Amberguity: Why Some Projects Are Impossible (and others land on the Moon)

Some projects are big, complex, and groundbreaking – yet they run smoothly.  Others seem straightforward but spiral into an unmanageable mess.  Why?

It all comes down to Amberguity - the breakdown in communication and decision-making across the organisation, that impedes the flow of crucial information, directly affects how decisions are made, and ultimately prevents project success.

Amberguity kills projects

Modern organizations face growing levels of Amberguity.  Collaboration, endless meetings, and an overload of communication tools should improve decision-making—but they often slow it down instead.  Employees juggle multiple responsibilities, leaving little time for deep, focused work.

So what does high and low Amberguity look like in action?  Let’s compare two massive projects:

Apollo: The Hardest Project with remarkably low Amberguity

A rocket soars to the Moon

In 1961, President John F. Kennedy set a clear, unwavering goal:

🛰️ "Land a man on the Moon and return him safely to Earth."

At over $300 billion in today’s money, the Apollo Program was one of the most ambitious projects ever attempted.  Yet, in terms of Amberguity, it scored surprisingly low.

Why? Because the objective was crystal clear.

🚀 Not Mars.

🚀 Not a one-way trip.

🚀 Not “try our best.”

🚀 Moon.  Land.  Return.  Safely.

Sure, Apollo faced huge technical uncertainties – Could astronauts survive the journey?  How do you land on the Moon?  How do you get home? – but there was zero debate about what success looked like because the critical decisions had already been made.

If you walked into any Apollo meeting in the 1960s, you wouldn’t hear arguments about the goal. The entire team was aligned, which meant they could focus on solving problems to achieve the goal – not on deciding what to do.

🚀 High difficulty.  Low Amberguity.  Success.

HS2: The Simple Project with Fatal Amberguity

Railway line stretches into the distance

 Now let’s look at HS2 – the UK’s high-speed rail project.  On paper, this should have been simple.

🚄 England has been building railways for 200 years.

🚄 The technology is fully understood.  The technology is not new.  The engineering is not ground-breaking.

🚄 The objective was apparently straightforward: connect London to the Midlands and the North.

And yet, HS2 collapsed under the weight of its own Amberguity.

Unlike Apollo, HS2 lacked a clear, unwavering mission that everyone involved had bought in to.   The goal kept shifting, the scope changed, and – most critically – it was packed with unmade decisions.  Each decision carried time and cost consequences, creating a compounding disaster.

🔹 The budget? Started at £35 billion. Then £90 billion. Then £130 billion. Or was it £178 billion? It kept growing.

🔹 The planning process? Over 8,000 separate permissions were needed for just one leg of the route – each requiring legal approvals and negotiation.  Unmade decisions piled up – every delay had cascading cost implications.

🔹 The outcome?  Delays.  Cost overruns.  Scope changes.  And finally, cancellation (or maybe just another delay – again, it is hard to tell).

🚄 Low difficulty.  Fatal Amberguity.  Failure.

So What About Your Projects?

In today’s workplace, decision-making is already slowing down.  More collaboration, more meetings, and more tools often create confusion rather than clarity.  Employees juggle multiple priorities, making it harder to focus on deep, productive work.

If your project lacks clear goals, aligned decision-making, and a structured path forward, and you don't take steps to work with it, even simple initiatives can grind to a halt.

Most organizations aren’t launching Moon landings or national infrastructure projects. But they do face the same Amberguity traps:

✅ Clear, unchanging goals drive success.  The more alignment there is from the start, the easier execution becomes.

✅ Unmade decisions are dangerous.  The more uncertainty around decision-making, the worse the delays, costs, and chaos.

✅ Complexity is fine – if the path is clear.  Big, technical challenges can be solved.  But if the mission keeps shifting, the project will collapse.

The takeaway? Define the mission. Align the team. Minimise, or at least identify and manage Amberguity.  Otherwise, even a simple project could become your version of HS2—costly, confusing, and undeliverable.

So here’s the real question: Is your project more like Apollo – or HS2?

Let’s discuss.🚀