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The aim of this paper is to present a parametric design method to generate optimum adaptive facades regarding occupants' comfort and building energy criteria. According to the literature review, the following questions have arisen to address the research gaps: Is it possible to have the outside view throughout the whole year without discomfort glare by utilising adaptive solar facades (ASFs)? How can architects integrate both view quality and quantity into ASF design? What is the impact of dynamic vertical shading systems mounted on south facades on the outside view, occupants' visual comfort and operational energy? How can we evaluate the view quantity through multi-layer shading systems?

In recent years, there is a surge in demand for fully glazed buildings, motivating both architects and scholars to explore novel ideas for designing adaptive solar facades. Nevertheless, the view performance of such systems has not been fully explored especially when it comes to the effect of dynamic vertical shading systems mounted on south facades. This fact clarifies the need to conduct more research in this field by taking into account the window view and natural light. Consequently, a simulation research is carried out to investigate the impact of a dynamic shading system with three vertical slats used on the south facade of a single office room located in Tehran, on both view quality and quantity, visual comfort and operational energy. The research attempts to reach a balance between the occupant's requirements and building energy criteria through a multi-objective optimisation. The distinctive feature of the proposed method is generating some optimum shading which could only cover the essential parts of the window area. It was detected from the simulation results that the usage of a dynamic vertical shading system with multi slats for south facades compared to common Venetian blinds can firstly, provide four times more view quantity. Secondly, the view quality is significantly improved through enabling occupants to enjoy the sky layer the entire year. Finally, twice more operational energy can be saved while more natural light can enter the indoor environment without glare. The final outcome of this research contributes toward designing high-performance adaptive solar facades.

This paper proposes a new metric to evaluate the view quantity through a multi-layer shading system. The proposed method makes it clear that the usage of dynamic vertical shading systems with multi-layers mounted on south facades can bring many benefits to both occupants and building energy criteria. The proposed method could (1) provide four times more view quantity; (2) improve view quality by enabling occupants to watch the sky layer throughout the whole year; (3) slash the operational energy by twice; (4) keep the daylight glare probability (DGP) value in the imperceptible range.

The research limitations that should be acknowledged are ignoring the impact of the adjacent building on sunlight reflection, which could cause discomfort glare issues. Another point regarding the limitations of the proposed optimisation method is the impact of vertical shading systems on users' visual interests. A field study ought to be conducted to determine which one could provide the more desirable outside view: a vertical or horizontal the view. Research on the view performance of ASFs, especially their impact on the quality of view, is sorely lacking.

This paper (1) analyses the performance of dynamic vertical shadings on south facades; (2) evaluates outside view through multi-layer shading systems; and (3) integrates both view quality and quantity into designing adaptive solar facades.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how older people who are almost entirely housebound use a view from their window to make sense of the world and stay connected to the outside space that they cannot physically inhabit.

Semi-structured interviews with 42 individuals were carried out who were living at home, were relatively immobile and had an interesting view outside they liked from one or more of their windows.

The findings suggest that immobile older people enjoy watching a motion-full, changing, world going on outside of their own mobility and interact and create meaning and sense, relating themselves to the outside world.

Findings suggest that those working in health and social care must realise the importance of older people observing the outdoors and create situations where that is enabled and maintained through improving vantage points and potentially using technology.

This study builds and updates work by Rowles (1981) showing that preference for views from the window involves the immediate surveillance zone but also further afield. The view can be rural or urban but should include a human element from which older people can interact through storytelling. The view often contains different flows, between mundane and mystery and intrigue, and between expected and random.

With the growing attention around carbon emissions disclosure, the demand for external carbon assurance on emissions reports has been increasing by stakeholders as it provides additional credibility and confidence. This study investigates the association between the higher level of external carbon assurance and improvement in a firm's carbon emissions. It provides an understanding of corporate incentives for obtaining a higher level of carbon assurance, particularly in relation to carbon performance enhancements.

Data are collected from 170 US companies for the period 2012–2017 and are analysed using a change analysis. Generalised method of moment (GMM) is used to address endogeneity.

Following the rationales taken by legitimacy and “outside-in” management views, the findings reveal that a higher level of carbon assurance (i.e. reasonable assurance) marginally improves firms' carbon performance (i.e. reported carbon emissions). This is consistent with “outside-in” management view suggesting that a higher level of assurance could be utilised as a tool for accessing more information about stakeholders' needs and concerns, which can be useful in enhancing carbon performance.

The findings are generalisable to US firms and may not extend to other contexts.

The implication of this study for companies is that a high level of sustainability assurance is a useful tool to access detailed information about stakeholder concerns, of which internalisation can help to marginally improve carbon performance. For policymakers, the insights into and enhanced understanding of the incentives for obtaining carbon assurance can help policymakers to develop effective policies and initiatives for carbon assurance. Considering the possible improvements in carbon performance when obtaining a high level of sustainability verification, governments need to consider mandating carbon assurance.

This study extends the existing studies of assurance in sustainability context as well as in carbon context by explaining why companies voluntarily get expensive external verification (i.e. higher level of assurance) of their carbon emissions disclosure. This study responds to calls in the literature for empirical research investigating the association between environmental performance and external assurance with a focus on level of assurance.

1. A higher level of carbon assurance Marginally improves firms' carbon performance.

2. Corporate incentives to obtain higher level of carbon assurance is beyond seeking legitimacy.

3. Higher level of assurance is a useful tool for accessing more information about stakeholders' concerns.

4. Consistent with “ouside-in”management view, companies internalise stakeholders' concerns to marginally improve performance.

A higher level of carbon assurance Marginally improves firms' carbon performance.

Corporate incentives to obtain higher level of carbon assurance is beyond seeking legitimacy.

Higher level of assurance is a useful tool for accessing more information about stakeholders' concerns.

Consistent with “ouside-in”management view, companies internalise stakeholders' concerns to marginally improve performance.

Project complexity has been researched much. The majority of publication is searching for law-like relations or development of descriptive frameworks. More prescriptive knowledge is needed to guide the project managers in navigating the project complexity in project managers' pursuit of success. Identifying the complexities of a given project is a real-world problem for project managers (Mikkelsen et al., 2021). The purpose of the paper is to investigate the research of prescriptive knowledge on the management of project complexity.

Based on a longitudinally case study, this paper uses Action Design Research (Sein et al., 2011) (ADR) to research the management of project stakeholder complexity. ADR is a variation of action research (AR) with inspiration from design science (Hevner et al., 2004) where an artifact is designed to solve a real-world problem. In this case study, an information system was configured in collaboration with the project managers of the recipient organization.

The findings from the research project are presented using the affordance theory (Gibson, 1977) as a framing concept and give special attention the affordance perception (Pozzi et al., 2014). Among the project managers, who were very engaged in the co-design, the majority refrained from activating the information system and got the outside view from the stakeholders. Interviews afterward identified “fear of bad project ratings from the stakeholder” as the main course of resistance to deploy the surveying information system.

The paper contributes on two levels. The paper presents a novel approach to researching project complexity based on engaging the stakeholder in generating a common perception of the ongoing state of the projects. The paper also contributes insights into reasons for reluctance on the part of the participants (the project managers) of the recipient organization and hereby adds to the understanding of the organizational change aspect of AR in the research of project management. The paper concludes with the identified benefits of using ADR in research on project complexity management and gives recommendations for future research.

This study examines occupants' satisfaction with the indoor environmental quality (IEQ) of a green-certified building [The Green Star South Africa (SA) Building] in Ghana.

Views of 300 respondents are solicited on 15 IEQ (obtained through a critical review of the literature and complemented with a pilot interview on the subject) parameters. Data obtained are analysed using both descriptive and inferential statistics.

Findings suggest that occupants are generally satisfied with five critical aspects of IEQ. The results also indicate that the occupants perceive five key IEQ parameters to have high levels of importance. Further inferential analysis of the parameters revealed that two core IEQs require the highest levels of improvement actions.

The study was conducted in Ghana and analysed occupants' perceptions of working within one green-certified building. Again, the collection of the occupants' responses was not linked with the direct measurement of physical characteristics of the IEQ parameters of the building. Hence, the findings cannot be generalised.

Practically, the study contributes to providing all stakeholders involved in the Green Star SA Ghana certification system with the relevant feedback for their decision-making on current and future projects to be certified under this certification system.

This study provides valuable information on the performance of IEQ parameters of the building and points out potential IEQ areas that need improvement efforts, especially concerning current and future facilities certified under this certification system.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been reported to have a major impact on the mental health of an individual. Healing the mental stress, anxiety, depression and insomnia of an individual's immediate surroundings play a major role. Therefore, this study reviews how the built environment impacts the healing of an individual's state of mind.

Various works of literature on healing environments were analysed to create frameworks that can facilitate psychological healing through architectural elements. Articles were selected from various journals like SAGE, PubMed, Journal of Applied and Computational Mechanics (JACM), Routledge Taylor and Francis, Journal of Contemporary Urban Affairs (JCUA), ScienceDirect, and Emerald databases, news articles, official web pages, and magazines that have been referred.

Indicators (spatial, sensory comfort, safety, security, privacy and social comfort) are linked to sub-indicators (access, distractions and views) and design characteristics (indoor climate, interior view, outside view, privacy, communication, noise, daylighting, temperature) which help in better connection of the built environment with individual's mental health. From the above indicators, sub-indicators and design characteristics, the authors have come to a conclusion that a view to the outside with better social interaction has an in-depth effect on an individual's mental health.

This study predominantly talks about healing in hospitals but quarantining of COVID-19 patients happens in residences too. So, it is important to find the healing characteristics in residences and in which typology the recovery process is high.

This paper has been written completely by the author and the co-authors and has not been copied from any other sources.

Imposed change at work can present individuals with ambiguous events about which they experience ambivalence in their interpretation of meaning. This paper seeks to examine the dimensions of ambivalence as defined by Piderit among a group of managers in the public sector.

The research is based on a group of 20 Band 11 senior managers responsible for collecting tax and between them covering the UK in a business restructured into a large business group. The authors adopted a qualitative approach involving semi‐structured interviews seeking to uncover individual accounts of imposed change, allowing subjects to reflect on their experience of change and its meaning to them.

The findings suggested that long‐service civil servants and private sector managers draw on their previous experience to interpret the changes they experience, giving rise to different perceived ambiguity between rhetoric and reality. Each group either comes to terms with ambiguity by interpreting the meaning of change to fit in with their expectancies of change, or, in one case, do not reconcile the change which then becomes a point of resistance.

The case highlights the need for change agents to understand the full complexity of employee attitudes. Not only can a variety of attitudes be identified, but each set of responses can be understood in variety of ways.

The devil in the detail of imposed change offers both researchers and managers of change a significant source of information about likely individual and group responses to imposed change at work. Piderit's framework offers three dimensions of ambivalence which clarify different individual responses to imposed change.

This paper introduces the Viable Systems Model and in particular the Meta System component of that model, as a framework within which to consider how foresight can be facilitated in organisations. Shows how the System 4 function within the meta system is in a position to facilitate processes that will produce effectiveness and the development of overall system identity. Also shows how adopting another framework for understanding the paradigms or worldviews that operate in organisations can enhance the likelihood that these processes will be successful.

Personal lifestyle, work environments and work-related factors can significantly affect occupant productivity. Although many studies examine the affecting factors of occupant productivity in offices, explorations for the home-based work environment, which is designed mainly for living purposes, are still scarce. Moreover, current pandemic has made work from home a new normal for workers around the world. Therefore, it is important to identify key causal factors of occupant productivity when working from home.

This study employed descriptive analysis and regression analysis method to explore the relationship among personal lifestyle, indoor environmental quality and work-related factors toward occupant productivity. A questionnaire including a comprehensive list of key measures was designed and 189 valid responses were collected from more than 13,000 participants.

Results show that a healthy lifestyle, the perceived satisfaction of visual and acoustic environment, communication, interest in work, workload, flexible schedule and privacy positively affect occupant productivity when working from home, while coffee consumption, outside views and windows have negative effect.

Opportunities to enhance occupants' home-based work productivity include developing a healthy lifestyle by taking advantage of flexible schedule, equipping a working room at home with advanced and intelligent environment control systems, and improving communication, workload and schedule by changing the policy of companies.

Recognising interest in the nascent “rise of China”, the purpose of this paper is to engage with the normative social science approach to comparative management, positing that it is inadequate for an enlightened view of the Chinese subject.

This paper presents a critical appraisal of extant literature, specifically Redding's The Spirit of Chinese Capitalism, by drawing resources from Fabian's epistemological critique of anthropology and Levinas' ethics to replace ontology as first philosophy, and by reference to historical studies on China's economic culture and its language.

Attention is drawn to how Redding's research subject is made an object of knowledge. In the objectification process, the subject's continuity is interrupted, its voice deprived, and its capacity for dialogue denied. This is evident in Redding's framework for analysis. Indeed, his Weberian social science template manifests a certain “imperialism of the same” and is symptomatic of much in comparative management regarding non‐western subjects. After critique, this essay then explores a supplement to Redding.

The paper proposes three principles for finding one's way out of objectification: ethics before “knowledge”, justice before “power”, and dialogue before “vision”.

The paper contributes to discourse on how comparative management must transcend its imperial social science legacy before it can find a just footing, and be born again.