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The paper focuses on the contribution which adequate organisational learning and innovation can make to the enhancement, development and improvement of professional expertise in the construction domain. The paper, based on research undertaken within the European (fourth framework)‐funded CONDOR project, explores the role of evaluation in a business process re‐engineering initiative and its relationship with organisational learning and innovation. The paper presents the evaluation of the implementation of a business process re‐engineering project in three case studies in the construction industry. The implementation of the BPR project was based on an eight‐stage BPR methodology. The participating companies were asked to evaluate the implementation, describe the decisions made in order to adapt to the change process and analyse the potential benefits that they expect in terms of business performance improvement, organisational effectiveness and user acceptability. Finally, this paper discusses the evaluation results of the implementation of a business process re‐engineering model in three case studies in order to identify links with organisational learning and innovation.

This paper uses as its focus the traditional U.K. retail industry at a time when competition from newer channels is increasing. Research into other industry sectors has proven that well planned and executed customer relationship management strategies can increase profitability by improving customer loyalty. Many areas of the retail sector appeared to have neglected the benefits of CRM strategies, and where attempts have been made to implement CRM one or more of the vital constituents - employees, customers and shareholders have been neglected. The true barriers to CRM implementation are often thought to be financial or technological, according to research into other industry sectors. In reality however, financial and technological barriers are less problematic than organisational change, cultural and people barriers. The results of the retail survey carried out by the researchers support their original idea that few sectors of the traditional UK retail industry have implemented CRM strategies, and those that have are still are the early stages in the cycle. The survey questioned retailers on 3 main areas - The Company; IT Strategy and Future Strategy. Results for each for area are presented and change implications are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to explore and identify relationships between psychological contract inducements and the five‐factor model of personality (FFM) in Greece.

A survey questionnaire that incorporated measures of intrinsic and extrinsic psychological contract inducements and a Greek personality measure of the FFM was completed by 299 respondents. Hierarchical regression analyses were used to explore the hypotheses.

The paper finds that extroversion and conscientiousness are associated with intrinsic but not extrinsic psychological contract inducements and that neuroticism is associated with extrinsic but not intrinsic inducements. The hypothesis pertaining to openness to experience was rejected, because it was not associated with intrinsic psychological contract inducements, as expected.

The study design was cross‐sectional and used only self‐report measures. Therefore, it should be cross‐validated with different research designs (e.g. longitudinal research) and in other countries.

The findings provide further support on the significance of personality measures for the selection, development and motivation of employees.

The most significant contribution of the study is that it explores the relationship between personality and psychological contract inducements rather than psychological contract types. Another contributing factor is that the study is carried out in Greece.

The readiness level may vary on the basis of what employees perceive as the balance between costs and benefits of maintaining a behavior and the costs and benefits of change. The purpose of this paper is to examine the concept of individual readiness to change and the impact of perceived impact of organizational change on its relationship with personality and context characteristics.

In all, 183 employees of a technological company based in Greece completed a questionnaire. This company was implementing a large scale restructuring change project.

The results show that perceived impact of change mediates the relationship between the pre-change conditions and work attitudes and individual readiness to change.

Employees who are confident about their abilities they experience high levels of readiness to change and therefore managers may want to examine this variable when selecting people for jobs entailing change. Creating a climate of trust and enhance positive communication also have an influence on individual readiness to change. Satisfied employees are more ready to change because they weigh the positive consequences of changing as significant and therefore decide to embrace change.

This research addressed the need for a more person-oriented approach in the study of change, exploring the concept of individual readiness to change and the perceived benefit of this change.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between the five‐factor model of personality (FFM) and employees' voice behavior in Greece.

Employees' personality characteristics were assessed along with their voice behavior towards their supervisor and the top management of their company. Data were collected from a cross‐sectional sample of 334 professionals.

The findings demonstrate the relationship between personality and voice behavior towards the immediate supervisor, but not towards the top management of the company, and show that conscientiousness and emotional stability are the strongest predictors of employees' voice behavior.

The results of the study should be interpreted with caution, since they are based on self‐report measures. However, the findings suggest that two personality dimensions (emotional stability and conscientiousness) are significantly related with employees' voice behavior towards their supervisor.

The findings suggest important practical implications for HR practices, such as employee communication and personnel selection, since at least two personality dimensions are related with employees' voice behavior. The study also emphasizes the significance of first line supervisors' communication style in enhancing employees' voice behavior.

This is the first study exploring the relationship between the FFM and employees' voice behavior carried out in a EU‐country, such as Greece.

Explores the role of evaluation in a business process re‐engineering initiative and its relationship with organisational learning and innovation. The paper presents the evaluation of the implementation of a business process re‐engineering project in three case studies. The implementation of the BPR project was based on an eight‐stage BPR methodology. The participating companies were asked to evaluate the implementation, describe the decisions made in order to adapt to the change process and analyse the potential benefits that they expect in terms of business performance improvement, organisational effectiveness and user acceptability. Discusses the evaluation results of the implementation of business process re‐engineering model in three case studies in order to identify links with organisational learning and innovation.

Explores the need for a business process re‐engineering methodology and presents a critique of the existing methodologies. The identified weaknesses served as a basis for the development of a new eight‐stage BPR methodology which was implemented and evaluated within three European construction companies. Summarises these stages, highlighting the need for a more integrated approach to organisational change where the human and organisational issues are incorporated in the implementation of the BPR initiative.

At the heart of organizational change lies the extent to which individuals cope with the uncertainties and complexities that change introduces into their work lives. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the behavioral reactions of employees to change and their associated reasons for or against a large-scale technological change implemented in a bank.

A total of 146 bank employees located in 40 bank branches participated two times in providing critical incidents regarding their initial and midcourse reactions to this change.

Results showed that anticipated benefits associated with change initiate positive reactions to change. These reactions are maintained positive due to supervisory support. Resistance is activated by perceived high cost-low benefit change at hand and it is shifted to active support when there is open communication and supervisory support.

Until now the majority of research studies on reactions to change do not investigate the duration and/or continuity of a behavior, assuming that once the reasons behind and the behaviors are formulated these will persist over time.

The paper is based on research carried out within the Condor project funded under the European ESPRIT programme. Condor is a partnership between English, French and Swedish construction companies with aims and objectives of defining the working practices, processes, techniques, tools and technical infrastructure to allow the construction industry to progress from its current position towards a large scale, computer integrated industry. The selection, design and implementation of a new information technology system involves inevitably many technical issues but it must also meet user and organisational requirements. A generic model for business process re‐engineering was produced based on research results in order to facilitate Condor’s implementation to participating companies.

Occupational stress and organizational change are now widely accepted as two major issues in organizational life. The current study explores the linkage between employees’ attitudes towards organizational change and two of the most significant constructs in organizational behaviour; occupational stress and organizational commitment.

A total of 292 participants completed ASSET, a new “Organizational Screening Tool”, which, among other things, measures workplace stress and organizational commitment and a measure assessing attitudes towards organizational change.

The results were in the expected direction showing negative correlations between occupational stressors and attitudes to change, indicating that highly stressed individuals demonstrate decreased commitment and increased reluctance to accept organizational change interventions. The most significant impact on attitudes to change was coming from bad work relationships emphasizing the importance of that occupational stressor on employees’ attitudes towards change. The results did not support the role of organizational commitment as a moderator in the relationship between occupational stress and attitudes to change.

A limitation of the research design could be that all measures originated from the same source resulting in possible contamination from common method variance. Further, the cross‐sectional research design adopted in the present study, as opposed to a longitudinal or experimental methodology, does not allow affirmative causal explanations.

The present study showed that good and effective work relationships are very important in organizational change. Handling conflicts, building supportive work relationships and communicating effectively all contribute to the formulation of positive attitudes to change and, therefore, to the success of a change programme. In addition, organizations need to examine the extra workload which organizational change may create. Increase in workload is not only easily attributable to the change but it also makes change unattractive and problematic leading to non‐supportive attitudes.