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A Systemic ‘Theories of Change’ Approach for Projects and Change Initiatives in the Context of Quality Enhancement Activity in Higher Education Read chapter Read first chapter

2019 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

7. Managing Context: Lessons from a Large-Scale Science Project

Author : Stephen Little

Published in: Problem Structuring Approaches for the Management of Projects

Publisher: Springer International Publishing

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Abstract

Recent decades have seen repeatedly the high-profile abandonment of ambitious and expensive projects. Sauer (Why Information Systems Fail. Alfred Waller, Henley-on-Thames, 1993) and Flyvbjerg et al. (Megaprojects and Risk. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) argue that the management of large-scale and long-term projects involves the definition and redefinition of success and failure, and the maintenance of financial and political support. To be successful, projects and policies must address both task and institutional orientations. Even if clear criteria are available for identifiable sub-systems, the issue of the effectiveness of any significantly complex system will impinge on a range of potentially conflicting values and interests. To manage these requires the development of narratives convincing to a range of stakeholders. The high energy physics experiments developed at CERN over decades offer insight into the successful long-term management of complex projects.

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previous chapter Exploring the Use of Soft Systems Methodology (SSM) in Front-Ending Public-Funded Rural Bridge Construction Projects in Bangladesh
next chapter Systemic Approach and Problem Structuring Methods in Teaching Sustainability in Project Management Courses at Manchester Metropolitan University: Some Reflections on Good Practice
Footnotes
1
Tim Berners-Lee celebrating 20 years of WWW at http://​info.​cern.​ch/​www20/​.
 
2
The LHC is a collider in which two opposing beams of electrons (hadrons) are brought together within detectors in order to produce collisions which create short lived sub-atomic particles. Four major experimental detectors are located around the 27 km circumference of the LHC.
 
4
Austria to quit CERN particle physics laboratory
Fri, May 8 2009, 7:11 AM EDTVIENNA (Reuters) – Austria plans to pull out of the international particle physics laboratory CERN because its share of the high cost is eating up too much of the country’s budget for international research.
See the response to this statement at
Austria to stay in particle physics lab after all.
Mon, May 18 2009, 11:30 AM EDTVIENNA (Reuters) – Austria has changed its mind and will now not pull out of the international particle physics laboratory CERN over the cost, Chancellor Werner Faymann said in a statement on Monday, overruling his science minister.
 
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Metadata
Title
Managing Context: Lessons from a Large-Scale Science Project
Author
Stephen Little
Copyright Year
2019
Publisher
Springer International Publishing
Book
Problem Structuring Approaches for the Management of Projects

Print ISBN: 978-3-319-93262-0

Electronic ISBN: 978-3-319-93263-7

Copyright Year: 2019

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-93263-7_7

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