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The research problem in this study is how a client (as a project owner) should organise early stakeholder involvement and integration in the front-end phase of a project. This study aims to create normative managerial statements as propositions from the client's perspective and to combine them into a set of activities enabling efficient organisation in the front-end phase of a hospital construction project.

Action design research (ADR) was carried out in a large hospital construction project where the first author acted as an “involved researcher” and the other authors acted as “outside researchers”.

The authors created seven normative managerial propositions that were verified by the case project stakeholders and developed a managerial framework describing the client's essential stakeholder involvement and integration activities in the front-end phase of a hospital construction project based on these propositions. The authors have also depicted the subphases of the front-end phase: value definition phase in the client permanent organisation, value proposition phase in the client Programme Management Office (PMO) and finally development phase in the alliance organisation ending on the final investment decision.

The collaborative contract delivery model enables the early involvement and integration of stakeholders. It has been somewhat surprising to note the extent to which collaborative contracts change the client role in the project front-end. The results offer practical activities for how clients can manage front-end activities in collaborative contracts.

The case project offered a platform to analyse how the collaborative contract delivery model changes the emphasis of activities in the front-end of a project. One of the key benefits of collaborative contracts is that development, design and delivery occur partially in parallel, thereby enabling contributions from production to be included in the design and development. The benefit of having a real-life case under study provides the possibility to triangulate and analyse rich data, however limited by the qualitative case method.

Project management scholars and practitioners have long debated how best to harness social interactions to optimise knowledge exchange and enhance stakeholder alignment and value. This study aims to assist project managers to understand and manage fuzziness and create enduring front-end value. It views the project life cycle as a potential source of co-created value. The paper uses a social capital lens to provide a deeper understanding of the project front-end; it uses a three-dimensional view (structural, relational, cognitive) to explore how stakeholder social capital can overcome front-end fuzziness to enhance decision-making and, thus, value creation.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with senior managers from teleconnections companies, which, when combined with secondary data, established the impact, nature and dimensions of social capital within a project management setting.

The research found that social capital can help to reduce complexity, uncertainty and equivocality in the early stages of projects, making them more clearly defined and thus helping to create greater stakeholder value in the later stages of the project. A surprising finding was that some project team members engaged in intentional equivocality to try to promote their own benefits rather than those of the organisation.

This paper reconceptualises the impact of social capital on stakeholder value creation in the front-end of projects. The paper contributes to a more holistic view of the front-end of project management, focusing social capital to reduce the sources of front-end fuzziness.

The front-end phase plays an important role in achieving project success, and establishment of performance measurement systems considering project challenges or pitfalls is a way of keeping track of this phase. Early warning signs, a type of proactive performance indicators, may serve as means for improving decision-making and project processes aiming for short- and long-term project success. In this paper, the authors present findings from a study on early warning signs (EWS) in hospital projects' front-end. A preliminary systematisation of identified signs as a contribution to front-end improvement is provided.

The paper is based on a mixed methods approach, using a sequential, exploratory research design comprising document studies, interviews and a survey.

The authors identified 62 challenges for hospital projects' front-end performance and further established four categories of EWS as follows: (1) structure and tools, (2) context and frame factors, (3) management and (4) relational factors and properties. This mirrors the presence of hard and soft issues from previous studies. There is need for clarifying terminology and raising consciousness on EWS. Processual approaches to identify EWS are considered more useful than subsequent established indicators.

The findings from this paper provide insight into EWS in hospital projects' front-end phase. This adds to the general understanding of EWS and contributes to more knowledge on the front-end phase in general.

The purpose of this paper is to explore managerial functions and related activities of inexperienced project managers in the front-end of the innovation (FEI) process.

In total, 15 student project managers were interviewed while they were engaged in the front-end phase of their respective eight-month projects. In total, 757 interview transcript segments on their perceptions of managerial functions were categorized based on thematic similarity of content.

Four major managerial functions emerged: providing structural support, coordinating and acting as a link, empowering the team, and encouraging and providing social support. Out of these, traditional task-oriented managerial functions were emphasized.

Although limited by the small amount of participants in a university setting, the results suggest that task-oriented managerial functions are dominant even in the FEI for inexperienced project managers. More research is needed to understand the antecedents and consequences of such task-dominance, and whether it persists as more experience is accrued. On the other hand, domain knowledge seemed to play a smaller role than indicated by previous research.

Project managers should pay attention to creating structure in the uncertain front-end phase. Swift familiarization with the capabilities and practices of each team member cannot be overemphasized, as otherwise the heterogeneity of the team might become a limitation rather than asset. On the other hand, domain experience of the manager may not be necessary in the FEI.

The study addresses the gap in previous research on managerial functions specifically in the FEI. Task-oriented managerial functions emerged as way of novice project managers attempting to deal with the fluctuating contingencies in order to foster innovation.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how firms manage the front end of new product development projects where packaging forms a core part of the product itself. Within the fast-moving consumer goods industry, innovation provides opportunities to create packaging that forms an integrated part of the product offering. The authors refer to these as packaging-integrated-products. This study conceptualises three levels of integration and investigates how they impact upon the management of the front end.

The study consisted of a two-phase design. This involved a preliminary study with key informants, followed by a multiple case study design, which examines product development projects with differing extents of packaging integration.

The results identify nine different new product opportunities. The authors also present 11 propositions that reveal the key characteristics of the front end of packaging-integrated development projects, as well as the project management requirements to capture the opportunities they present.

Initial insights into a number of unique front-end project management characteristics required to deliver different project types form an area for further research to better understand product packaging integration. The propositions presented guide the way forward for future studies.

The findings provide marketers with new understanding of three types of new product opportunities presented by packaging integration and demonstrate what is required to capture the opportunities they present in the front end of product development.

The paper contributes to extant studies of packaging development in the marketing literature, which have previously failed to capture the high levels of integration between packaging and the product. The authors present a new conceptual approach to understanding integration and subsequently uncover how the opportunities it presents can be captured.

Infrastructure projects are expected to deliver value to their stakeholders long after completion. Project value is multi-dimensional and subjective and evolves over the project lifecycle. How stakeholders frame the expected value is central to the public debate about proposed infrastructure projects and influences the financing decisions; however, this framing is inadequately understood. The purpose of this paper is to develop new knowledge for shaping infrastructure projects by identifying the ways in which stakeholders frame project value at the project front end.

Three transport infrastructure projects are compared in a qualitative, document-based study. The authors map the dimensions of value at the project front end and identify stakeholders’ approaches to lifecycle-oriented framing of value.

Financial, social and comparative values are dominant in the project front end. The authors frame value into positive and negative dimensions and identify four themes in the lifecycle-oriented framing of value, including uncertainties, timing of cost and benefit realization, project relations and external sponsorship.

The research is limited through the focus on transport infrastructure projects and project front end only, the selection of cases from a single country and the use of document-based data. The systematic analysis approach has yielded novel analytical frameworks that will be useful for further research.

This study identifies value dimensions that are specific to transport infrastructure projects and proposes a framework to assist stakeholders and project managers to better assess and negotiate value when designing their projects.

Regional and comparative values are revealed as novel aspects of value specific to infrastructure projects. The alternative lifecycle-oriented frames offer a new way to understand and structure the co-creation of value and shape negotiation for investment decisions in the project. A portfolio perspective to investment decision making is proposed.

This study aims to analyze the dynamic of front end development (discover, define and create/analysis and test phases) in the co-creation with multiple stakeholders taking into account the value creation and capture process in a strategic business, consulting project, adding knowledge sharing flows.

The first phase of the study consisted of a review of the narrative literature. The method chosen for analyzing the findings is the narrative synthesis, which sought to identify and show the complementarity between the areas studied. Then, a summary of the review presents a conceptual structure. At the third phase of the study consisted of a field survey characterized for being a descriptive-exploratory and qualitative investigation based on a single case study.

For the results, three phases of evolution in the relationships among stakeholders can be characterized, namely: formation, strengthening and integration. With regard to value capture, it is also possible to characterize three phases of simultaneous non-linear evolution: sharing of perceptions, ideas and experiences, self-reflection, and vision and solution. With regard to knowledge sharing, two important flows were characterized: solution development and socialization and communication, in which there is a greater relationship with the development of trust, commitment, tie strengthening and shared vision. And some insights from the perspective of integrating dynamic capabilities and front end with value co-creation with multiple stakeholders.

Practical and theorical results of the evolution of value co-creation on the front end phases dynamic.

Transport megaprojects often struggle to offer social value (SV) that meets local communities' needs. This problem is embedded in how local communities' views are captured and incorporated into SV plans through local community engagement (LCE). By problematising the literature, this article aims to identify LCE issues and their impacts on SV plans at the front-end of transport megaprojects.

The theoretical lens of the study is the practice theory developed by Schatzki (2016, 2005). The authors conceptualised LCE as a practice and conducted 32 semi-structured interviews with UK practitioners. The authors collected data in three steps from three types of practitioners involved in LCE practice and SV planning: project managers, LCE experts and SV experts.

The authors identified 18 LCE issues with thematic analysis and clustered them into five themes. These issues impact LCE with five mechanisms. Findings show that a weak link between LCE and SV plans due to the issues reduces LCE to a tick-box exercise and presents a distorted view of local communities. This reduces SV plans to the bare minimum for project approval instead of offering relevant SV to local communities. Addressing the issues goes beyond changing the approach of project teams to engagement (from instrumental to normative) and requires changing the practices.

For the first time, the study uses practice theory to conceptualise LCE as a practice, following the notion of project as practice. The study problematises the literature to address the under-represented link between LCE and SV plans.

The purpose of this paper is to adopt an in-depth perspective on cost estimation, from the development of the initial idea until the budget is agreed, to obtain new insights into issues of underestimation at the front-end.

The study uses a small sample of projects with exceptional increases in cost estimates during the front-end phase. The authors analyzed the magnitude of cost increases and possible reasons for them.

The paper concludes that underestimation in the front-end phase was significant in the sample and poses a serious problem in that suboptimal projects are approved. The causes of underestimation include underestimating risk, overestimating opportunities, inadequate estimation methods and skills, reliance on weak information, and strategic/deliberate scope creep and division of projects.

The study builds on a small sample, and hence further studies should be undertaken to verify whether the findings are generalizable.

The sample shows that the projects with the most unrealistic early estimates have disputable relevance. The paper suggests a number of recommendations that might help to counter the problem of unrealistic early cost estimates, which in turn, might allow suboptimal projects to be funded.

The underestimation of costs at the front-end is grossly neglected in the literature compared with whether costs comply with the budget. While cost overruns are an indication of failure in terms of the project’s tactical performance, the contention is that the up-front underestimation of costs might result in an inferior project being selected and thus affect the strategic performance of the project.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the adverse incentives at the front end of government-funded projects with concentrated benefits and no liabilities for the privileged groups. In particular, the author discusses the risk of perverse incentives of the types typically found in the development aid sector that results in counterproductive outcomes.

The paper uses a simple conceptual framework based on agency theory. A qualitative, case-based approach with purposive sampling was chosen for the empirical part of the study. Eight Norwegian projects were selected because incentive problems were to be expected, and one development aid project served as a reference case.

The paper finds that low strategic project success corresponded well with the terms of financing. There were clear indications of agency problems, in three cases to the extent that the incentives turned perverse. The paper concludes with a discussion of relevant measures to prevent the emergence of perverse incentives.

The paper contributes to an improved understanding of the incentives related to public project initiation and selection, which is an under-researched topic and generally not included in formal project governance schemes. The research should therefore be useful to scholars as well as practitioners within the field of project governance.