Last week, the EBIT team travelled to London together for FourCentric’s Away Day. Starting off strong, the train ride up gave us the opportunity to work and share morning coffees together, excited to spend time with colleagues from across the Group.
Upon arrival, FourCentric’s CEO, Simon Terry, welcomed everyone with breakfast and Group updates – including welcoming the newest acquisitions, Clarity Consultants, healthcare and public sector transformation specialists, and Evolve Commercial, CaaS solutions providers. Group announcements ended with a drum roll … the 2026 Away Day activity was a Hack-a-thon!
Split into 26 teams, each consisting of a mixture of colleagues across the House of Brands, we were assigned one of three possible tasks. In 2 hours, create and construct a pitch for an AI agent that supports or mitigates:
- Project management deadline slippage
- Contract management organisation
- Client proposal development
Although we were competing to win, the ultimate goal was to tackle challenges together, share ideas, and bring different specialisms into one room to see how we approach problems collectively in practice. Moreover, the hope of this activity was to demonstrate to peers – ranging in sceptical or afraid, to advocates, users, or developers of AI – that anyone can benefit from and easily utilise AI as a support resource.
Perhaps the most profound lesson taken from the Hack-a-thon’s winning team is this latter point: AI is a support resource, not a replacement of human work, knowledge, and engagement. AI is only as powerful as the humans using it, and thus effective Agents pause for human checks, balances, inputs, and corrections; their findings augmenting rather than eradicating human capability.
After lunch, Group invited it’s keynote speaker to the stage: John Volanthen – Senior IT Consultant for Comparket Ltd, and in his personal life, expert cave diver. His cave diving expertise brought him to quite unexpected and unintentional fame when he and several other expert cave divers from around the world worked diligently for three weeks to save 13 people from Tham Liang Cave, Thailand in 2018. His keynote highlighted the importance of compartmentalisation when facing a crisis: reducing high risk or stressful scenarios to what you can control and working methodically to identify a solution. His story of courage, perseverance, and assertion demonstrated that no matter the circumstances – high stakes rescues or board meetings – 1) self advocacy regarding talent, position, or concerns and 2) trusting one’s instinct to react, retreat, or re-evaluate are essential factors in successful problem resolution.
The day concluded on a cruise through the River Thames, exploring the city from North to South. This gave peers across Group time to continue conversations in a more informal setting while snacking on small bites, enjoying the views, and sharing a laugh or two!
An occasion we look forward to every year, 2026’s Away Day came and went too fast! Between now and 2027’s Away Day, we look forward to both witnessing and contributing to the continued success of FourCentric Group as well as our colleagues and peers.
