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Digital transformation continues to rapidly progress in higher education globally, spanning all aspects of higher education operations, values and culture. Despite expanding literature, guidance remains focussed on emergency application during pandemic lockdowns and/or on single organisational case studies. Digital transformation frameworks that move beyond these foci are heavily criticised for being commercially contextualised (outside of higher education) and are often too narrowly conceptualised. The purpose of this paper is to review the most common framework currently used in the UK, which takes a strategic and organisational perspective on digital transformation.

This is a technical review article that summarises key guidance for organisational digital capability and then reflects on its application in the UK (a developed economy and higher education system) and in Vietnam (one of the fastest-growing economies with a developing higher education committed to digital transformation) as an initial attempt to explore its applicability beyond the UK context. Vietnam has been chosen as a reference context, given its significant current digital transformation policy reform at the national level and as a collaboration partner with the UK in its digital transformation.

The guidance highlights six core areas to consider for digital capability: information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure, content and information, research and innovation, communication, learning, teaching and assessment and organisational digital culture. Although the framework is normative, findings suggest it is sufficiently open-ended to enable its users to determine practical steps to drive digital transformation. However, complementary tools are suggested to deal with the rapidly developing digital transformation policy context of Vietnam.

This is the first time a review has been conducted from the perspective of different countries, with a view to supporting leaders, managers and policymakers in the UK, Vietnam and other Association of South Eastern Nations (ASEAN) networks in their own digital transformation transitions.

The aim of this paper is to contribute to the discussion of wellbeing within the university education system by outlining the key issues and benefits and recognising future research on digital well-being for students. The JISC Digital wellbeing paper highlights the many positive and negative impacts associated with digital wellbeing. This paper explores how some of these features have been considered within institutions within the UK and Vietnam and highlights the emerging research in one Vietnamese institution in relation to student wellbeing, where digital wellbeing was identified as a key concern.

This is a technical review article which summarises key guidance for organisational digital wellbeing and then reflects on the application in the UK (a developed economy) and in Vietnam (one of the fastest growing economies). This is the first time a review has been conducted from the perspective of different countries. There are two aspects to digital wellbeing, individual and the social or organisational perspectives.

The JISC Digital wellbeing paper highlights the many positive and negative impacts associated with digital wellbeing. This paper explores how some of these features have been considered within institutions within the UK and Vietnam and highlights the emerging research in one Vietnamese institution in relation to student wellbeing, where digital wellbeing was identified as a key concern. The context of digital wellbeing within higher education is then discussed drawing similarities between the UK and Vietnamese student experiences whilst acknowledging the limitations of current research within the field.

Many institutions have seen a rise in the number of wellbeing challenges, and there are few examples of specific initiatives aimed at addressing digital wellbeing challenges for their stakeholders. Existing research on students' wellbeing is predominately focused on undergraduate students and does not differentiate between undergraduate and postgraduate students, nor between masters, doctoral and professional level students and does not explore the impact of digital wellbeing discretely; this is an area which would benefit from future research.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the specific characteristics of consumers’ lived experience in a brand museum within a luxury context. While previous research has investigated this experience through the lens of brand heritage, the unique attributes and prestigiousness of the luxury field have not yet been examined. The authors argue that these distinctive features may alter the brand heritage experience in significant ways.

To understand the dimensions of a brand heritage experience in a luxury context, the authors applied a qualitative method using reflexive introspection. Specifically, the authors used 89 reflective introspections of 29 visitors of nine different luxury brand museums.

The findings indicate that a brand heritage experience in luxury is based on four dimensions: aesthetic, authentic, scientific and mythic. The data also reveal the heterogeneous aspect of the experience, which varies according to the level of consumers’ brand familiarity as well as whether the museum visit is led by a guide or not.

The authors contribute to the literature by emphasizing a new dimension of a brand heritage experience in luxury: a mythic dimension. This study also unveils the impact of contextual factors on the brand heritage experience.

Psychedelic drugs can induce altered states of consciousness characterised by changes in visual perception, tactile sensation, cognition, and emotion. Although there is a history of misinformation surrounding these drugs, recent investigation has reinvigorated interest. However, little research has assessed the attitudes of psychedelic consumers regarding these substances. The current study aims to explore the attitudes and perceptions of people with experience with psychedelic drugs, specifically surrounding psychedelic drugs themselves and their use within Aotearoa New Zealand.

Nineteen individuals with experience of psychedelic use were recruited to participate across eight groups in semi-structured, exploratory interviews, where a range of topics associated with psychedelics were discussed. Reflexive thematic analysis of the data focussed on participants’ current perceptions and attitudes.

Four themes were produced: (1) a negative historical influence on current perceptions of psychedelics; (2) knowledge is key but not everyone has it; (3) prohibition is not working, policy needs to change; (4) psychedelics have therapeutic potential. These themes emphasise key features of people with experience of psychedelic drugs’ current views and highlight potential areas for future investigation and intervention.

Findings indicate a need for greater public knowledge and awareness of psychedelics in Aotearoa society. Findings also inform information, education and policy, which in turn will reduce the stigma and associated harm that those who have used or use psychedelic drugs may experience.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, qualitative research aiming to understand attitudes and perspectives surrounding psychedelic drugs and their use from a drug users’ perspective have not yet been assessed.

This chapter presents an interpretation of gentrification and touristification as gender-related issues. The underlying question driving this discussion is: How can we envision feminist cities when certain forms of feminism today are strongly intertwined with consumerism? In the context of ghost cities or neighborhoods, Airbnb and digital nomads dominate, skyrocketing prices make life unaffordable, support structures vanish in favor of place branding, and oppressive security practices are normalized. The chapter examines the history of neoliberal deactivation in Rome’s Ostiense neighborhood. It explores the resistance by places of liberation, such as the occupied former barracks of Porto Fluviale, which serves as a residence for homeless families. It delves into the genuine transformation of the area into an open-air museum exploited for tourism and the occupation of a former nightclub turned into a meeting space for marginalized individuals to ensure their safety through acts of resistance. The territorial appropriation dynamics driven by neoliberal forces have altered geographies, resulting in an emotional detachment that renders the city unlivable. The chapter touches upon the transformation of soulful places into sites of emotional resistance, illustrated through Sara Ventroni’s poem dedicated to the Gasometer. This suburban colossus has indelibly shaped the area’s cityscape since the early 20th century, constantly caught between branding and resistance. Drawing from these experiences and insights, a new theory of the city is proposed, one rooted in the principle of care.

This paper aims to explore the impact of fourth-party logistics (4PL) adoption on the agility, adaptability and alignment (AAA) capabilities within humanitarian supply chains (HSCs).

Semi-structured interviews with individuals from a large non-government organisation were combined with secondary data to assess the influence of 4PL adoption on AAA capabilities in HSCs.

The results indicate that HSCs exhibit some of the AAA antecedents but not all are fully realised. While 4PL positively affects the AAA capabilities of HSCs, its adoption faces challenges such as the funding environment, data security/confidentiality and alignment with humanitarian principles. The study suggests an AAA antecedent realignment, positioning alignment as a precursor to agility and adaptability. It also identifies three core antecedents in HSCs: flexibility, speed and environmental uncertainty.

The study shows the positive impact 4PL adoption can have on the AAA capabilities of HSCs. The findings have practical relevance for those wishing to optimise HSC performance through 4PL adoption, by identifying the inhibiting factors to its adoption as well as strategies to address them.

This research empirically explores 4PL’s impact on AAA capabilities in HSCs, highlighting the facilitating and hindering factors of 4PL adoption in this environment as well as endorsing a realignment of AAA antecedents. It also contributes to the growing research on SC operations in volatile settings.

Managers must make numerous strategic decisions in order to initiate and implement a business model innovation (BMI). This paper examines how managers perceive the management team interacts when making BMI decisions. The paper also investigates how group biases and board members’ risk willingness affect this process.

Empirical data were collected through 26 in-depth interviews with German managing directors from 13 companies in four industries (mobility, manufacturing, healthcare and energy) to explore three research questions: (1) What group effects are prevalent in BMI group decision-making? (2) What are the key characteristics of BMI group decisions? And (3) what are the potential relationships between BMI group decision-making and managers' risk willingness? A thematic analysis based on Gioia's guidelines was conducted to identify themes in the comprehensive dataset.

First, the results show four typical group biases in BMI group decisions: Groupthink, social influence, hidden profile and group polarization. Findings show that the hidden profile paradigm and groupthink theory are essential in the context of BMI decisions. Second, we developed a BMI decision matrix, including the following key characteristics of BMI group decision-making managerial cohesion, conflict readiness and information- and emotion-based decision behavior. Third, in contrast to previous literature, we found that individual risk aversion can improve the quality of BMI decisions.

This paper provides managers with an opportunity to become aware of group biases that may impede their strategic BMI decisions. Specifically, it points out that managers should consider the key cognitive constraints due to their interactions when making BMI decisions. This work also highlights the importance of risk-averse decision-makers on boards.

This qualitative study contributes to the literature on decision-making by revealing key cognitive group biases in strategic decision-making. This study also enriches the behavioral science research stream of the BMI literature by attributing a critical influence on the quality of BMI decisions to managers' group interactions. In addition, this article provides new perspectives on managers' risk aversion in strategic decision-making.