Unlocking the power of AI in water

With approximately $48 billion of planned investment identified across current Water Services Delivery Plans, attention is turning to how the sector improves productivity, attracts capability and delivers better value for customers through new delivery models, technology and collaboration

In response, many water organisations are making foundational decisions about governance, service models, operating structures, technology architecture and information management.Water services strategies, asset management plans and investment are increasingly shaping how future organisations will operate.

Every leadership team faces a choice: design today's operaworkforce and deliberately design for that future now.

This is a moment for bold leadership. The organisationting model and worry about AI later, or recognise that AI is likely to become part of the future s that unlock the greatest value will be those willing to redesign work, decision-making and accountability around the workforce of the future.

Addressing the capacity challenge

The water sector is being asked to do more than ever before. More investment, more scrutiny, more reporting, more evidence, more accountability.

Yet many organisations continue to compete for a limited pool of experienced engineers, planners, operators, asset managers and regulatory specialists.

Across the sector, highly skilled professionals spend significant amounts of time searching for information, reconciling records, reviewing documentation, interpreting standards, preparing evidence and defending decisions. Valuable expertise is often consumed before the real decision-making begins.

Designing your operating model to incorporate AI can help you to manage inevitable challenges with capacity.

Integration now avoids redesign later

Globally, organisations have poured billions into artificial intelligence initiatives.

The results have been mixed. Many organisations have approached AI as a technology project rather than an organisational capability, and have built operating models for one way of working, implemented systems around those assumptions, and then attempted to bolt AI onto them afterwards.

Taking advantage of AI from the start will ensure that your processes, governance arrangements, decision rights and organisational structures are suited to tomorrow's capabilities.

The next evolution of stewardship

The best performing organisations understand that successful asset management is not simply about plans, systems or asset registers. It is about the ability to consistently make transparent, evidence-based decisions that balance cost, risk, performance and service outcomes.

Augmented stewardship; integrating AI into your asset management processes, can support professional judgement, engineers and asset managers, and create organisations where people and digital capability work together.

Integrating AI offers water providers a future where:

Risks can be identified earlier
Evidence can be assembled earlier
Institutional knowledge is easier to access
Trade-offs are easier to understand
Decisions are more consistent and defensible

And the opportunity for scarce expertise to be applied to judgement and decision-making rather than administration and information gathering.

The question for leaders

Providers are at an advantage in that you have the opportunity to consider – How do we design an organisation that can make the most of AI from day one?

In answer, providers should treat AI as a workforce and organisational design consideration that influences decisions being made today.

A final thought

The lasting impact of AI may have less to do with technology and more to do with how organisations choose to evolve. As the water sector grapples with increasing complexity and finite expertise, a crucial leadership question emerges:

How well are today's organisations being designed for the workforce of tomorrow?

Want to explore the idea further?

If these ideas resonate, get in touch.

Dr Abtin Ijadi Maghsoodi and Alistair Evans are exploring how predictive AI, hybrid reasoning, trusted evidence, generative AI and human judgement can help organisations build capacity and improve the quality and defensibility of important decisions.

Ultimately, the discussion is much broader than AI. It touches on how organisations are structured, how expertise is applied, how decisions are made, and what future operating models could look like in an increasingly complex environment.

What should the next-generation of water services look like?