Dialogue and knowledge transfer between local authorities and firms in sustainable megaprojects

Overview

Most public infrastructure and construction projects delivery in the UK in the last years have underperformed their initial goals. This low performance underscores the challenge of engaging different stakeholders' needs and expectations and developing socially sustainable projects that fully understand and address local communities and regional needs for growth. 

Funded by The British Academy Leverhulme scheme, this research project 'Improving the dialogue and knowledge transfer between local authorities and firms in sustainable megaprojects', explores how to improve knowledge transfer and value creation between communities and local governments involved and affected by major infrastructure projects. 

The research project investigates two megaprojects which recorded interesting and divergent local dynamics: HS2 and Tideway. Using qualitative methods, we attempt to understand the views of a wide stakeholder group for each one (e.g., both from the perspective of project organisations and local authorities), by involving people who have knowledge about such dynamics and/or had an influence on the project’s planning, delivery and management. We therefore study how construction firms and local authorities can effectively engage and include communities in order to achieve better value creation and social impact. 

The findings will contribute to our understanding of how organisations, particularly project-based organisations, can work together with local governments to improve and foster social sustainability in construction megaprojects. 

Our aim

To improve local community inclusion in construction megaprojects by investigating the knowledge transfer and value creation process between project-based organisations and local authorities affected by such projects. In other words, to understand how project organisations can improve knowledge transfer from projects to local authorities and, as such, improving the way their community is engaged and value is distributed.

Projects

• HS2

• Tideway

   

Impact

The insights that this research project will offer are twofold:

Firstly, it will provide tangible governance processes aimed at improving project management practices and quality in local governments and the way their community is engaged. They will be captured in Action Plans for both Heads of Projects of organisations and Local Government representatives that is or has been, impacted by construction megaprojects. 

Secondly, it will shed light on understanding how to foster project management participatory practices in response to the social sustainability and value creation challenges of megaprojects. In addition, our findings may contribute to the theorisation of the role of local governments, and the ways in which the quality of their governance can be enhanced through the actions of project-based organisations. 

Outputs

The research aims to have the following outputs:

• Project intermediate and final reports
• Two journal articles
• Two conference outputs
• Research webinar

Finally, the project will present two practitioner executive summaries, one to be shared with project organisations, and the other with the local authorities involved in the project or that are being affected by them.