John Beckford, partner in Beckford Consulting, Visiting Professor at University College London and Loughborough University; president of the Cybernetics Society United Kingdom

Infrastructure systems for an intelligent nation

Starting with the aphorism that ‘All models are wrong, some are useful’ (Box, 1976, attrib.) John Beckford shares insights to the opportunities, challenges and practical issues with the idea of digital twins their utility and limitations for infrastructure systems. John offers a structure within which an Intelligent Nation can enhance utility and understanding by developing models which are ‘less wrong, more useful’ in recognising that they are not twins but digital approximations.

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John is a partner in Beckford Consulting, Visiting Professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Geomatic Engineering at University College London and in the Centre for Information Management at Loughborough University. He is Non-Executive Chair of RISE Mutual CIC (Domestic Abuse Prevention) and a Non-Executive Director of the social enterprises Fusion21 Limited (Procurement) and CoreHaus Ltd. (ModularConstruction. John is President of the Cybernetics Society.

John holds a PhD in Management Systems and Sciences (Hull), is a Fellow of the Cybernetics Society, a Member of The Institute of Management Services, a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts and a Fellow of the Institute of Engineering and Technology. John is author of: ‘Quality’ (Routledge, 4^th Edition, 2017), ‘The Intelligent Organisation’ (Routledge, 2^nd Edition, 2020), ‘The Intelligent Nation’ (Routledge, 2021) and numerous papers and articles.