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Policy framework has significant roles in minimizing the impact of climate change in agrarian societies like Ethiopia. The purpose of this paper is to assess the integration of issues related to climate change adaptation into the national development planning of Ethiopia.

A qualitative research design, which depended on secondary and primary data sources, was used in this study. Data were collected from relevant documents. These were substantiated with field data gathered through key informant interviews and focus group discussions from participants identified using purposive sampling. Thematic analysis of the collected data was done by first considering the relevant documents and then comparing with the field data. During the analysis and interpretation, the results were combined to explain, confirm, refute and/or enrich the data obtained through document reviews and interviews.

The result of the study revealed that the general issues of environmental management have been included in the relevant documents (national plans). However, the documents do not explicitly identify climate change adaptation strategies and options that can alleviate the current impacts and the projected negative impacts associated with climate change. In fact, some documents were found to be characterized by numerous gaps. For example, the environmental policy of Ethiopia does not address climate trading, climate resilient green economy and recent development. The result from interviews shows that the constitution of the country lacks sufficiently addressing climate change adaptation. The result obtained from focus group discussion with informants indicated that the environmental policy of the country is shallow and suffers from showing clear direction regarding integration. The informants indicate that though there is an office that works on climate change at zonal level, there is no well-defined structure for climate change at zonal, district and Kebele levels and there appears to be weak integration among the different institutions working on climate change.

This study would speed up the revision of environmental policy of Ethiopia and the development of a separate policy document that focuses on adaptation to climate change.

This paper makes a case for the investigation of organizational paradoxes through the analysis of documents. After having presented what paradoxes are and the methodological challenges of studying them, the paper turns to document research, with emphasis on its potential contribution to paradox research. More specifically, document research typically provides ready-to-code data in a nonintrusive manner, allowing for the potential longitudinal, multilevel and multivoice analysis of organizational paradoxes and their management, in practice. To illustrate this, the purpose of this paper is to explore exemplar research based on multiple approaches to the study of different paradoxes in/around various documents and sets a research agenda.

Exemplar research on paradoxes using organizational documents as central data are presented. This highlights the range of documents and analytical strategies that can be used to explore organizations’ discursive management of paradoxes, as well as the roles documents can play in organizational contexts marked by different types of paradoxes.

A research agenda is developed, formulated around the needs to study paradoxes within documents and around them; grasp the discursive strategies deployed in documents to deal with paradoxes and/or the action of documents in contexts marked by paradoxes; follow the organizational processes involving documents, paying special attention to the paradoxes surrounding the development, adoption and appropriation of documents; and compare paradoxes in documents and those around the documents’ mobilization.

Despite growing interest in organizational paradoxes, reflections on methodological approaches to exploring them remain scarce and alternative methods largely unexplored. This paper makes the following proposition: organizational documents (strategic plans, annual reports, policies, websites, etc.) can provide a valuable entry point to explore organizational paradoxes.

The literature on the past triggering learning in strategy practice is scant. To fill this gap, this study aims to examine the meaning of the past to learning in strategy practice and expands on the strategy-as-practice (SAP) literature. Understanding the relationship between the past and learning in strategy practice is important because learning is what keeps strategy practice in motion and remains in place, even if organizations and strategy practitioners change.

The authors used a longitudinal case study design combined with historical methods to examine how the past is embedded in present strategy practice. To capture learning in strategy practice over time, the authors applied a four-stage methodology in our analysis of document and interview data.

The authors identified four dimensions of the past embedded in the present strategy practice. These dimensions emerged from the analysis of the interviews and document data. The study’s results showed that the past appears in structures and routines, materiality, positioning and reflecting over repeated rounds of strategic planning. According to the study’s results, reflecting on strategy practice draws on past structures and routines, positioning and materiality. The past facilitates reflecting and reflecting on the past enables learning in strategy practice.

The authors constructed a conceptual model and showed that in strategy practice, reflection triggers learning. The authors contributed to theory development by demonstrating how the past is embedded in present strategy practice and is available for use by strategy practitioners. The authors showed that strategy practice is a continuous learning process.

The purpose of this paper is to theoretically explain the significance of discourse for the construction of the legitimacy of place marketing practice, and to illustrate empirically how this is done in a “genre of strategy”.

The paper applies a critical discourse analysis perspective, and utilises a theoretical framework of four legitimation strategies of authorisation, moral evaluation, rationalisation and mythopoesis to analyse how the legitimacy of a place marketing project carried out in the region of North Karelia, Finland, is discursively constructed within strategic documents of the project.

Several discursive legitimation strategies were recognised. The authority of the project was constructed by referring to the organisational context of the project, while rational and moral legitimation strategies drew from hegemonic discourses of regional competitiveness, attractiveness and cooperation. These discourses were further connected to discussions of contemporary regional development in Finland and in Europe.

While the paper underlines the significance of the “genre of strategy” for the discursive legitimation of place marketing projects, it points out that it does not extend to cover the reception or change over time of the legitimation strategies, that should be addressed in further studies.

The paper presents an original perspective on legitimacy of place marketing projects by introducing discourse as a central element in the construction of legitimacy. This is especially useful for critical purposes, as it allows the discourses that legitimise place marketing practice to be placed under scrutiny, hence opening up the possibility for alternative discourses to emerge.

This article presents a hands-on example of how the Sydney Conservatorium of Music developed a new strategy to create public value in the lead up to its centenary celebrations in 2015.

Traditional research methods, such as semi-structured interviews (Qu & Dumay, 2011), alongside a strategic workshop incorporating a group discussion method called ‘The future, backwards’ are utilized to canvass the knowledge and divergent diverse views of employees, who would be impacted by the strategy, and to identify both the congruence and divergence of their views in order to help shape the value the strategic plan creates. The theoretical underpinning of the process is based on narrative (Weick & Browning, 1986) and the micro-sociological theory (Westley, 1990).

The process used here offers an insight into how strategic management can be developed in a public sector organization to help visualize its public value.

The process fills a gap in the academic literature and provides information for strategic practice by developing insights into how strategic management can be successfully employed in a public sector organization.

The process provides an example of a public sector based ‘value chain’ demonstrating how a public sector organization developed and articulated a public value creating strategy.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how corporate real estate (CRE) managers of higher education institutions formulate their CRE strategies and CRE operating decisions to align CRE with the corporate strategies of these institutions.

An analytical alignment framework has been developed, which was used to study the possible and actual connections between CRE management and corporate management at 13 large Dutch Universities of Applied Sciences. The data collection included a content analysis of the strategic plans of these universities and interviews with the CRE managers.

The research findings show several layers of how CRE managers aim to align CRE with corporate goals to add value to the organization. It appears that the CRE strategies in-use are more clearly aligned with the corporate strategies than with the espoused CRE strategies.

The paper emphasizes the relevance of involving CRE management in corporate decision-making to contribute to the attainment of the organizational objectives with an efficient and effective accommodation.

Substantial changes in learning and teaching practices in higher education lead to evolving corporate strategies, which result in the need for aligned CRE strategies and CRE operating decisions. This paper makes practitioners and researchers aware of the differences between alignment-based espoused CRE strategies and alignment that results from CRE strategies in-use in the field of higher education. The findings and insights might be applicable in other sectors as well.

Urban conservation is an integral part of urban development planning and it is incorporated into land use rules and plans. In order to achieve the goals of an ideal heritage conservation policy, there are spatial plans, building codes and relevant regulations that should be well prepared as reference for development projects. Kota Lama Semarang (Old City of Semarang) area has been recognized as part of the origin of the development of Semarang City, the capital city of Central Java. This area has been designated as a cultural heritage area both at the city and national level since 2020. The Heritage City Conservation Program (P3KP) encourages Kota Lama Semarang Area to experience fairly massive development since 2013. On one hand, to control and manage the area, the Semarang City Government issued several official planning documents, i.e. (a) Kota Lama Semarang Area RTBL documents (2003); (b) Kota Lama Semarang Grand Design (2011); and (c) Kota Lama Semarang Site RTBL (2020), which consecutively were used as references of development projects. On the other hand, the results of development projects indicated that there are no coherent physical improvements in the area. The study was conducted to show whether there are consistencies or mismatches between the three planning documents.

This study used a qualitative deductive method with content analysis technique to compare three planning documents, using the predetermined variables.

The results showed that the consistency between the three planning documents was not fully demonstrated, but they are mutually interconnected.

The research focused only on three formal planning documents, for which comparative analysis was undertaken using content analysis to identify consistencies and inconsistencies based on determined 9 variables.

Good planning documents should be consistent, since they are used as development references. Inconsistencies among planning documents produced segmented urban environments in Kota Lama Semarang Area/Site, which are mostly due to the different institutions preparing the documents.

The segmented urban development in the area has reduced the historical and cultural values of the area. Revitalization program that was undertaken has some implication to the sustainability of the local economy.

The paper explores both the consistencies and mismatches among the three planning documents, which have been used as references in implementing development projects in Kota Lama Semarang Area. Failures in maintaining consistencies among documents are supposed to produce inconsistent physical development in the area, unless adjustment to current development has to be made.

The aim of this paper is to explore an important but relatively uncharted territory: the actual functioning of performance measurement systems (PMS) in their organisational context. The objective of the paper is to document the ways in which managers go about aligning operational measures with their organisation's strategy in practice.

This research adopts an interpretive multiple‐case approach in order to gather rich data on the strategies used in managing operational PMS. Data were collected from detailed interviews with managers and supervisors in four government agencies.

The expectations were that the operations managers would adjust their performance measures to support the changes in strategy. This was not the case. All the interviewees employed one or more tactics to cope with the tensions between strategy and performance measures. The ten tactics identified are collected into three strategies; do‐nothing strategy, pseudo‐realigning strategy, and distracting strategy.

This paper casts some doubt on the practice, rather than the principle, of strategy‐aligned performance management. More work needs to be carried out to ascertain how other, both for profit and public sector, organisations deal with these tensions in practice.

From a practitioner point of view it raises the question as to whether senior managers are exerting sufficient control over the alignment issue or providing suitable tools, methods or indeed incentives to bring alignment about.

The paper highlights a gap between theory and practice and suggests that the way to ensure implementation of “modern management methods,” might be to deal firstly with the issues of relevance, timeliness, structure, integration, and symmetry.

This paper aims to determine, from key actors’ perspective, how sustainability has been integrated into the policies and strategies of higher education institutions (HEIs), particularly Portuguese public universities, within the framework of the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (UN DESD) 2005-2014.

Semi-structured exploratory interviews were conducted after gathering a sample of 15 key actors in decision-making processes who designed and implemented Portuguese education for sustainable development (ESD). Seven interviews with the key actors were undertaken and analyzed, leading to other plans, policies and programs that were not publicly accessible.

The main findings are the lack of commitment from governmental institutions to implementing ESD at the university level and how few documents are partially linked to sustainable development, according to the key actors’ opinions. Nevertheless, Portuguese universities’ autonomy and their social responsibility have lead them to develop several initiatives and policies toward ESD.

Convenience sample does not allow results to be generalized to all Portuguese HEIs. Future investigation will be undertaken, including the analysis of plans, policies and strategies at university level, and a questionnaire survey will be applied to those responsible for implementing sustainability in Portuguese universities.

This study provides findings, conclusions and recommendations that ultimately motivate HEIs to achieve sustainable development and to be more effective in integrating sustainability into their policies and strategies.

The paper contributes to the literature by reflecting the lack of integration of policies and strategies in HEIs in a southern European country (Portugal), within the framework and goals of the UN DESD 2005-2014, and by explaining similar patterns probably existing in other countries.

Businesses face increasing competition in local, international and global markets where responsiveness to changes within these markets is the key to success and survival. Consequently business strategies need to be consistently re‐defined to effectively reflect the different requirements of customers and to respond to changes in the business environment. The process of generating strategies is not always a simple decision‐making task and revised business and corporate strategies are often generated without considering the structure of the business, particularly at operational level. Furthermore, there is considerable vagueness in the literature and in practice about what constitutes strategy management. This paper reviews the diverse literature in strategy management and presents a business process model of the strategy generation process to ensure consistent generation and communication of strategy throughout an organisation. The performance of a business strategy can then be measured against a model of initial alignment and effective implementation.