Perform Partners

27/05/2026

A message from our Co-Founder and Director, Rob Smith 🏆

We’re incredibly proud to have been recognised as one of The Sunday Times Best Places to Work for the third year running. In this message, Rob shares what this means to us as a business and to him personally.

Being a Sunday Times Best Place to Work company is something we’re incredibly proud of, not just because of the award itself, but because it reflects the feedback, experiences and voices of our people.

A huge thank you again to our brilliant team for helping make Perform Partners the place it is today.

22/05/2026

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT 🏆

We’re incredibly proud to share that we’ve been named one of the Sunday Times Best Places to Work for the THIRD year running! 🎉

https://hubs.li/Q04hCj0f0

Achievements like this only happen because of the people behind them. This recognition means even more because it comes directly from our people.

To be accredited, organisations must achieve high engagement scores across areas such as job satisfaction, wellbeing, empowerment, reward and recognition. It's wonderful to see that reflected in the culture our team builds together every day.

So a huge THANK YOU to our team for putting us on the list once again with your incredible feedback and high scores!

While awards are always exciting, the real value comes from listening to our people through the survey, learning from their feedback and creating a workplace where people feel supported, valued and able to do their best work.

We’ll be sharing more highlights from the 2026 results over the coming days, but for now, we’re heading into the bank holiday weekend feeling incredibly grateful and very proud!

Wishing everyone a lovely bank holiday weekend! ☀️

With early finishes, free takeaways, sabbaticals and subsidised sports, these firms prove bigger isn’t always better — little wonder staff love them

08/05/2026

Most organisations don't need more opinions on IT modernisation, AI, cloud, or the next big shift. They need clarity on what's realistic, what's next and what will reduce surprises.

In our email newsletter, we often offer practical, grounded insights on the decisions technology leaders are actually facing, delivered regularly, straight to your inbox.

Subscribe by email: https://hubs.li/Q04f8bbG0

06/05/2026

Proud to share this feedback from a recent client following our multi-year enterprise software delivery engagement.

Andrew Daniels, Group Chief Information Officer:

"I am delighted to provide a glowing testimonial for Perform Partners, who assisted us with a multi-year enterprise software delivery project. Throughout our engagement, Perform Partners consistently demonstrated an exceptional level of professionalism, dedication, and flexibility.

Their commitment to our project's success was evident from the outset, exhibiting a remarkable willingness to adapt to our evolving needs.

Working with Perform Partners was a truly rewarding experience. I wholeheartedly recommend them to any organisation seeking a reliable and adaptable change delivery partner for their projects. Their professionalism, flexibility, and commitment to excellence make them an invaluable asset to any team.”

Read more about this project: https://hubs.li/Q04f8ksN0

05/05/2026

A lot of modernisation content talks in big transformation language.

But in practice, higher education institutions usually need something more grounded: a structured, lower-risk route to improving resilience and delivery pace, with disruption carefully managed along the way.

That is why the University of Sheffield example is so relevant.

The challenge was familiar:
- legacy infrastructure
- downtime risk
- slow lead times to add capability
- rising pressure on the estate

The outcome was practical, not theoretical: new environments created in hours rather than weeks, with stronger resilience and security built in.

That aligns with what we keep hearing across the sector. Modernising technology infrastructure is consistently raised as a top priority, with many institutions focused on building something more cost-effective and flexible for the long term.

That is the kind of modernisation conversation we think matters most in higher education right now, focused progress that improves service outcomes.

P.S. We've shared the University of Sheffield case study in the comments for anyone looking for a practical example.

01/05/2026

Compliance-led change with delivery confidence and control...

In regulated industries, compliance does not usually fail because leaders make the wrong decisions. It fails when too much change collides with too little capacity.

A common pattern we see is this. Regulatory obligations continue to evolve while strategic programmes are already in flight. Delivery teams are at full stretch. New compliance requirements arrive late, urgently, and outside existing plans. Confidence drops. Control starts to fragment.

If this feels familiar, a few practical principles can help.

▪️First, clarity before action matters
Unclear compliance positions create overcorrection. Clear, defensible regulatory interpretations give leaders confidence to act proportionately without pausing delivery or creating unnecessary work.

▪️Second, compliance should be absorbed into delivery, not imposed on it
When regulatory change is pushed onto teams already at capacity, ex*****on suffers. The work still gets done, but momentum slows and risk increases. Integrating compliance into live programmes protects both outcomes.

▪️Third, change should be delivered once, not multiple times
Fragmented ownership across people, processes, technology and governance creates duplication and delay. Integrated delivery reduces operational drag and restores control.

This is why Perform Partners and Betsmart Consulting work as one integrated team.

Betsmart Consulting establishes clear and defensible compliance positions grounded in regulatory reality.
Perform Partners ensures those requirements are delivered in a way that respects delivery capacity, sequencing and momentum.

The result is proportionate, practical compliance that maintains progress and gives leaders confidence at every decision point.

For organisations operating in regulated markets, the challenge is not choosing between compliance and growth. It is delivering both without losing confidence, control or pace.

Read more here: https://hubs.li/Q04f7JzX0

29/04/2026

🎙️ Proud to see our work with Basingstoke College of Technology featured in the ITPro Podcast special edition: How AI is changing education, in association with AWS.

The conversation with Scott Hayden, BCoT's Head of Teaching, Learning and Digital, gets to the heart of something we believe deeply: AI's biggest win in education isn't flashy, it's giving teachers their evenings and weekends back.

Less marking. Less admin. More time for the human side of teaching that no algorithm can replicate.

We were delighted to support BCoT on their AI journey, including helping them secure $25K in AWS credits through our OGVA programme to accelerate innovation in further education.

A huge thank you to Scott and the team at BCoT for leading the way and to ITPro and AWS for shining a light on what's possible when educators, cloud partners and the right technology come together.

👉 Listen to the episode: https://hubs.li/Q04dSbwM0 👉 Read how we helped BCoT: https://hubs.li/Q04dS6yZ0

Quickly and easily listen to The ITPro Podcast for free!

24/04/2026

Education organisations do not need more AI noise.

They need a clearer way to think about where AI is actually useful.

In practice, the most worthwhile conversations are rarely about the technology on its own. They are about operational outcomes.

Where could AI reduce manual effort?

Where could it create capacity?

Where is there a genuine case for change?

And what needs to be true for that change to be safe, workable and worth pursuing?

This carousel explores a more grounded approach to AI in education — one that starts with value, implementation and practical use, rather than AI for its own sake.

It is a more demanding conversation, but usually a more productive one too.

This AI assessment is a great place to start: https://hubs.li/Q04dcjT-0

23/04/2026

IT departments rarely lose sight of spending overnight.

They lose it gradually through inherited assumptions, overlapping licences, and renewals that roll forward because there isn’t enough visibility to challenge them.

On paper, things can look stable: reports are positive, spreadsheets reconcile, and budgets feel predictable. But underneath, hidden IT costs build quietly; from untracked entitlements, unchecked renewals, and unmanaged cloud workloads.

Our free resource, The Hidden Cost Playbook, is designed to address: how these costs arise, why vendors often have the advantage (complexity + audit pressure), and how a clear, data-driven approach helps organisations regain control before the next licence renewal dictates the agenda.

A line we come back to often: visibility creates control and control creates leverage.

When you can evidence what you have, what’s used, and what it costs, renewal conversations become commercial negotiations again (not risk conversations).

Link to the free download is in the first comment.

Question: Where do hidden IT costs show up most often in your organisation?

Download The Hidden Cost Playbook: How to Regain Control of Your IT Spend: https://hubs.li/Q04db-h40

22/04/2026

If you’re leading tech change in 2026, you’re balancing the same pressures:

▪️deliver upgrades
▪️reduce risk
▪️control run-cost
▪️keep teams moving

Those are some of the challenges our newsletter is built around.

Subscribe via email and we’ll send you the next issue when it’s published.