October 2025 — Building the Future, One Step at a Time

Another month, another step into the future. Sora 2 is OpenAI’s new video model, and it is frankly unhinged. The understanding of physics, and the connection to relevant audio (whether spoken word or sound effects) is very tight - and will have a huge impact for digital content creators. Loads of examples here.

Interestingly, OpenAI is also getting into the social media space, with the introduction of ‘cameos’ - AI generated short videos featuring a replica of oneself. Meta is similarly attacking that space through ‘Vibes’, a new AI short video feed in the meta.ai application.

We’re a long way from Will Smith eating spaghetti.

MISSION+ Update

We’ve been working on projects in the Middle East for a while now, but we finally had our official GCC launch in our Dubai International Finance Center (DIFC) office launch on the 30th September. Many thanks to all those who attended, and to the MISSION+ team for the smooth organisation!

We were also extremely honoured to be able to host Mr. Syed Muhammad Raziff Aljunied, Consul-General of Singapore in Dubai, who spoke about the strong relationship between Singapore and the UAE and its ongoing potential.

The day focused on how the GCC can build differently. Panels, demos, and client stories covered:

• Future of Work - AI isn’t removing jobs, it’s reshaping skills. The region needs AI literacy across every function, not just in technical teams.

• Client Voices - From wealth management to conversational AI, clients showed real gains in speed, retention, and operational efficiency.

• AI ROI in Practice - ROI appears at scale, not in pilots. Hours saved, compliance risk reduced, and why the GCC’s lighter legacy stacks give it a speed advantage.
  Noor, the Digital Twin - Hazleen Ahmad introduced an empathy-driven AI system exploring how trust and fairness can be structured, measured, and financed.

• Bias, Bots, and Business - A discussion on control, regulation, and representation in AI, and why treating data as a first-class asset is critical for the region.

It was a solid day of conversation and ideas, and a good reminder that the GCC’s pace of change demands new delivery models, the kind that Mission+ was built for.

The launch also drew regional media attention, with coverage in Zawya, Al Bayan (Arabic) and Khaleej Times

The event also gave us a good opportunity to talk about our thoughts on the AI-assisted SDLC, which we’ve also written about: Reimagining the AI SDLC Operating Model. Using AI to generate code is a well established goal for many engineering managers - but cutting code when building a product is like cutting cloth when tailoring a suit. Important, yes. But it's only one part of the craft.

Like the suit, there are many more parts of the process - each with their own opportunities for AI-augmentation. Some of these - such as using AI to drive requirements analysis - are efficiencies. Others - such as generating support notes - perform tasks that are often overlooked.

Building software is being impacted as much as every other industry. If this is interesting to you and you would like to discuss further, please register interest here.

Reflections On The Mission

A question many organisations eventually ask themselves is: “How do we make the tech team more effective?”

Whether measured through developer productivity, DORA metrics, or project velocity, it’s a constant topic - often accompanied by a sense of concern that performance is too slow.

But the response to this question often focuses on the wrong areas. Having worked with many engineering teams, I have come to the conclusion that Developer Experience (DX) sits at the heart of the issue.

If we imagine effectiveness as a lever, there are many points you can push: process changes, better planning, improved project management, prioritisation meetings, etc. But the point furthest out, that delivers the most force when pushed, is Developer Experience.

A poor DX manifests in many forms:

• Underpowered equipment - whether laptops of servers

• Lack of appropriate tooling - sacrificed in the name of cost

• Lack of autonomy to operate efficiently - leading to lots of requests for someone else to execute basic tasks

• Low trust in engineers and constant fire drills

These factors bog engineers down. Sometimes it can feel like no matter the amount of energy poured in, nothing seems to move forward.

Adding new engineers to an organisation where the mud has taken over can make the problem worse. The communication overhead of a new team member outweighs the additional firepower. Ironically, reducing team size might actually help the team move forward.

A lot has been written about how meetings destroy productivity. There is some truth in this, but equally some meetings are absolutely necessary, and many are mostly necessary. You can’t simply mandate no more meetings.

The real problem is that meetings can become a negative loop - as milestones are missed, meetings are held where developers have to explain why they are late, further slowing them down. But this is a secondary effect - if the Developer Productivity was improved, many of the annoying meetings would melt away on their own.

Unlock the Experience

So what can you do to improve DX - and therefore Developer Productivity?

• Invest in autonomy and tools. Cutting corners here is the most expensive form of false economy.

• Review network security mechanisms such as VDIs or blocked websites to ensure engineers can still operate efficiently.

• Create self-service opportunities across infrastructure provisioning, software deployment, error messages in logs for all systems, etc.

• Bring in Fractional Tech Leaders with experience of effective organisations. Consultants often haven’t actually worked in the types of cultures they’re advising on.

• Engineering managers, scrum masters and designated advocates should be regularly capturing feedback on the worst parts of the Developer Experience. And then actually doing something about it!

Listen to your technologists - they are often fully aware of not only the problems, but also the solutions. And stop pushing on the wrong end of the lever!

Interesting Articles

• AI 2027 - a research-backed forecast for the next two years of AI. Love the infographics!

• What Is Man, That Thou Art Mindful Of Him? - turns out humans are not that much better than AI models after all…

• Hosting a WebSite on a Disposable Vape - because, why not?

This Is The Way

Feature A Fractional

We’re On A Mission

Until next month. Together, We Build {+}

Ned & the MISSION+ team

P.S. If you would like to bring the MISSION+ team into your organisation to help, please reach out to [email protected]!