Picking Up the Pieces - What happens after the consultants leave

Happy New Year and welcome back!

This session is a relaxed post–winter break catch-up for the HCD UAE community, with time to reconnect, share stories, and ease back into the year together.

Alongside the networking, we’ll have a short, informal talk led by Julie Rix, Co-founder and Strategic Designer at The Sifer Network. Julie will reflect on a familiar pattern many organisations experience after engaging large management consultancies, the moment when the strategy decks are delivered, the consultants move on, and internal teams are left to “pick up the pieces”.

The conversation will touch on themes such as how strategy engagements often fail to build real capability inside organisations, how dependency can form in both the short and long term, and what happens when a 300+ slide PowerPoint lands without clear ownership, execution, or embedded change.

Rather than a takedown, this is a reflective discussion grounded in a couple of real projects and lived experience. The aim is to spark thoughtful conversation about what actually helps organisations scale, adapt, and improve once external advisors have left the room.

As always with HCD UAE, expect a friendly crowd, thoughtful discussion, and plenty of space to connect with others working across design, product, service, strategy, and research.