Vlerick Repository
The Vlerick Repository is a searchable open-access publication database, containing the complete archive of research output written by Vlerick Business School faculty and researchers.
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Publication Duration forecasting in resource constrained projects: A hybrid risk model combining complexity indicators with sensitivity measures(Elsevier, 2024)This paper presents a new hybrid forecasting model to predict the final time and cost of a project using input parameters from the project scheduling and risk analysis literature. The hybrid method integrates two well-known risk models. A Structural Equation Modeling constructs and validates a theoretical risk model to represent known relations between project indicators and the project performance. A Bayesian Networks is used to train the theoretical model using artificial project data from the literature. These two integrated models are then used to predict the final duration and cost of a new unseen project. The accuracy of this integrated model is compared with other well-known forecasting methods from the literature. The computational experiments on a set of 33 empirical projects show that risk models demonstrate a noteworthy advantage for time and cost forecasting. To show the usefulness of this method, it is compared with a set of known machine learning forecasting algorithms. These static predictions of risk models are also compared with some well-known dynamic forecasting methods that continuously update the time/cost predictions along the project progress. These dynamic models make use of predictors from the earned value management and earned duration management literature. The results show that the static risk models offer more precise forecasts than the dynamic methods in the first half of the project progress for time forecasting, but then loose their power in favor of the dynamic forecasts.Publication Restraining overconfident CEOs through credit ratings(Wiley, 2025)Overconfident CEOs significantly reduce their acquisition activity when facing a higher risk of a credit rating downgrade, possibly because credit ratings impact their ability to access external financing. Investment-grade firms managed by overconfident CEOs that are placed on a negative rating outlook reduce their acquisitiveness by approximately 16 percentage points. Our findings offer a novel perspective on the role of credit rating agencies as an external control mechanism, constraining overconfident managers from pursuing value-destroying acquisitions. Our findings survive a battery of robustness checks, including endogeneity, controlling for internal control mechanisms and market reaction tests.Publication Year Report 2024 (research in the energy sector)(Vlerick Business School, 2025)The 2024 Year Report for the PhD project between an energy business partner and Vlerick Business School highlights the research activities executed in 2024. Early in the year, a large dataset of customer service interactions was developed, linking conversation transcripts to customer satisfaction and recommendation scores. Using advanced Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques, the study extracted emotional and linguistic features to analyze their impact on customer perceptions. A key focus was the application of machine learning models for Emotion Recognition in Conversations (ERC) and the integration of multimodal approaches combining textual and audio features. Mid-year, research expanded into assessing service quality through Large Language Models (LLMs) and conducting statistical analyses on the effects of emotional alignment in service interactions. The findings were consolidated into an academic manuscript, which underwent rigorous peer review and was ultimately accepted for publication in a high-impact journal. Toward the end of the year, work progressed on refining multimodal emotion recognition models and developing predictive frameworks for customer satisfaction and recommendation outcomes. Future research will explore the trade-offs between different modeling approaches and their applications in real-world service environments.Publication Year Report 2023 (research in the energy sector)(Vlerick Business School, 2024)The 2023 Year Report for the PhD project between an energy business partner and Vlerick Business School highlights the research activities executed in 2023. The year began with an in-depth examination of inconsistencies in emotion labeling across multiple datasets, leading to the exploration of external knowledge-based frameworks for dataset enrichment. Machine learning models were assessed for their ability to generalize across datasets, highlighting the need for standardization in emotion classification. Mid-year, the research shifted toward predictive modeling, integrating service interaction data with customer feedback to explore customer experience metrics. A cloud-based machine learning infrastructure was implemented to improve scalability, and transfer learning approaches were tested to enhance model robustness. Later in the year, comparative studies were conducted to evaluate different emotion classification methodologies and their applicability across diverse datasets. The findings underscored key challenges in emotion recognition and provided insights into improving predictive accuracy. Future research will refine these approaches and expand the analysis of customer interactions in service environments.Publication Integrating sustainability in business-to-business marketing(Routledge, 2025)This state-of-the-art handbook provides a comprehensive review of recent research and academic thought on the relationship between marketing and sustainability. It combines a ‘micro-marketing’ approach considering how to market more sustainable goods and services, with a more critical perspective considering the implications of our marketing systems for the future of the planet and humankind. It also balances a traditional socio-economic perspective on marketing with a physical systems perspective considering how the consequences of our consumption and production systems play out over time and space. Bringing together a range of leading international experts from more than a dozen countries, this unique collection addresses both the environmental side of the sustainability agenda, through topics such as product development, packaging and circular economy initiatives, and its social side through topics such as fair trade marketing, bottom-of-the-pyramid initiatives and marketing ethics. A range of key market contexts are discussed including food, mobility, tourism, luxury consumption and sports along with important developments in the field around social marketing, sustainable lifestyles, new information technologies and the need for better marketing of sustainability. Exploring how marketing can meet the challenge of the transition towards a more sustainable economy and a fairer society, this unique volume will be welcomed by researchers, students and practitioners from a variety of fields including marketing, business ethics, sociology and environmental studies.