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The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted the ‘real’ world and substantially impacted the virtual world and thus the Internet ecosystem. It has caused a significant exogenous shock that offers a wealth of natural experiments and produced new data about broadband, clouds, and the Internet in times of crisis. In this chapter, we characterise and evaluate the evolving impact of the global COVID-19 crisis on traffic patterns and loads and the impact of those on Internet performance from multiple perspectives. While we place a particular focus on deriving insights into how we can better respond to crises and better plan for the post-COVID-19 ‘new normal’, we analyse the impact on and the responses by different actors of the Internet ecosystem across different jurisdictions. With a focus on the USA and Europe, we examine the responses of both public and private actors, with the latter including content and cloud providers, content delivery networks, and Internet service providers (ISPs). This chapter makes two contributions: first, we derive lessons learned for a future post-COVID-19 world to inform non-networking spheres and policy-making; second, the insights gained assist the networking community in better planning for the future.

The aim of this chapter is to describe a four-type model of organisational structures and to discuss two cases, Embrapa and the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation, as well as additional cases at SAM-Research and the centre for shared medical support services established at the University of Bologna.

These cases should help readers understand the importance of designing distinctive, tailored-made support services while keeping these structures flexible for further adaptation under unforeseen changes.

The chapter concludes by stressing the role of institutions to steadily invest in the design of these tailored support structures and in personalised training for their support staff.

This chapter examines how implementation of SDG solutions can be improved through adaptive strategies. Many so-called blueprint strategies are inflexible during implementation and underestimate the importance fitting general goals and plans to shifting local needs and contexts. The chapter emphasizes the importance of identifying the specific types of dynamic challenges that will prompt the need for adaptation when implementing sustainability strategies. Adaptive cocreation provides a valuable framework for overcoming traps of various sorts that may block implementation. The problem-driven iterative adaptation (PDIA) model is introduced as one approach to adaptation. PDIA is particularly valuable for achieving bottom-up integration of SDGs and projects. Finally, the chapter considers the importance of social learning as a strategy for collaborative adaptation.

Universities are large, complex and highly hierarchical organisations with deeply engrained gendered values, norms and practices. This chapter reflects on the experiences of two universities in initiating structural change towards gender equality as supported by the TARGET project. A common aspect thereby is the lack of a national policy in higher education and research providing specific support for implementing gender equality policies. The process of audit, design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the first gender equality plan (GEP) in each of these universities was conceived as a first step in a long journey, providing a framework for engaging different institutional actors and fostering reflexive, evidence-based policy making. The analysis deals with reflexivity and resistance and seeks to draw lessons from bottom-up and top-down experiences of GEP implementation. It is the result of shared reflection between the GEP ‘implementers’ in the two universities and the team who provided support and acted as ‘critical friends’.

The TARGET approach aims at establishing a reflexive gender equality policy in research performing and research funding organisations. Monitoring has enormous potential to support reflexivity at both the institutional and the individual levels in the gender equality plan (GEP) development and implementation context. To exploit this potential, the monitoring system has to consist of meaningful indicators, which adequately represent the complex construct of gender equality and refer to the concrete objectives and policies of the GEP. To achieve this, we propose an approach to indicator development that refers to a theory of change for the GEP and its policies. Indicator development thus becomes a reflexive endeavour and monitoring a living tool. This requires constant reflection on data gaps, validity of indicators and the further development of indicators. Furthermore, we recommend the creation of space for reflexivity to discuss monitoring results with the community of practice.

The chapter summarizes key literature, including emerging ideas, that is pertinent to the question of how organizations and their leadership deal with and are resilient through crises – highlighting what works in surviving unexpected crises. The chapter presents an illustration of organizational response; it concludes with an analysis of what is missing from the literature and recommends a path forward to expanding actionable knowledge in this area. Multiple, interdependent factors that foster resilience are identified including (1) being sensitive to possible threats – even seemingly small failures, (2) not relying on simple interpretations of events but rather seeking diversity to create a complete view of the environment, (3) leadership that embraces communication, transparency, and continuous learning, (4) valuing expertise and allowing expert staff to make decisions during a crisis, and (5) a cultural commitment to a resiliency mindset that accepts failures as opportunities to learn and improve. Emerging concepts that may foster resilience but require more research include managing paradox, emotional ambivalence and diversity. Additional areas for fruitful research include: the impact of short-term versus long-term, or successive, crises; external versus internal shocks and the framing of the source of shocks; how crisis affect the pace of innovation and change; the role of diversity in organizational responses to crises; and a set of methodological opportunities to leverage natural experiments or simulations in ways that allow for longitudinal data illuminating the full cycle of crises across organizations from anticipation, to response, to longer-term adaptation to the new normal.

The purpose of the paper is 1) to address the importance of contingency at the right level when defining project control baseline, including cost reserves / “room to manoeuvre” and 2) present proactive uncertainty management as a regime to ensure cost effective management of project reserves and contribute to project success.

The paper is a combination of literature study and quantitative research on how contingency develops during the lifetime of a case project. The investigation into the case project includes document study into quantitative material from the case project. The combination of empirical material and theory makes the discussion robust.

Unrealistic low cost uncertainty will lead to unrealistic low contingency. The case study from a Norwegian mega project shows a contingency of 15 per cent in addition to expected costs. The case study shows that by continuous opportunity management and risk reduction, the needs for management reserves are systematically reduced and the contingency is controlled.

This research is limited to one case study. A higher number of cases are necessary to generalise the findings. However, the authors would claim that the systematic mapping of need for management reserve towards the project contingency, and a continuous uncertainty management system will help to obtain cost effective management. The findings from the case study could be applied on similar cases.

The case study shows a way of setting contingencies and managing contingencies through systematic uncertainty management.

Improved management of project provisions will increase the value of future projects.

The study aims to investigate the concept of strategy-as-practice in construction management literature has been investigated. The focus is on the link between strategizing practices and project management.

An exploratory literature review is carried out based on fifteen journal articles on strategizing practices in the construction industry.

The analysis shows how strategy-as-practice questions and contradicts project management practices as depicted in the dominant deterministic perspective. Strategy-as-practice has a focus on reacting and adapting to a chaotic and changing environment, while project management is concerned with creating and maintaining a stable working environment. The findings point to the necessity of considering the organizational and institutional context of project management practices, and hence the values the strategy-as-practice lens, when considering new avenues for improving the industry.

As the study is based on an exploratory literature review of only 15 articles, generalizations should be made with caution. The identified literature is restricted by search words and choice of database.

The differences between strategizing and project management practices are very clear, and a focus on both may offer insights into how the construction industry could improve its productivity by developing more robust management practices.

The paper illustrates the benefit of applying a strategizing perspective, which hitherto has been under-investigated in construction management research.