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This paper reports on the history of the main Volvo Tuve truck plant in Gothenburg from its beginnings in 1981 until 2002. It focuses on the assembly work involved in the completion of truck chassis carried out by blue‐collar employees. Extensive (physical) alterations during this period have been important for understanding the plants' present design. The various designs of the assembly system, in combination with alterations and changes, have radically reformed the blue‐collar employee's work in a way that, in most respects, had not been intended. The ambitious guidelines, design assumptions and praxis of the early plant design which promoted collective dimensions of work have shifted to ones in which assembly work can be seen more as a set of individualised tasks. Moreover, the plant, which in earlier times had been small‐scale and utilised a heterogeneous assembly systems design, now has been transformed into a large‐scale plant with a homogenous assembly systems design. That is, to be more specific, two rather short assembly lines with intermediate buffers (1980s assembly systems design) were turned into the use of extended assembly lines without intermediate buffers (1990s assembly systems designs). The latter assembly systems were earlier working in coexistence with so‐called assembly docks (small work groups completed their own truck chassis). Lastly, these heterogeneous assembly systems designs were recently changed by further extension of the two main product flows and the assembly docks were closed down (2000s assembly system design). We argue that the choice of assembly systems designs was, and maybe still is, an ad hoc process and not a truly rational process. The history of the Volvo Tuve plant history illuminates how one specific plant can illustrate an uneven line of development with regard to assembly system design, within an organisation which successively has turned more international by an ongoing process of creating one single, larger scale, assembly system design. Thereby leaving behind the characteristics which were once a trademark of the Swedish automotive industry.

Looks at customer dissatisfaction by focusing on the events which provide the source of the dissatisfaction and complaints. Uses data from research into public transport. Includes analysis of written complaints and information from interviews with customers. Concludes that quality shortcomings are in most cases recurrent. Suggests that the company featured in the study should focus on aspects related to the drivers, punctuality and use of information coming from customers in the form of complaints.

Access to unbiased self-reported (primary) data for a normative concept like social sustainability has been a challenge for construction project management (CPM) scholars, and this difficulty has been further amplified by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. This paper aims to address this issue by asserting the suitability of secondary data as a methodologically sound but underutilized alternative and providing directions for secondary data-based research on social sustainability in a project setting.

By drawing on a framework for social sustainability and using “project-as-practice” approach as its point of departure, this conceptual paper identifies possibilities for utilizing multiple secondary sources in CPM research.

The paper provides a roadmap for identification of secondary sources, access to data, potential research designs and methods, limitations of and cautions in using secondary sources, and points to many novel lines of empirical enquiries to stimulate secondary data-based research on social sustainability in CPM.

Indicated secondary sources and empirical opportunities can support research efforts that aim to promote societal welfare through construction projects.

The presented guidance will assist researchers in identifying, accessing and utilizing naturalistic, secondary data for designing and conducting empirical research that cuts across social sustainability and CPM. This, in turn, will facilitate methodological pluralism and “practice turn” in such research endeavors.