Strategies for managing the structural and dynamic consequences of project complexity

In this paper we propose a theoretical framework that highlights the most important consequences of complexity for the form and evolution of projects, and use it to develop a typology of project complexity. This framework also enables us to deepen the understanding of how knowledge production and flexibility strategies enable project participants to address complexity. Based on this understanding, we advance a number of propositions regarding the strategies that can be most effective for different categories of complexity. We hope these results will help integrate various strands in the research on project complexity, and provide a roadmap for further research on the strategies for addressing it

Complexity, uncertainty-reduction strategies and project performance

This paper investigates how complexity influences projects and their performance. We develop a classification of project complexity by relying on fundamental theoretical insights about complexity and then use results from practice-oriented literature to assign concrete project complexity factors to the resulting categories. We also identify specific strategies for organizing and knowledge production that project planners use to address complexity-related uncertainties. We theorize about the way these strategies interact with various types of complexity to increase project performance. Anticipated influences are mostly corroborated using survey data on 81 complex projects from five continents and a diversity of sectors

Understanding Project Resilience: designed, cultivated or emergent?

This paper combines insights from complexity and resilience research with a process view of project organizations to advance our understanding of project resilience. We propose the concept of evolving resilience as the dynamic interaction between perturbations and processes of anticipatory shaping, regular becoming and exceptional organizing in project networks. Adopting a theory elaboration approach, we apply an initial conceptual framework on data regarding four complex projects. This enables us to identify a typology of emergent responsiveness patterns, namely reinforce trajectory, bounce back to trajectory, and jump to alternative trajectory. This typology provides the building blocks for elaborating an integrative process model of evolving project resilience. Results contribute to research on project resilience, and on the complexity of front-end shaping and ongoing organizing processes, and sheds light on the debates surrounding agile methods and allocational versus relational contracts

The induction machine in Eastern Europe: a research agenda

This paper aims to offer an overview of the research on induction machines in Eastern Europe. To this end, it reviews all papers published on the topic between 2010 and 2017, in the six most prestigious Eastern European journals. The main findings show that: (1) researchers focus on the induction machine as used in electrical drives, their major research interest being the torque or speed control improvement; (2) in spite of the International Electrotechnical Committee’s (IEC) new requirements to improve the efficiency of electric machines, this topic is almost inexistent among the studies published in Eastern European journal

Project management between will and representation

This article challenges some deep-rooted assumptions of project management. Inspired by the work of the German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer, it calls for looking at projects through two complementary lenses: one that accounts for cognitive and representational aspects and one that accounts for material and volitional aspects. Understanding the many ways in which these aspects transpire and interact in projects sheds new light on project organizations, as imperfect and fragile representations that chase a shifting nexus of intractable human, social, technical, and material processes. This, in turn, can bring about a new grasp of notions such as value,\ud knowledge, complexity, and risk

The response of complex projects to turbulent events: Understanding the cohesion, flexibility and innovativeness of inter-organizational networks

This paper discusses the ability of inter-organisational networks involved in developing and executing complex projects to respond to turbulent events. We rely on organisation theories and on multiple case studies of large-scale engineering and construction projects to develop an understanding of three properties enabling an adequate response to such events – cohesion, flexibility, and innovativeness. We analyse how the concrete practices that network participants use to create and maintain links between them are related to these three properties. Using archetypes abstracted from commonly encountered network forms, we model the systemic effects of various combinations of participants and links, and explain the patterns of response to turbulence observed in projects corresponding to each archetype