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Australian construction sites are culturally diverse workplaces. This paper aims to compare operative and manager attitudes towards cultural diversity on Australian construction sites, and to examine the strategies that are used to manage it.

A face‐to‐face questionnaire survey was undertaken of 1,155 construction operatives and 180 supervisors on Australian construction sites.

The vast majority of operatives and managers are comfortable with cultural diversity. However, there is some anxiety about cultural diversity, especially around safety risks, and there is evidence of racism. Those concerns are more keenly perceived by operatives than by managers. Both operatives and managers see some of the negative issues (discrimination, racist joke telling) as inevitable daily outcomes of cultural diversity on sites. The normalisation of these negative forms of cross‐cultural interaction reveals a pessimistic disposition towards cultural diversity. Cultural diversity policy, and programs, are not seen as a priority by managers, and some see such strategies (e.g. affirmative action plans) as discriminatory, and unfair, since they may favour some groups over others.

No research has compared operative and management attitudes towards cultural diversity in the Australian construction sector. This paper provides a first glimpse into the value attributed to cultural diversity programs by managers within construction sites. These insights will be of value to managers and supervisors who have to manage multicultural workforces in the construction industry. Conceptually, the paper reveals how the “politics of sameness” are hegemonic within the construction industry, presenting as an a priori anxiety towards difference, the normalising of poor cross‐cultural relations, the non‐prioritising of policies to better manage cultural diversity or their ad hoc adoption.

Cooperation is generally purported to be vital to construction project success. However, there has been, as yet, no empirical work done to quantify explicitly the extent to which cooperation, in relation to other factors, determines construction project success. This study attempts to fill this research gap. This paper details a grounded empirical approach to identify important construction success factors using data from 29 interviews, 398 quantitative response and six follow‐up interviews from construction firms in Hong  Kong. Results show how using the grounded approach enables the tapping of unique determinants of project success previously not identified in the literature and point to a potentially fruitful approach for future research in construction management.

Prior research has advanced several explanations for social media influencers' (SMIs’) success in the burgeoning computer-mediated marketing environments but leaves one key topic unexplored: the moderating role of SMIs in service failure and recovery strategies.

Drawing on a social constructivist perspective and an inductive approach, 59 in-depth interviews were conducted with millennials from three European countries (Italy, France and the United Kingdom). Building on social influence theory and commitment-trust theory, this study conceptualises four distinct pathways unifying SMIs' efforts in the service failure recovery process.

The emergent model illustrates how source credibility and message content moderate service failure severity and speed of recovery. The insights gained from this study model contribute to research on the pivotal uniqueness of SMIs in service failure recovery processes and offer practical explanations of variations in the implementation of influencer marketing. This study examines a perspective of SMIs that considers the cycle of their influence on customers through service failure and recovery.

The study suggests that negative reactions towards service failure and recovery are reduced if customers have a relationship with influencers prior to the service failure and recovery compared with the reactions of customers who do not have a relationship with the influencer.

More attention should be paid to project managers’ (PMs) job satisfaction as they play an important role in ensuring projects are completed successfully. The purpose of this paper is to identify human resource management (HRM) policies and practices that lead to higher PMs’ job satisfaction.

A questionnaire survey was conducted on PMs who are working in construction firms and project management consultancy firms. Data were collected via random, convenience and snowball sampling. The data collected were analysed using partial least square-structural equation modelling, independent samples t-test and Pearson’s correlation.

The findings show that PMs who are satisfied with their firms’ HRM practices and job rewards also have higher job satisfaction. Several HRM strategies that give rise to higher job satisfaction are identified, e.g. a system to recognise and develop talent, and taking active steps to identify and develop backups in case of emergency. Unfortunately, some practices are not implemented to a significant extent, and these include: systematically recruiting and retaining talented PMs, encouraging PMs to plan for their careers, offering performance and development coaching, and appraising employees.

The limitations include the low response rate and the relatively small sample size of 81. The profile of respondents is largely from construction companies with more than 150 staff, and, therefore, the findings are more applicable to medium- to large-sized construction firms.

The study identified many HRM practices and policies that are significantly associated with PMs’ job satisfaction, yet many of these are not implemented to a significant extent by the employers. The practical implication is that employers of PMs should systematically implement these in order that their PMs have higher job satisfaction which is important for a project’s success.

The originality of this research is that the HRM practices and policies that are associated with job satisfaction of PMs are uncovered. Its value is in showing that PMs derive greater job satisfaction when HRM policies encompass talent development, career coaching and a personalised management style. Among these important practices, those that have been neglected were also identified. The study offers recommendations on the HRM practices that firms should be put in place for their PMs to experience higher job satisfaction.

Through the lens of the Social Exchange Theory, this study investigates the role of emotional and psychological well-being in explaining the relationship between academic stress and friendship quality.

Using a cross-sectional quantitative research design, the study gathered data from 298 tertiary students. Statistical analysis was conducted using Hayes Process Macro in SPSS.

Results from the study challenge conventional assumptions, indicating a positive and significant relationship between academic stress and friendship quality. In addition, the study revealed that psychological well-being partially mediates the relationship between academic stress and friendship quality, while emotional well-being fully mediates the relationship between academic stress and friendship quality.

This study is limited to the tertiary institutions in Ghana. Future studies may consider expanding the scope to other levels of education to gain a more comprehensive perspective of the variables of the study.

This study presents a novel approach by examining the proposed model within the Ghanaian setting. It offers valuable perspectives on the interplay between academic stress, well-being, and friendship quality.

Subcontractors and suppliers are playing an increasingly important role in project construction – it is not uncommon for as much as 90 per cent of a project to be undertaken by subcontractors. The result of this increased involvement is that main contractors are now concentrating their efforts on managing subcontractors rather than employing direct labour. Outlines an approach to partnering developed by a European conglomerate which is being employed throughout the UK. Commences with an overview of recent studies into the UK construction industry concentrating on partnering, quality and lean production. The second part discusses the context of these points from a quality, general and construction project management perspective. A form of benchmarking is described and the actual partnering approach is detailed. Finally, the paper identifies the main points relating to quality as perceived by the project participants, as well as some of the overall advantages of adopting this approach to partnering.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the role of online and mobile marketing as drivers of brand love.

Data were collected through an online survey during early 2013. A total of 241 valid answered questionnaires were collected and the constructs were tested for unidimensionality by using principal components analysis.

This work confirms that in spite of the fact that players are relevant assets and investments, sports managers need to concentrate their efforts on managing the team’s brand, as this is one of the company’s most important assets. Moreover, the present paper shows that developing an interactive website is not enough to get brand love. In particular, findings reveal that traditional websites are no longer motivating customers to return to the site. As a result, sports managers need to use interactive marketing mediums to connect with consumers in real time. In addition, by integrating different elements of social media such as blogs, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, professional teams elevate presence and create virtual communities, which influence the choice of brands and impact fan engagement.

As the Real Madrid branded mobile application was not found to be a driver of brand love, marketers should consider this strategy with caution.

This work could also be of help for sport managers considering mobile marketing as a way to interact with their followers.

This paper aims to provide scholars and practitioners with an innovative method of analyzing luxury brand associations in social media (i.e. Twitter). To do so, authors investigated the alignment between luxury brand identity and luxury brand image in online communication, taking into consideration firm- and user-generated content (UGC) in the form of bloggers’ contents. This paper introduces new tools that luxury brand managers could use to manage and adapt the way they communicate and interact with their customers.

The study adopts a qualitative approach based on a content analysis of Twitter posts of six luxury fashion brands (1,334 posts) and the related Twitter electronic word-of-mouth of fashion bloggers (329 tweets).

The results show a match between luxury brand identity and luxury brand image on Twitter. Specifically, the findings indicate that both brands and bloggers stress the same dimensions of luxury (aesthetic, desirable, symbolic, restricted accessibility and hedonistic experience) confirming that the ways they communicate luxury brands to consumers are aligned. Moreover, the results suggest that luxury brands could reinforce their brand value by making more use of words that are semantically related to luxury.

This study approaches the relationship between social media and luxury brands in a novel way and provides scholars and managers with a tool for monitoring the gap between desired and perceived brand associations.

Following Airbnb’s recent turn to the luxury market, this paper aims to explore how Airbnb hosts construct meanings of luxury as enacted in their hosting practices.

Semi-structured interviews with 46 Airbnb hosts were undertaken using purposing sampling.

Study findings reveal that social and personal meanings of luxury manifest in host practice, with “home feeling” representing the epicentre of the luxury peer-to-peer (P2P) accommodation experience.

Although this study draws from host views, it represents a first attempt to empirically examine perceptions and applications of luxury within P2P accommodation. The study provides a conceptual framework which may serve as a point of departure for further research into which luxury service dimensions guests value.

The findings of the study carry implications to the wider hospitality context. Specifically, hospitality practitioners need to reconceptualize luxury hospitality provision to promote a “homotel” accommodation model which highlights the offering of physical and social luxury dimensions in addition to elements of personalized service and home-like hedonic benefits.

The study offers a conceptual framework of the luxury P2P accommodation servicescape, which identifies two distinct luxury offerings that may be informative to both P2P accommodation providers and hospitality practitioners.