Purpose – New business models, such as life‐cycle contracting, challenge the narrow and static understanding of contracts with hard and precise terms. The aim of this paper is to examine how flexibility could be incorporated into contracting processes. Design/methodology/approach – The...

Purpose – Recent work on public private partnerships (PPP)/private finance initiatives (PFI) and on the construction industry has emphasised the importance of knowledge transfer, learning and innovation to improve the working processes and procedures of the industry. However, until recently...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide insights into the importance of human skills in project management success and the apparent emphasis placed on this within the context of university education. Design/methodology/approach – An investigation into the effectiveness of a British...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore critical success factors in knowledge‐intensive creative project work, using product development as an example field. Design/methodology/approach – Critical‐incident based in‐depth interviews of 11 product development experts (chosen...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the sensemaking processes leading to project managers' responses to an unexpected event in an international project setting. High uncertainty and unexpected events are prevalent in international projects conducted in challenging and complex...

Purpose – While earlier literature has focused on the management tactics of unexpected events, this paper employs an inter‐organizational network perspective to the study of unexpected events in international projects. The paper aims to illustrate how a focal project's local stakeholder...

Purpose – The construction industry in Australia is characterised by a long work‐hours culture, with conditions that make it difficult for staff to balance their work and non‐work lives. The objective of this paper is to measure the success of a work‐place intervention designed to...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to offer insights into how emotions can influence project manager behaviours and decisions specifically within the context of undertaking their roles in relationship management in projects. It shows that the emotional awareness of project managers may be...

Purpose – Virtual project teams are teams whose members use technology to varying degrees in working across locational, temporal, and relational boundaries to accomplish an interdependent task. Work in virtual project teams is a challenge for many organizations. Having studied the issue for...

Purpose – The paper aims to investigate the communication of uncertainty information and knowledge between the project manager, owner and steering group. The purpose of the project is to identify the effects of project owner and steering group involvement in the process of uncertainty...