From Iconic Design to Lost Luggage: Innovation at Heathrow Terminal 5

Abstract

This paper aims to contribute to understanding of how organizations respond to risk and uncertainty by combining and balancing routines and innovation. It shows how approaches to risk and uncertainty are shaped by the contractual framework in large multi-party projects. The paper addresses a gap in the literature on how risk and uncertainty is managed to deliver innovation in large-scale ‘megaprojects’. These megaprojects are notorious for high rates of failure that conventionally evoke organizational strategies avoiding risks and uncertainties. Yet strategies for managing risk and uncertainty are essential to the routines and innovation that overcome the challenges of successfully delivering large-scale, complex projects.