Discover solutions to common obstacles faced by project managers. Written as a business novel, the book is highly interactive, allowing readers to participate and consider options at each stage of a project. The book is based on years of experience, both through the author's research projects as well as his teaching lectures at business schools.

In this study, we shed light on the unexplored potential of customer co-creation in a mass customization (MC) setting to contribute to the promotion of sustainable consumption. We theoretically derive and empirically test a number of opportunities for companies to improve corporate sustainability in a joint effort with consumers. Our research bridges between the MC and the sustainability literatures and shows that MC enables consumers to cohere attitude and action based on individual sustainability preferences. We use a mixed-method approach to empirically assess whether MC companies can nudge their customers successfully towards more sustainable choices by designing sustainability-based starting solutions and by providing sustainability information in MC configuration systems. We do so by portraying a simulated online buying process of a customizable TV with a realistic web-based product configurator. We find that offering goods with customizable attributes of different sustainability levels gives consumers the ability to customize products reflecting their individual consciousness for sustainable consumption (CfSC). Moreover, sustainable default settings play a significant role in promoting sustainable consumption, while providing detailed sustainability information does not show an effect. To get more insights into our results, we discuss the results on a supplementary qualitative analysis, revealing also a number of suggestions for future research

Multiple organizations increasingly co-create value – that either organization is unable to create on its own – in a cooperative manner, based on digital platforms [14]. Co-creation has been studied in the context of a single firm and in dyadic relationships, but much less in environments with multiple parties. Furthermore, open co-creation alliances differ from traditional (dyadic, contract-based, or closed) alliances in various aspects. In this research-in progress, we focus on open co-creation and the organizational capabilities required to get the most out of it. We do this by investigating the case of VDAB, the public employment service of the Flemish region in Belgium, and its 4-year experiment with open services. Based on an embedded case study, we ultimately aim to propose a characterization of the difference between ad hoc efforts versus a repeatable form of open co-creation with multiple partners.

The S&OP literature highlights the importance of integrating financial planning with S&OP. However, neither S&OP nor budgeting literature offer descriptive or prescriptive studies on this daily organizational reality. This paper provides a case study in a multi-national, detailing the relationship and reciprocating effects (positive and negative) between S&OP and budget.

In the contemporary fast-changing business and consumer environment, traditional businesses experience a wide range of challenges and opportunities, coming from new digital technologies. EPCA has therefore engaged in this research project with Vlerick Business School to identify how digitisation can create extra value in the supply chain of the petrochemical sector. Professor Ann Vereecke and researchers Joachim Van den Bergh and Olga Varganova conducted the research in two phases. Through a survey to a large number of respondents, they have investigated the digital technology awareness and digital innovation practices present in companies that are active in the petrochemical supply chain. Secondly, they identified some best practices of digitisation in the petrochemical supply chain and present them as eleven short cases, eye-openers showing the value that can be created through digitisation and how to get it done.

The concept of degrowth aims fundamentally at reducing material and energy throughput equitably, while questioning the desirability of further economic growth. In order to achieve this reduction of society’s throughput, radical changes in the ways goods and services are produced, distributed and used are required. In this think piece, concepts of consumer integration into the value creation process and (new) enabling technologies are discussed as possible constituting elements of alternative organizational models in a degrowth society. To date, collaborative value creation concepts, such as crowdsourcing and mass customization, have been discussed almost exclusively as business model patterns for companies in economies that are set to grow. The same applies to the assessment of (new) technologies, such as additive manufacturing, web-based user interfaces for co-creation, and other flexible production technologies that allow for collaborative and individualized production. Potential positive and negative effects of these concepts and technologies with regard to the objectives of degrowth are discussed in order to initiate a debate about the inclusion of CVC for the design of alternative organizational models that are in line with degrowth thinking. This think piece illustrates that several elements of collaborative value creation and its enabling technologies coincide with degrowth objectives but do not lead per se to their attainment. Thereby, a starting point for future (empirical) work in this area is generated.