{"title":"Demystifying peer reviewing: Building capacity, capability and community in project scholarship","authors":"Vedran Zerjav , Miia Martinsuo , Eleni Papadonikolaki , Martina Huemann","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102834","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102834","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102834"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147398681","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-01-31DOI: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102826
Yuanyuan Tan, Daniel Hall, Ad Straub, Queena K Qian
Building Information Modeling is recognized as a key socio-technical system driving stakeholder collaboration in the construction industry. However, at the project level, it often encounters the paradox of difficult collaboration. Previous research has primarily compiled static lists of barriers, overlooking the processual challenges and stakeholders' behavioral responses during collaboration. To address this gap, this study applies transaction cost economics to examine the challenges stakeholders encounter throughout the collaborative process. Drawing on empirical data from expert focus groups and semi-structured interviews, the study first contextualizes a transaction cost map. Secondly, it identifies the learning and training costs arising from high asset specificity within organizations and uncertainty-driven coordination costs across organizations. The findings explain that under pressure from high transaction costs, stakeholders tend to adopt low-risk strategies, leading to collaboration dilemmas. This study offers a new perspective for understanding digital collaboration dilemmas and provides practical implications for project management.
{"title":"Revisiting collaboration dilemmas among stakeholders in digital projects: A transaction cost lens","authors":"Yuanyuan Tan, Daniel Hall, Ad Straub, Queena K Qian","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102826","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102826","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Building Information Modeling is recognized as a key socio-technical system driving stakeholder collaboration in the construction industry. However, at the project level, it often encounters the paradox of difficult collaboration. Previous research has primarily compiled static lists of barriers, overlooking the processual challenges and stakeholders' behavioral responses during collaboration. To address this gap, this study applies transaction cost economics to examine the challenges stakeholders encounter throughout the collaborative process. Drawing on empirical data from expert focus groups and semi-structured interviews, the study first contextualizes a transaction cost map. Secondly, it identifies the learning and training costs arising from high asset specificity within organizations and uncertainty-driven coordination costs across organizations. The findings explain that under pressure from high transaction costs, stakeholders tend to adopt low-risk strategies, leading to collaboration dilemmas. This study offers a new perspective for understanding digital collaboration dilemmas and provides practical implications for project management.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102826"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146173830","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Projects operate within institutional environments that shape their structures, practices, and legitimacy. At the same time, projects may contribute to institutional stabilization, adaptation, or incremental change. A growing body of research has applied institutional theory to examine these interactions; however, the literature remains dispersed across various contexts and levels of analysis, thereby limiting a cumulative understanding of how institutional and project dynamics are interconnected. This paper undertakes an integrative review of 119 publications that apply organizational institutional theory in project management studies. The findings build upon earlier research to consolidate this body of work and clarify how institutional forces shape projects and how project actors, in turn, navigate, enact, and reproduce or selectively modify institutional arrangements and expectations. An integrative framework is developed to synthesize established and emerging institutional domains and their relationships in project management research. Building on this integrative view, we conclude by illustrating how institutional theory provides a relational and configurational foundation for understanding project–institution relationships and a fruitful basis for future research.
{"title":"Between conformity and change: How institutional forces shape, and are shaped by, projects","authors":"Masoud Aghajani , Ashkan Memari , Shankar Sankaran","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102828","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102828","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Projects operate within institutional environments that shape their structures, practices, and legitimacy. At the same time, projects may contribute to institutional stabilization, adaptation, or incremental change. A growing body of research has applied institutional theory to examine these interactions; however, the literature remains dispersed across various contexts and levels of analysis, thereby limiting a cumulative understanding of how institutional and project dynamics are interconnected. This paper undertakes an integrative review of 119 publications that apply organizational institutional theory in project management studies. The findings build upon earlier research to consolidate this body of work and clarify how institutional forces shape projects and how project actors, in turn, navigate, enact, and reproduce or selectively modify institutional arrangements and expectations. An integrative framework is developed to synthesize established and emerging institutional domains and their relationships in project management research. Building on this integrative view, we conclude by illustrating how institutional theory provides a relational and configurational foundation for understanding project–institution relationships and a fruitful basis for future research.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102828"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147398679","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-01-19DOI: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102817
Yadi Li , Ning Sun , Xiao Liu , Yan Ning
Provision of integrated consulting solutions for complex projects is increasingly prevalent, and its success hinges on effective inter-team knowledge collaboration in multi-team consulting projects. Therefore, this study aims to identify the boundaries inhibiting knowledge collaboration and corresponding cross-boundary facilitators across different phases of multi-team consulting projects. Qualitative research was conducted through 28 interviews with 46 participants and three real-life case studies. This study identifies three-fold boundaries (i.e., spatial-temporal, cognitive, and social boundaries) impeding knowledge collaboration and the corresponding cross-boundary facilitators for knowledge collaboration. It also reveals their dynamic emergence, utilization, and interactions across different project phases. This study enriches the project management literature by identifying boundaries and cross-boundary facilitators in knowledge collaboration and revealing their dynamic nature in multi-team consulting projects.
{"title":"Inter-team knowledge collaboration across boundaries in multi-team consulting projects","authors":"Yadi Li , Ning Sun , Xiao Liu , Yan Ning","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102817","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102817","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Provision of integrated consulting solutions for complex projects is increasingly prevalent, and its success hinges on effective inter-team knowledge collaboration in multi-team consulting projects. Therefore, this study aims to identify the boundaries inhibiting knowledge collaboration and corresponding cross-boundary facilitators across different phases of multi-team consulting projects. Qualitative research was conducted through 28 interviews with 46 participants and three real-life case studies. This study identifies three-fold boundaries (i.e., spatial-temporal, cognitive, and social boundaries) impeding knowledge collaboration and the corresponding cross-boundary facilitators for knowledge collaboration. It also reveals their dynamic emergence, utilization, and interactions across different project phases. This study enriches the project management literature by identifying boundaries and cross-boundary facilitators in knowledge collaboration and revealing their dynamic nature in multi-team consulting projects.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102817"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146026039","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-02-13DOI: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102829
Alexander Ziebell, Fabrice Mielke, Valérie M. Saintot
Scrum, the most widely adopted agile project management framework, appears easier to understand than to implement. Facing repeated disruptions, Scrum teams often struggle to maintain focus, foster collaboration, and cultivate an agile mindset. This study investigates how mindfulness practices can influence agility in Scrum teams and how Mindful Moments can be integrated within Scrum, addressing an acknowledged research gap. Using an empirical qualitative research approach, data were collected through multiple online focus groups that replicated a Scrum-like process. The analysis identified specific mindfulness practices that positively influence agility, alongside notable challenges and conditions to be considered for the successful mobilisation of mindfulness practices. Scrum and mindfulness naturally complement each other: Scrum provides a structured foundation for integrating mindfulness, while the latter strengthens the agile mindset and Scrum values. An evolved Scrum framework entitled ‘Mindful Scrum’ is the outcome of this research.
{"title":"Mindful Scrum: Mobilising mindfulness practices to foster agility in project management teams","authors":"Alexander Ziebell, Fabrice Mielke, Valérie M. Saintot","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102829","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102829","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Scrum, the most widely adopted agile project management framework, appears easier to understand than to implement. Facing repeated disruptions, Scrum teams often struggle to maintain focus, foster collaboration, and cultivate an agile mindset. This study investigates how mindfulness practices can influence agility in Scrum teams and how Mindful Moments can be integrated within Scrum, addressing an acknowledged research gap. Using an empirical qualitative research approach, data were collected through multiple online focus groups that replicated a Scrum-like process. The analysis identified specific mindfulness practices that positively influence agility, alongside notable challenges and conditions to be considered for the successful mobilisation of mindfulness practices. Scrum and mindfulness naturally complement each other: Scrum provides a structured foundation for integrating mindfulness, while the latter strengthens the agile mindset and Scrum values. An evolved Scrum framework entitled ‘Mindful Scrum’ is the outcome of this research.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102829"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147398676","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-01-14DOI: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102815
Ahmad Nabeel Siddiquei , Khansa Zaman , Muhammad Ali Asadullah , Javaria Abbas
This study adopts the Job Demands-Resources model to propose team temporal conflict as a job demand that directly impacts IT project professional’s work performance and indirectly through time stress. Additionally, it presents the project manager’s inclusive leadership as a team-level job resource that moderates the impact of team temporal conflict on IT project professional’s work performance through time-related stress. Data were collected from 369 IT professionals nested in 65 App development projects in Pakistan’s Information Technology sector. Constructs’ factor structure and validity were confirmed using confirmatory factor analysis. The multi-level mediation and moderated-mediation hypotheses were tested using robust multi-level modeling via Mplus. Results showed that team temporal conflict negatively impacts IT project professional’s work performance, and this relationship is mediated by time stress. The negative impact of team temporal conflict on work performance through time stress was reduced when project managers exhibited a highly inclusive leadership style. This study advances existing literature by examining the role of team temporal conflict as a job demand and team-level stressor in IT project settings, which often face high failure rates due to time and temporal challenges. Furthermore, the study enhances the literature by proposing inclusive leadership as a job resource that can mitigate the negative impacts of team temporal conflict on IT project professional’s performance.
{"title":"Taming time: How inclusive leadership mitigates temporal conflict and time stress in IT projects","authors":"Ahmad Nabeel Siddiquei , Khansa Zaman , Muhammad Ali Asadullah , Javaria Abbas","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102815","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102815","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study adopts the Job Demands-Resources model to propose team temporal conflict as a job demand that directly impacts IT project professional’s work performance and indirectly through time stress. Additionally, it presents the project manager’s inclusive leadership as a team-level job resource that moderates the impact of team temporal conflict on IT project professional’s work performance through time-related stress. Data were collected from 369 IT professionals nested in 65 App development projects in Pakistan’s Information Technology sector. Constructs’ factor structure and validity were confirmed using confirmatory factor analysis. The multi-level mediation and moderated-mediation hypotheses were tested using robust multi-level modeling via Mplus. Results showed that team temporal conflict negatively impacts IT project professional’s work performance, and this relationship is mediated by time stress. The negative impact of team temporal conflict on work performance through time stress was reduced when project managers exhibited a highly inclusive leadership style. This study advances existing literature by examining the role of team temporal conflict as a job demand and team-level stressor in IT project settings, which often face high failure rates due to time and temporal challenges. Furthermore, the study enhances the literature by proposing inclusive leadership as a job resource that can mitigate the negative impacts of team temporal conflict on IT project professional’s performance.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102815"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146001813","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-02-13DOI: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102830
Jutta Tobias Mortlock , Neil Turner , Anke C. Plagnol , Anya Beaumont , Mike Bourne
Project complexity research has established that structural, socio-political, and emergent complexities require different response capabilities, yet little is known about how project leaders enact these responses in practice. Drawing on practice theory and strategy-as-practice, this study examines how project leaders mobilise mindfulness as a multi-level metacognitive practice to address project complexity. We analyse qualitative data from a flagship UK government Project Leadership Programme, including open-ended survey responses (n = 58) and semi-structured interviews (n = 10) with senior project leaders. Our findings show that mindfulness is enacted at individual, team, and organisational levels to operationalise planning and control, relationship-building, and flexibility responses. Mindfulness functions both as relief, enabling leaders to regulate stress and reactivity, and as engagement, supporting sustained attention, psychologically safe dialogue, and adaptive sensemaking. We contribute to theory by extending project complexity research from identifying effective responses to explaining how response capabilities are enacted across organisational levels through socially embedded metacognitive practice. We contribute to practice by offering a scalable and context-sensitive repertoire of mindfulness practices that project leaders can embed in leadership development, governance routines, and team interactions to build sustained capability for navigating structural, socio-political, and emergent project complexity.
{"title":"From complexity responses to enacted practice: Mindfulness as a multi-level metacognitive capability in project leadership","authors":"Jutta Tobias Mortlock , Neil Turner , Anke C. Plagnol , Anya Beaumont , Mike Bourne","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102830","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102830","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Project complexity research has established that structural, socio-political, and emergent complexities require different response capabilities, yet little is known about <em>how</em> project leaders enact these responses in practice. Drawing on practice theory and strategy-as-practice, this study examines how project leaders mobilise mindfulness as a multi-level metacognitive practice to address project complexity. We analyse qualitative data from a flagship UK government Project Leadership Programme, including open-ended survey responses (<em>n</em> = 58) and semi-structured interviews (<em>n</em> = 10) with senior project leaders. Our findings show that mindfulness is enacted at individual, team, and organisational levels to operationalise planning and control, relationship-building, and flexibility responses. Mindfulness functions both as relief, enabling leaders to regulate stress and reactivity, and as engagement, supporting sustained attention, psychologically safe dialogue, and adaptive sensemaking. We contribute to theory by extending project complexity research from identifying effective responses to explaining how response capabilities are enacted across organisational levels through socially embedded metacognitive practice. We contribute to practice by offering a scalable and context-sensitive repertoire of mindfulness practices that project leaders can embed in leadership development, governance routines, and team interactions to build sustained capability for navigating structural, socio-political, and emergent project complexity.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102830"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147398677","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2026-03-01Epub Date: 2026-02-17DOI: 10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102831
Viktor Werner , Karin Wigger , Anna Yström , Thomas Magnusson , Solmaz Filiz Karabag
This paper combines literature on program management and the multi-level perspective on sustainability transitions to analyze how a firm within the petrochemical industry negotiates across niches and regimes in its transition-oriented program. The analysis shows that this strategic change program comprises three types of projects—exploitation, exploration, and hybrid. In the context of the firms’ ambition to attain net-zero emissions, individual projects of all three types play distinctive roles. In exploitation projects, negotiations stay at the regime level, which reinforces existing institutions but also enables a transfer of certain emission-reducing technologies. In contrast, exploration and hybrid projects entail negotiations that cut across niche and regime levels. For hybrid projects, we find that niche-regime negotiations remain predominantly internal, while they are externalized in exploration projects. Clarifying the relationship between internal and external negotiations, our work suggests that strategic project sequencing could facilitate transition-oriented programs. Run in sequence, exploration projects may help mobilize external support and resources, hybrid projects can safeguard internal support, and exploitation projects can enable companywide diffusion of practices that support the net-zero objectives.
{"title":"Niche-regime negotiations in transition-oriented programs: aiming for net-zero in a petrochemical firm","authors":"Viktor Werner , Karin Wigger , Anna Yström , Thomas Magnusson , Solmaz Filiz Karabag","doi":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102831","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.ijproman.2026.102831","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper combines literature on program management and the multi-level perspective on sustainability transitions to analyze how a firm within the petrochemical industry negotiates across niches and regimes in its transition-oriented program. The analysis shows that this strategic change program comprises three types of projects—exploitation, exploration, and hybrid. In the context of the firms’ ambition to attain net-zero emissions, individual projects of all three types play distinctive roles. In exploitation projects, negotiations stay at the regime level, which reinforces existing institutions but also enables a transfer of certain emission-reducing technologies. In contrast, exploration and hybrid projects entail negotiations that cut across niche and regime levels. For hybrid projects, we find that niche-regime negotiations remain predominantly internal, while they are externalized in exploration projects. Clarifying the relationship between internal and external negotiations, our work suggests that strategic project sequencing could facilitate transition-oriented programs. Run in sequence, exploration projects may help mobilize external support and resources, hybrid projects can safeguard internal support, and exploitation projects can enable companywide diffusion of practices that support the net-zero objectives.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":48429,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Project Management","volume":"44 2","pages":"Article 102831"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2026-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"147398678","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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