Search results

Safety professionals' primary job is to execute safety control measures towards frontline personnel, and previous studies focus on the effectiveness of such controls. Rare research efforts, however, have been devoted to the effectiveness of management control measures towards safety professionals themselves. This study aimed to fill up this knowledge gap by examining whether safety professionals under differing management control configurations differ in their work attitudes, including affective commitment, job satisfaction, career commitment and intention to quit.

Drawing on a holistic view of control, five forms of management control, i.e. outcome control, process control, capability control, professional control and reinforcement, were investigated. A cross-sectional questionnaire survey targeting at construction safety professionals was conducted. The latent profile analysis approach was employed to identify how the five forms of management control are configured, i.e. identifying the distinctive patterns of control profiles. The Bolck–Croon–Hagenaars method was then used to examine whether safety professionals' work attitudes were different across the identified control profiles.

Seven distinct control profiles were extracted from the sample of 475 construction safety professionals. The overall test of outcome means showed that mean levels of affective commitment, job satisfaction and intentions to quit were significantly different across the seven profiles. The largest that was also the most desirable subgroup was the high control profile (n = 161, 33.9%). The least desirable subgroups included the low control profile (n = 75, 15.8%) and the low capability and professional control profile (n = 12, 2.5%). Pairwise comparison suggested that capability, professional and process controls were more effective than outcome control and reinforcement.

In theory, this study contributes to the burgeoning literature on how to improve the effectiveness of control measures targeted at safety professionals. The results suggested that effective management controls involve a fine combination of formal, informal, process and output controls. In practice, this study uncovers the ways in which managers leverage the efforts of safety professionals in achieving safety goals. Particularly, it informs managers that the control configurations, instead of isolated controls, should be executed to motivate safety professionals.

Megaprojects exert a significant impact on sustainable development, and it is imperative for stakeholders to collectively ensure their development occurs in a socially responsible manner. While there has been a growing focus on the involvement of megaprojects in social responsibility, scant attention has been given to understanding the collective actions of stakeholders in implementing social responsibility within these projects. Specifically, the institutional mechanism leading megaproject stakeholders to engage in socially responsible collective action is largely unexplored. To fill this gap, this study primarily aims to explore the institutional antecedents influencing socially responsible collective action in megaprojects.

Drawing on institutional theory, this study empirically examines the factors influencing socially responsible collective action in megaprojects. An online questionnaire survey was administered to collect data from 365 participants engaged in mega water transfer projects in China. The data analysis employed the partial least squares structural equation modeling technique.

The findings from the partial least squares analyses indicate that coercive isomorphism, mimetic isomorphism, and normative isomorphism all demonstrate positive associations with stakeholders’ intention to engage in socially responsible collective action. Moreover, the findings also show a positive correlation between stakeholders’ intention and their behavior in participating in socially responsible collective action within megaprojects. Additionally, coercive isomorphism positively moderates the connection between mimetic isomorphism and the intention to engage in SRCA, while negatively moderates the relationship between normative isomorphism and the intention to undertake socially responsible collective action.

This study enriches the existing body of knowledge by identifying coercive, mimetic, and normative isomorphism as antecedents to adopting socially responsible collective action in megaprojects. Furthermore, the study enhances our comprehension by demonstrating that stakeholders’ intention to fulfill social responsibility translates into tangible actions. The implications and recommendations provided shed light on how various types of institutional isomorphism can be used to encourage stakeholders to embrace socially responsible collective action in megaproject management.

Sharing tacit knowledge across firm boundaries is challenging in architectural and engineering design projects as tacit knowledge is embedded in the designer’s mind. It thus requires autonomous motivation. This study aims to examine how clients integrate distributive justice (DJ), procedural justice (PJ) and interactional justice (IJ) to motivate tacit knowledge sharing in interorganizational architectural and engineering (A/E) design projects.

A theoretical model was built, describing how the combination of distributive, procedural and interactional justice influences tacit knowledge sharing. This model was then verified using latent profile analysis (LPA) of 360 A/E design projects.

A total offour subgroups with quantitatively different combinations of distributive, procedural and interactional justice were identified. Within each subgroup, the levels of the three forms of justice were quite aligned. The results indicate that clients often implement interorganizational justice in a collective manner. Among the four subgroups, projects with the highest level of justice combination have a significantly higher level of tacit knowledge sharing than the other three. This indicates that sharing of tacit knowledge is driven by the overall level of interorganizational justice.

The configurational approach complements previous research by presenting how combinations of interorganizational justice influence tacit knowledge sharing in A/E design projects.