# Dr Steve Hodgkinson

Dr Steve Hodgkinson is a digital transformation leader whose work focuses on helping complex organisations build strong technology and delivery capabilities, form collaborative partnerships, and develop shared digital services. Hodgkinson also writes about building this “digital fitness” as a foundation for using AI effectively.

- Profile: https://b2binfluencer.marketing/creators/steve-hodgkinson/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevehodgkinson
- LinkedIn followers: 11,427
- Topics: artificial-intelligence, leadership, digital-transformation, ai-readiness
- Based on 11 dated posts, latest 2026-07-29

## Summary

Useful for keynote or advisory work on digital fitness and collaborative partnerships for AI readiness.

- Best for: Public-sector or large-enterprise leadership campaigns on AI readiness and collaborative vendor relationships.
- Not for: Consumer AI app launches needing sponsored short video, product endorsement and engagement metrics.
- Check first: Confirm whether Hodgkinson accepts paid brand work and negotiate terms directly.

### Takeaways

- AI ambitions need digital fitness: platforms, data, teams, ways of working, vendors, executive confidence.
- Vendor relationships should be designed as collaborations, not purchases.
- Relational contracting governs long-term outsourcing so parties' interests stay aligned as circumstances change.

## Main ideas

- **AI ambitions need digital fitness first**: Hodgkinson argues that organisations rushing to show "AI hustle" are attempting a demanding event without training. Digital fitness cannot be purchased: signing a contract or subscribing to an AI agent builds capability no more than buying a gym membership or rowing machine builds physical fitness. They list six preconditions for using AI productively rather than performatively: modern, secure, scalable platforms; disciplined data strategy, architecture and governance; in-house teams with hands-on engineering and delivery experience; high-cadence, repeatable ways of working; long-term vendor partnerships built on collaboration; and executive confidence earned through performance. Where those foundations exist, AI is the next step up from established platforms. Where they do not, money goes into pilots that never scale, and the technology gets blamed for a capability problem. The priorities: stop thinking in projects, invest in the in-house team, value foundational capability and delivery cadence over grand ambition, and treat strategic vendors as collaboration partners.
- **Leadership style should describe a method, not a character**: Hodgkinson borrows the military idea of a Concept of Operations and turns it into a personal question: what is your Concept of Effect? When a recruitment panel asks about leadership style, the safe answer—restating how ethical, capable, competent and personable you are—describes character rather than method and offers no point of difference. Instead, they name three success patterns: Platform+Agile, which means making deliberate choices about technology platforms, vendors and methods, then using them to help in-house teams deliver consistently and repeatably, one system at a time; Collaborative Partnerships, which means formalising mutually beneficial, long-term vendor relationships through modern relational contracting; and Ecosystems of Co-Production, which means working with peer organisations and strategic vendors on shared, interoperable systems. All three follow the same logic: create the conditions for people to collaborate, and they will. Hodgkinson adds, with some surprise, that this approach also produces better outcomes and makes people happier.
- **Vendor relationships should be designed as collaborations, not purchases**: Hodgkinson contrasts transactional procurement and its waterfall outsourcing projects with partnerships deliberately structured to create shared value. The Vested community calls this "relational contracting": a formal methodology for governing sustainable win-win outsourcing partnerships in complex organisations, with governance written into the contract to keep the relationship collaborative as circumstances change. A Vested deal can establish a new outsourcing relationship, but is also commonly used to fix or reinvigorate a long-standing one in trouble. The aim is to get more from the relationship than a fixed scope of services. Hodgkinson is clear about the frictions: procurement legislation does not prevent these deals, but the tendering process must be carefully designed to allow relational contracting. A deal also needs visionary leadership to set the destination, an experienced coach to get started and a proven methodology to navigate the journey.
- **Connected organisations are an ecosystem to co-produce with**: Hodgkinson argues that organisations are already part of connected ecosystems, whether they acknowledge it or not. The sensible move is to embrace that and make it work rather than fly solo. Scalable platforms, service-oriented architecture, pooled resources and joint work with peer organisations and strategic vendors let several organisations co-produce a solution that none would build as well alone. Loosely coupled, interoperable systems reduce costs and accelerate innovation for everyone involved.

## Work to read

- [What is your 'Concept of Effect'?](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/stevehodgkinson_vestedway-strategy-leadership-activity-7477523637416157184-SWw1)
- [Build digital fitness before chasing AI hustle](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/stevehodgkinson_digitalfitness-platformagile-conceptofeffect-activity-7480491707831099392-RJ9v)
- [What the Vested Way conference showed about collaborative contracting](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/stevehodgkinson_vestedway-ey-activity-7466932412942344192-lyBj)

## Brand relationships

- **Victorian Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS)** (employment)
- **Victoria Police** (employment)
- **Vested** (mention)
- **EY** (mention)

## Partnerships

Dr Steve Hodgkinson’s posts publish no sponsorship packages, rate card or partnership terms. They discuss collaboration, not brand offers, and provide no official inquiry route. Brands should expect to negotiate terms directly rather than choose from a documented menu. In a post about the 2026 Vested conference in Amsterdam, Hodgkinson describes relational contracting as a formal method for governing long-term outsourcing relationships so the parties’ interests stay aligned as circumstances change. They note it has been most common in facilities management outsourcing, with growing interest in IT managed services. Elsewhere, they present collaborative partnerships as one of three recurring success patterns from their digital transformation work across health, human services and policing. They argue organisations should move beyond transactional vendor relationships and contract for collaborative ways of working, not just deliverables. That points to a longer-term, jointly governed engagement around building capability rather than a conventional sponsored post or short campaign. The posts don’t confirm whether Hodgkinson accepts commercial partnership work. Before planning, ask for their current sponsorship or speaking policy, fee information and a contact route.

## Alternatives

- David Kershaw: Choose David Kershaw for a campaign on practical AI procurement in the public sector: helping leaders address procurement standards, contracting, contract management and the challenges smaller innovators face navigating public-sector buying. His summit posts focus on those issues and call for procurement to play a stronger role in AI discussions. That offers a more direct route into AI procurement than Steve Hodgkinson’s broader emphasis on building digital capability and collaborative partnerships.
- Michal Silhacek: Choose Michal Silhacek if the audience is small or medium-sized suppliers seeking practical guidance on working with large global customers. The posts discuss supplier ecosystems, cost transparency, shared operating rules, cultural differences and examples such as joint product development and multi-party agreements. That is a closer fit for a supplier-focused collaboration session than Hodgkinson’s leadership-oriented AI-readiness campaign.

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AI-assisted summary of public posts. Audience demographics are not available. Engagement appears only where we checked recent posts. Method: https://b2binfluencer.marketing/methodology/