthening the human side of complex delivery, and our focus on helping teams navigate challenges with clarity and confidence.
As we look ahead, our purpose remains unchanged. We will continue to support clients in building the social, cultural and behavioural foundations that underpin successful delivery. We will continue to help teams align, collaborate and make better decisions. And, we will continue to bring independent insight, challenge and partnership to the moments where it matters most.
Thank you to our clients, partners and colleagues for being part of this journey. We are excited for what comes next and look forward to supporting the teams who will shape the future of major project delivery.
On behalf of the team, we’d like to wish everyone a happy festive season and new year!
Dec 1, 2025 | 25 in 25, News and insight
As part of our 25in25 series, we’re highlighting the people who’ve helped shape our work this year. Today, we’re recognising Jim Abbatt, whose practical approach to interface mapping has supported several teams working in complex environments.
Jim has a real ability to make the important connections visible – helping people understand how their work fits together, where the pressure points sit, and what needs attention next. This work that often goes unseen but makes a noticeable difference to how teams operate day to day.
His spotlight reflects the thoughtful way he approaches collaboration and the impact he’s had across multiple programmes this year. Read on to find out more:
“Most of my work sits at the busy intersection of people, process and pressure. With ResoLex I help teams map the interfaces that matter, turn ambiguity into clarity, and create the conditions for better decisions. The aim is simple. Less noise around the work. More signal about what has to happen next.”
I first partnered with ResoLex because of the way the team thinks. The mix of disciplines is real, the curiosity is genuine, and the work is grounded in delivery rather than theory. On complex programmes, there are always frictions at the handovers: design into delivery, programme into project, engineering into commercial. Interface clarity makes those handovers visible. Once you can see the work, you can govern it, resource it and protect it.
“The value is not the map on the wall. It is the conversation the map unlocks. Roles get clearer. Risks surface sooner. Decisions happen at the right level, at the right time.”
This year, the focus has been on three things. First, agreeing on what “good” looks like for each critical interface, from information flow to decision rights. Second, building lightweight artefacts that teams actually use: simple RACI shifts, meeting cadences that respect time, and visual logs that track dependencies without creating admin. Third, strengthening the behaviours around the system so collaboration holds when the pressure rises.
“What I enjoy about ResoLex is the climate. It is psychologically safe to explore an idea, invite a challenge and refine it together. That is how you move from clever slides to practical outcomes.”
There have been several moments this year where seeing how parts of the organisation actually fit together, rather than how people assumed they fit, has prompted challenging conversations. The difference is that those conversations remained anchored to reality, rather than a desktop view, and that is where progress came from.
Results show up in the day-to-day. The time to decision shortens because owners are explicit. Reviews are more likely to go through the first time because expectations are aligned. Escalations are calmer because the path is agreed and visible. None of this is flashy. It is disciplined, humane, and quietly powerful.
“Complex programmes do not need more slogans. They need clearer interfaces, steadier rhythms and leaders who make it easy for others to do their best work. That is the craft I bring to ResoLex, and why I keep coming back.”
A thank you to Sam Platten and Richard DaGama, two excellent consultants, and to the broader team for their engagement. It has been a pleasure working together this year.
I am proud to work with a team that blends different backgrounds yet shares the same values. The ResoLex approach respects context, invites honesty and leaves clients with tools they can run without us. That suits me. Help people hear the signal, then help them own it.
We’re grateful to our Associates for bringing their expertise, living our values, and helping clients achieve their desired project outcomes.
To find out more about interface mapping, read our article ‘From Friction to Flow: The Power of Interface Mapping in Major Projects’ on our website.
Nov 19, 2025 | Events, Roundtables
As the demands on leaders in major projects and programmes continue to grow, so too does the pressure on their personal capacity. How can leaders sustain performance, maintain resilience, and create the conditions for their teams to succeed in increasingly complex environments?
At our recent November roundtable, Annastiina Hintsa, CEO of Hintsa Performance, joined us for a thought-provoking conversation about what high performance looks like, both on and off the track. Drawing on lessons from Formula 1, working with large organisations, and years of research into human wellbeing, she explored how the world’s best sustain excellence under intense pressure and what leaders can take from it.
Building on the themes from the MPA’s No More Heroes report, which highlights the leadership gap linked to burnout and low productivity, our roundtable explored practical ways to help leaders thrive. The evening was full of energy, discussion, and plenty of moments of “this really can apply to me”.
Sustaining High Performance
In Formula 1, milliseconds decide championships, yet performance is not only about engineering or pushing harder. As Annastiina explained, success at the pinnacle of motorsport is about managing paradoxes: profit and purpose, efficiency and innovation, stability and change, wellbeing and performance. The ability to hold these tensions is a hallmark of senior leaders too.
Hintsa Performance works from a simple belief: when people live better, they perform better. It is a philosophy that has shaped the routines of more than 3,000 executives and over 90 percent of Formula 1 race winners in the past decade. Lewis Hamilton reflected, “We’ll always be in each other’s lives”, a reminder that true performance coaching goes far beyond results.
The methodology behind Hintsa’s work focuses on your Core (inner motivation) and creating a Sustainable Performance Cycle that is personal to each individual, whether an F1 driver, Olympic athlete or business leader.
Their session opened with three fundamental questions:
- Do you know who you are?
- Do you know what you want?
- Are you in control of your life?
It echoed a question often put to young drivers by Dr Aki Hintsa: Do you want to be in the drivers seat of your life or the passenger seat?
Annastiina shared several practical frameworks that leaders and teams can use to maintain performance over the long term:
- Periodisation: Understanding your daily, weekly, and annual performance rhythm. Knowing when to push, when to make time to recover, and when to renew.
- Optimal Pressure: Identifying your stretch zone and recognising when healthy challenge begins to tip into strain.
- Recovery: Planning small recovery moments across your day, week, and year to protect wellbeing and fuel growth.
- Preparation: Creating capacity before peak periods so you can perform when it matters most.
- Team: Remembering that even the best driver cannot win without a world-class pit crew and support team.
One of the key messages was that resilience is a skill that can be learned. Balancing the comfort zone with the stretch zone underpins the optimal area for performance.
There was also a helpful distinction between healthy and unhealthy stress. Stress itself is not the enemy – we need it to perform, but problems arise when stress becomes chronic. Knowing your early warning signs and planning moments of recovery is vital.
Annastiina explored the four elements of mental recovery: Control, Relaxation, Mastery, and Detachment. Building these into everyday routines can make a significant difference. While embedding recovery within projects and programmes may need a cultural shift, it often begins with the small things – what you do, and what you enable others to do.
One Change That Cascades
Each of us was encouraged to consider one meaningful change that could have the biggest ripple effect. Sustainable change starts with awareness and grows through small, consistent actions. The WOOP framework (Wish, Objective, Obstacle, Plan) offers a simple and practical way to turn good intentions into tangible progress.
Resilience is not a fixed trait. It is a rhythm, a balance between pressure and recovery, competition and cooperation, performance and wellbeing. The conversation left us with a shared realisation: resilience is not about enduring difficult environments, but about designing conditions where people and teams can thrive.
For further insight into how the world’s best balance wellbeing and performance, explore the latest Hintsa F1 Insights Report.
Nov 7, 2025 | 25 in 25, Events, News and insight
ResoLex worked with the Crossrail East leadership team to embed a structured approach to behavioural risk management, collaboration, and leadership alignment. Using our RADAR methodology, we helped leaders recognise the direct connection between behaviours and project outcomes, creating a new reporting process that surfaced risks early and informed decision-making.
Crossrail East involved complex works along the eastern section of the route, including track upgrades, station improvements, and new facilities to increase train capacity and reliability. While technical challenges were well managed, the leadership team faced a less visible risk: how behaviours, culture, and team dynamics could influence delivery. Recognising this, the Project Director asked us to help strengthen alignment, build collaboration, and develop a reporting framework that could highlight issues before they escalated.
We began by gathering data across the project to establish a baseline of behavioural and project risks. Through confidential interviews, leaders were able to share perceptions openly, surfacing the issues that mattered most to them. These insights shaped a facilitated workshop where the leadership team collectively analysed root causes and prioritised 20 key risk areas. Importantly, they also identified positive and negative behavioural indicators, giving them tangible signs to track and address.
The outputs were built into a monthly monitoring cycle, with RADAR reports providing leading indicators of risk. These reports highlighted where perceptions varied significantly across the team, enabling the Programme Director to focus attention on alignment and shared understanding. Over time, RADAR became central to monthly strategy meetings, shaping agendas and guiding discussions, and giving the leadership team consistent visibility of behaviours and their impact on risk.
The approach quickly expanded beyond the leadership team to include the wider programme, supporting collaboration across Network Rail, Costain, and Signalling Solutions. The result was a stronger culture of accountability and transparency across the programme and supply chain.
As Project Director Ben Wheeldon reflected:
“To successfully deliver [one of] Europe’s largest infrastructure projects required us to clearly and succinctly identify, rationalise and manage a very unique and complex set of challenges, risks and opportunities. ResoLex not only helped us identify those which potentially had the biggest impacts but also prioritise them and develop, implement and monitor our mitigation plans.”
By embedding behavioural insights into governance and reporting, the Crossrail East leadership team gained a clear, structured way of surfacing risks and turning them into actionable insights. This gave leaders the tools to manage complexity with greater confidence, reduce misalignment, and strengthen collaborative decision-making.
Ultimately, the work helped the team move beyond individual perspectives to build a shared understanding of risks, creating the cultural conditions for resilient delivery on one of Europe’s most complex infrastructure programmes.
