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To anticipate science and technology (S&T) changes and shifts in the competitive environment for the preparation of strategic development in an organization, this paper aims to address a structured analysis method for future technology trajectories and interactions by mapping and associating the future technology themes in foresight reports with a state‐of‐the art technology classification system. The objective of this paper is to develop an integrative method for systematically clustering, analyzing and visualizing the path for technology development and transformation.

Delphi topics related to sustainable energy were collected from strategic foresight reports of Japan, South Korea and China, and used as sources for future technology themes analysis. A standard mapping taxonomy based on international patent classification system was used to map out the technology concept described in these future technology themes. Technology interactions can be identified through a causal effect analysis during the mapping, and the results among selected countries are cross‐compared and visualized in an aggregated view.

By this standard mapping taxonomy and structured analysis, future technology themes in strategic foresight reports from countries in focus are systematically mapped and integrated for viewing future technology options and interactions. Similarities and discrepancies for prospecting the future technology trajectory among these countries are also identified.

It would be a significant contribution if this structured analysis could be applied more broadly across different geographic regions or across research areas in foresight reports. This research may help to solve the practical difficulties faced during the secondary analysis of foresight studies in foresight preparatory studies by providing a consistent classification framework to make comparison and aggregation of future technology options from different countries/regions. Also, this classification framework can provide a bridge for linking with current technology performance such as patent productivity or quality and help in identifying the gaps between the probable future changes in S&T and the current capability.

The integrative method in this research provides a way to combine both the advantage of strategic technology foresight and competitive technology intelligence by utilizing the results deriving from the former as targets for analysis and the analytic practice deriving from the latter to identify the possible competitive or cooperative landscapes in the future.

Community resilience decides a lot on a city's ability to withstand an external shock. It has evolved naturally from a bounce-back approach to a more robust and meaningful bounce-forward process. The study explores gaps found in community resilience and finds that criteria specific to different disasters are absent.

The study uses a multi-criteria decision analysis technique, fuzzy Delphi, to select criteria. Derivation of the initial list of criteria was from a pilot study, a focus group discussion and other literature studies which was followed by the fuzzy Delphi survey.

After two rounds of fuzzy Delphi analysis, the consensus among 65 experts resulted in selecting 125 sub-sub-criteria within seven criteria. Findings show that many criteria previously not discussed in other pieces of literature project high fuzzy scores such as “availability of drinking water post-disaster” and “cracking down fake news spreaders by the police”. In addition, positive cooperation between political and religious institutions have proven to expedite disaster recovery.

The future scope also includes weighing the selected criteria using analytical hierarchy process (AHP).

Policymakers in the disaster management domain can use the study findings in implementing effective disaster mitigation strategies.

The selection of criteria is based on the community resilience shown by the Kerala community during the floods of 2018 and 2019 (in Kerala). Measures demonstrated by the community need to be studied, which will help foster disaster mitigation better in future scenarios.

The citizen-shareholder approach in the capital market is considered a knowledge-enhancing and emerging concept in financial and accounting offerings. Its reliable background in management and human sciences makes it an essential basis for protecting the interests of shareholders and investors. Shareholders are considered a necessary part of the social platforms that are companies and regulatory institutions in the capital market; beyond being obligated to protect their material and intellectual rights, they are responsible for developing norms and facilitating investment values and gaining trust through mutual interactions based on respect for their interests. The purpose of this paper is to perform interactive qualitative analysis of the requirements for protecting the rights of citizens of capital market shareholders.

The methodology of the research is mixed, so that in the qualitative part, through content screening, the dimensions related to the protection of the citizen rights of the capital market shareholders were identified through a systematic review of 10 research in the period of 2017–2022. Then, the reliability of the specified dimensions was examined through Delphi analysis; in the quantitative part of the research, the criteria identified through the pairwise comparison matrix were first determined by the level of their relationships to determine based on the pattern of systemic representation of drivers and the consequences of requirements to protect the rights of citizens of capital market shareholders.

The research results in the qualitative part indicated the existence of 12 primary themes; during the two stages of Delphi analysis, three themes were removed, and a total of nine themes entered the quantitative phase. The results in a quantitative part indicate the creation of specialized and active committees of the board of directors as the primary driver and the reliability and timely disclosure of information in the long term as a systemic consequence.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first research that presents the new concept of citizen shareholders to strengthen the requirements of protecting the rights of shareholders in the capital market while developing new theoretical literature.

The purpose of this paper is to utilise the collective opinion of a group of Finnish experts to identify the most important learning outcomes of secondary-level school-based health education, in the specific domains of physical activity and nutrition.

The study uses a Delphi survey technique to collect the opinions of a group (panel) of Finnish experts. A list of learning outcomes was compiled via an extensive literature review of documents from all levels of health education (physical activity and nutrition) policy development and implementation. A general inductive analysis method was conducted, resulting in education themes which were then compiled into health literacy-constructed learning outcomes to present to the panel in the two Delphi rounds.

The study question is answered in the form of a ranked list of the 24 most important learning outcomes of physical activity and nutrition education in Finnish schools. The analysis of variance pair-wise comparisons with Bonferroni indicated that six items were statistically possibly more important than the 18 others. The three most important items being: first, understand the importance of a varied and balanced diet; second, the ability to analyse their own lifestyle; third, understand the link between physical activity and health. The study also identified topics/themes which could be either under-represented or over-represented in the current literature and teaching.

This study is the only one of its type, and researches an as yet unknown area of health education. The value of this study lies in its role in the further development of school health education, in terms of identifying the “most important” contemporary issues to teach in the classroom, and may also be used as a topic prioritisation and curriculum planning tool.

The purpose of this paper is to identify and rank the most important topics for research in the field of public relations. An associated outcome was to propose the research questions most closely linked to the prioritised topics.

An international Delphi study on the priorities for public relations research, conducted in 2007 amongst academics, practitioners and senior executives of professional and industry bodies was used to investigate expert opinion on research priorities for public relations. This choice of qualitative methodology replicated earlier studies by McElreath, White and Blamphin, Synnott and McKie, and Van Ruler et al.

The role of public relations in the strategic operation of organisations, and the creation of value by public relations through social capital and relationships were ranked most highly. Some outcomes were comparable with earlier studies; for instance, evaluation of public relations programmes ranked third in this study and was amongst the leaders in the Synnott and McKie study. Only the topic “management of relationships” was wholly new, whereas “impact of technology on public relations practice and theory” ranked much lower than a decade ago.

The Delphi study method is a small scale qualitative process which limits generalisability, unless the choice of “experts” and their active participation can demonstrate that there is validity in its outcomes.

The research gives valuable insight into the main public relations research areas and will allow academics and practitioners to work closely together to improve understanding of public relations.

This is the first completed Delphi study into public relations research priorities since Synnott and McKie.

The purpose of this paper is to provide project management (PM) students with an example of the Delphi research approach that was applied to a recent doctoral research thesis. The objective is to provide both a description of the approach and an explanation of how it was successfully applied so that researchers in PM may become more aware and expand their perceptions of methodological options available to them.

The paper sets out a literature review of the Delphi approach and explains this research method as it was experienced as a research tool. The paper also provides reflection on the experience of being a researcher undertaking a doctoral study.

The Delphi approach is one of many that may be selected for researching PM issues and problems. It is appropriate for researching complex issues where larger scale quantitative “hard data” fails to unearth richness in tacit knowledge to help the research understand subtle expert opinion. It does not offer the rigor of clinical testing or quantitative analysis, but it provides a scientific methodology that is well suited to issues that require the insights of subject matter experts. The use of Delphi in this context was successful in that the thesis was passed and so its use in this context may be now considered as proved through rigorous examination.

The paper provides a solid literature review that may be used or referred to by researchers wishing to adopt this research approach. It also describes the protocols and processes adopted in the doctoral study. Thus, this paper provides the opportunity for PM researchers to expand their repertoire of research tools. Practitioners may also benefit from this paper as it provides a useful approach to assess and validate expert knowledge that could be contestable in a range of practice situations.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the combination of Delphi and focus group techniques and on the utilization of qualitative content analysis in this context. Moreover, it illustrates the potential of this hybridized methodology for gathering information from experts on multilingual practices in the primary school context in Germany in order to conceptualize a teacher training.

Based on a structured guideline, two group discussions with experts from the scientific community, schools and educational institutions (n=13; n=12) focused on language diversity in the school context, multilingualism, the heritage languages of children as well as on the role of language reflection and metalinguistic awareness in (second) language acquisition and development in primary school. Both group discussions were qualitatively analyzed, and inductive categories were framed.

The main aspects derived from the data were: teaching actors, their language awareness, their knowledge about multilingualism and attitudes toward it, characteristics of the materials and methods used in language lessons as well as students’ own experiences with both heritage and second language(s).

Following these domains derived from the analyses of the data, the authors developed a teacher training, systematically considering multilingual teaching practices and implications resulting from the modified Delphi-study.

Due to the fact that knowledge and experience of experts from research and school context had been taken into account, the teacher training measure achieved higher acceptance and efficacy.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the key issues faced by today's supply chain professionals when managing reverse logistics (RL) processes and compare these issues with the topics examined in extant research. By making such a comparison, the paper identifies areas of practical relevance that are being adequately addressed in the literature, as well as areas that may need further attention.

The paper employed a Delphi method in order to uncover the most salient RL issues faced in industry, as viewed by practitioners. The paper then completed a systematic analysis of the RL literature in order to examine the degree to which topics addressed in the extant literature correspond with the framework proposed by Carter and Ellram (1998). Finally, the paper compared and contrasted the findings of the content analysis and Delphi study, which highlights areas for future investigation that may help to better align research with practice.

In the Delphi study, the paper uncovered and ranked seven key issues for RL managers. These are: customer support, top-management support, communication, costs, formalization, timing of operations, and environmental issues. When compared to Carter and Ellram's (1998) framework, three of the seven factors coincide with factors described in the framework and two factors indirectly relate to the framework. The two factors not specifically represented are costs and formalization.

The findings provide practitioners with an understanding of what factors are most important to consider when managing RL programs. The discussion of the comparison between the Delphi results and extant literature provides guidance as to how to address the RL issues uncovered in this study.

This research effort suggests directions for future research that will better align academic topics with current managerial issues. Although the paper offers many suggestions for future research, the paper proposes that investigating ways to increase formalization of RL programs and establish RL as a profit center within organizations may be the areas in greatest need for additional scholarly research.

The purpose of this study is to review the literature on the Delphi method, its characteristics and current applications through an analysis of recent most-cited scientific papers, with an emphasis on three axes, namely, the number of rounds used, stakeholder participation relevance or only academic experts’ participation and the possibility of using indicators or techniques different from those related to descriptive statistics.

In total, 57 papers were initially reviewed, 10 of them with a high citation rate. Then, an analysis was made of papers in Scopus for the period 2015-2018 published in the Technological Forecasting and Social Change Journal and in the Futures and Foresight Journal, which had the characteristic of displaying quartile Q1 or Q2 in Scimago in addition to being in Scopus.

Among the main results, the authors observe the tendency to use fewer rounds, a higher prevalence of stakeholder participation and not only academic experts but also the use of new types of modified Delphi such as real-time spatial Delphi, Delphi group, market Delphi, real-world Delphi and policy Delphi.

Among the conclusions, the possibility of using other indicators or complementary techniques to the descriptive statistics is highlighted such as number of justifications or comments between rounds, coefficients to quantify the competence or degree of expertise of the participants, measures of the perception of the expert on the usefulness of the presented feedback, graphs of the number of arguments according to the number of questions, the Wilcoxon Ranked Pairs Test, the k means, Kolmogorov–Simonov test and the Mann–Whitney U-test.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the evolution of a supply network and the causes of network change and stability. It presents the study of a supply network of Delphi Braga (Portugal), one of the largest European plants producing car-radios, navigation system and other related products, in order to understand how it changed over time. The paper contributes to the understanding of network management.

The case study was carried out on a network of five suppliers of Delphi Braga adopting a relational view of networks meaning that both parties of the relationships were studied. Data and results are based on document sources and interviews with managers both from Delphi and the studied suppliers.

The causes of network change and stability are both exogenous and endogenous. They are multiple and have different impacts on network structures and processes. The paper analyses several causes of network change and their impact on the studied supplier network.

The research is based on a single case study. Although the studied supplier network comprises several firms, it should be pointed out that each network has its own dynamics and structures. Therefore, though the paper makes a relevant contribution for network management, the results cannot be generalized for other networks and firms.

Managers should be aware of the dynamics of their supplier networks and understand the different impacts of both their firm’s decisions as well as the environment changes. By doing this, managers can anticipate changes in the structure and dynamics of their supplier networks.

This case study contributes to our current understanding of relationship development both at the dyadic and network level by analyzing the case of a supply network in a major European plant of car-radios and navigation systems. It discusses implications and proposes further research to advance knowledge on the topic of network change.