Strategy Planning

Spektakularne sukcesy brandingu narodowego wywołały żywą reakcję. Idąc za przykładem Irlandii i Hiszpanii, inne kraje, w tym także
Polska, podjęły prace nad wykreowaniem swoich marek. Proces ten poszedł znacznie dalej i przeniesiony został na poziom regionalny
i lokalny. Obecnie marka miasta i regionu jest utożsamiana z sukcesem i umożliwia dywersyfikację.

This article presents results from the first statistically significant study of cost escalation in transportation infrastructure projects. Based on a sample of 258 transportation infrastructure projects worth US$90 billion and representing different project types, geographical regions, and historical periods, it is found with overwhelming statistical significance that the cost estimates used to decide whether such projects should be built are highly and systematically misleading. Underestimation cannot be explained by error and is best explained by strategic misrepresentation, that is, lying. The policy implications are clear: legislators, administrators, investors, media representatives, and members of the public who value honest numbers should not trust cost estimates and cost-benefit analyses produced by project promoters and their analysts.

Megaproject Planning and Management: Essential Readings contains the seminal articles from the growing body of research on megaproject planning and management along with an original introduction by the editor, Bent Flyvbjerg. The leading and most cited authority in the field, Flyvbjerg has used crowdsourcing and 25 years of experience to cherry-pick from several hundred articles and books the writings that define the field. This volume will be an indispensable source for those wishing to speak with authority about how megaprojects are prepared, delivered, and fought over. The target audience is students, academics, practitioners, and media pundits alike, as well as communities affected by megaprojects.

In questo articolo sono presentate tre differenti piattaforme tecnologiche adatte all'innovazione tecnologica nella gestione e nel controllo di flussi turistici nelle strutture ricettive e culturali.
La prima, eFlowTourist, per strutture ricettive; le altre due, eFlowAccess (in entrata) eFlowFeedback (in uscita), per musei e siti culturali. Queste piattaforme sono utili per la raccolta di dati statistici in tempo reale (da esportare in grafici, tabelle, report etc.) al fine di approntare strategie mirate. Le piattaforme sono multilingue e si basano su questionari a scelta multipla, a domanda secca, con form da compilare etc.
Sono strumenti adatti ad un monitoraggio interno e diretto della propria utenza, al fine di migliorare i servizi e la customer satisfaction.

These are three different platforms, the first eFlowTourist for hotels, the last two for museums and cultural sites. They are useful to collect real-time statistical data that will help define appropriate strategies: eFlowAccess to monitor visitors' access at the entrance and eFlowFeedback to monitor their feedback at the exit. These applications use highly customisable templates to generate multilingual feedback forms and multiple-choice questionnaires. The data thus obtained are processed to get statistics and reports (graphs, bar charts, pie charts) for each individual item. With all this information at hand, the museum has a powerful tool to monitor visitors' behaviour based on primary quantitative and qualitative data.

Back cover text: Megaprojects and Risk provides the first detailed examination of the phenomenon of megaprojects. It is a fascinating account of how the promoters of multi-billion dollar megaprojects systematically and self-servingly misinform parliaments, the public and the media in order to get projects approved and built. It shows, in unusual depth, how the formula for approval is an unhealthy cocktail of underestimated costs, overestimated revenues, undervalued environmental impacts and overvalued economic development effects. This results in projects that are extremely risky, but where the risk is concealed from MPs, taxpayers and investors. The authors not only explore the problems but also suggest practical solutions drawing on theory, experience and hard, scientific evidence from the several hundred projects in twenty nations and five continents that illustrate the book. Accessibly written, it will be the standard reference for students, scholars, planners, economists, auditors, politicians and interested citizens for many years to come.

The article first describes characteristics of major infrastructure projects. Second, it documents a much neglected topic in economics: that ex ante estimates of costs and benefits are often very different from actual ex post costs and benefits. For large infrastructure projects the consequences are cost overruns, benefit shortfalls, and the systematic underestimation of risks. Third, implications for cost–benefit analysis are described, including that such analysis is not to be trusted for major infrastructure projects. Fourth, the article uncovers the causes of this state of affairs in terms of perverse incentives that encourage promoters to underestimate costs and overestimate benefits in the business cases for their projects. But the projects that are made to look best on paper are the projects that amass the highest cost overruns and benefit shortfalls in reality. The article depicts this situation as ‘survival of the unfittest’. Fifth, the article sets out to explain how the problem may be solved, with a view to arriving at more efficient and more democratic projects, and avoiding the scandals that often accompany major infrastructure investments. Finally, the article identifies current trends in major infrastructure development. It is argued that a rapid increase in stimulus spending, combined with more investments in emerging economies, combined with more spending on information technology is catapulting infrastructure investment from the frying pan into the fire.

As megaprojects have become ubiquitous, their real benefits and costs have come under increased scrutiny. We interviewed Bent Flyvbjerg, who has extensively studied megaproject development. Flyvbjerg has found systematic problems in the development process: by intentionally misrepresenting information and deliberately disregarding risks, proponents instigate projects that result in fewer benefits and higher costs than promised.

The Supplementary Green Book Guidance on Optimism Bias (HM Treasury 2003) with reference to the Review of Large Public Procurement in the UK (Mott MacDonald 2002) notes that there is a demonstrated, systematic, tendency for project appraisers to be overly optimistic and that to redress this tendency appraisers should make explicit, empirically based adjustments to the estimates of a project’s costs, benefits, and duration. HM Treasury recommends that these adjustments be based on data from past projects or similar projects elsewhere, and adjusted for the unique characteristics of the project in hand. In the absence of a more specific evidence base, HM Treasury has encouraged departments to collect data to inform future estimates of optimism, and in the meantime use the best available data. In response to this, the Department for Transport (henceforth DfT), has contracted Bent Flyvbjerg in association with COWI to undertake the consultancy assignment "Procedures for dealing with Optimism Bias in Transport Planning". The present Guidance Document is the result of this assignment.

"Over budget, over time, over and over again" appears to be an appropriate slogan for large, complex infrastructure projects. This article explains why cost, benefits, and time forecasts for such projects are systematically over-optimistic in the planning phase. The underlying reasons for forecasting errors are grouped into three categories: delusions or honest mistakes; deceptions or strategic manipulation of information or processes; or bad luck. Delusion and deception have each been addressed in the management literature before, but here they are jointly considered for the first time. They are specifically applied to infrastructure problems in a manner that allows both academics and practitioners to understand and implement the suggested corrective procedures. The article provides a framework for analyzing the relative explanatory power of delusion and deception. It also suggests a simplified framework for analyzing the complex principal-agent relationships that are involved in the approval and construction of large infrastructure projects, which can be used to improve forecasts. Finally, the article illustrates reference class forecasting, an outside view de-biasing technique that has proven successful in overcoming both delusion and deception in private and public investment decisions.

This article presents results from the first statistically significant study of traffic forecasts in transportation infrastructure projects. The sample used is the largest of its kind, covering 210 projects in 14 nations worth U.S.$59 billion. The study shows with very high statistical significance that forecasters generally do a poor job of estimating the demand for transportation infrastructure projects. For 9 out of 10 rail projects, passenger forecasts are overestimated; the average overestimation is 106%. For half of all road projects, the difference between actual and forecasted traffic is more than ±20%. The result is substantial financial risks, which are typically ignored or downplayed by planners and decision makers to the detriment of social and economic welfare. Our data also show that forecasts have not become more accurate over the 30-year period studied, despite claims to the contrary by forecasters. The causes of inaccuracy in forecasts are different for rail and road projects, with political causes playing a larger role for rail than for road. The cure is transparency, accountability, and new forecasting methods. The challenge is to change the governance structures for forecasting and project development. Our article shows how planners may help achieve this.

Do different types of megaprojects have different cost overruns? This apparently simple question is at the heart of research at the University of Oxford aimed at understanding the characteristics of megaprojects, particularly in terms of how they are established, run and concluded. In this study, we set out to investigate cost overruns in the Olympic Games. To do so, we examined the costs of the Games over half a century, including both summer and winter Olympics. We looked at the evolution of final reported costs and compared these to the costs established in the Games bids, submitted to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) up to seven years before the Games occurred. In so doing we established the largest dataset of its kind, and documented for the first time in a consistent fashion the costs and cost overruns for the Olympic Games, from 1960 to 2012. We discovered that the Games stand out in two distinct ways compared to other megaprojects: (1) The Games overrun with 100 per cent consistency. No other type of megaproject is this consistent regarding cost overrun. Other project types are typically on budget from time to time, but not the Olympics. (2) With an average cost overrun in real terms of 179 per cent – and 324 per cent in nominal terms – overruns in the Games have historically been significantly larger than for other types of megaprojects, including infrastructure, construction, ICT, and dams. The data thus show that for a city and nation to decide to host the Olympic Games is to take on one of the most financially risky type of megaproject that exists, something that many cities and nations have learned to their peril. For the London 2012 Games, we find that: (1) With sports-related real costs currently estimated at USD14.8 billion, London is on track to become the most costly Olympics ever. (2) With a projected cost overrun of 101 per cent in real terms, overrun for London is below the historical average for the Games, but not significantly so. (3) The London cost overrun is, however, significantly higher than overruns for recent Games since 1999. London therefore is reversing a positive trend of falling cost overruns for the Games.

As megaprojects have become ubiquitous, their real benefits and costs have come under increased scrutiny. We interviewed Bent Flyvbjerg, who has extensively studied megaproject development. Flyvbjerg has found systematic problems in the development process: by intentionally misrepresenting information and deliberately disregarding risks, proponents instigate projects that result in fewer benefits and higher costs than promised.

Policy is bolstered by what is recognized as strategy in corporate management jargon. Strategy is the broad definition of an undertaking's aims and the identification of distinct routes of execution to fulfill the undertaking's envisaged objective. Strategy configuration, similar to policymaking, may be regarded as a decision-making mechanism that is broadly associated with the conception of an enterprise's ambitions, the deployment of its assets, and the environmental considerations. Strategic management, on the other hand, comprises the mechanism of establishing an organization's purposes, formulating policies, initiatives, frameworks, and schemes to fulfill such objectives, and allocating resources to execute the policies, initiatives, frameworks, and plans. To contextualize, strategic management comprises the management of the interrelated components of the strategy framework, encompassing strategy formulation, strategy execution, and strategy evaluation. Premised on such arguments, I sought to elaborate and disclose a research paper in the form of a report, the core feature of which comprised reviewing and critically analyzing strategic management components, theories, and deployments in the context of the soft drink industry and relative macroeconomic complexities, with The Coca-Cola Company serving as the organization under scrutiny in terms of strategic management endeavors. The report embarks on a synopsis of the beverage behemoth, its mission and vision statements, and its standing in the marketplace. A thorough literature review pertaining to Coca-Cola's OD configuration enabled the researcher to identify the constituents of the company's decentralized model, its execution prowess in adjusting to market variations, and how it all enables the firm to stimulate protracted sustainability. The external context was then comprehensively evaluated, with the goal of identifying opportunities, unfavorable scenarios, and formulating practices that may convert existing constraints into diverse elements of profitable advantages, all while employing two among the most comprehensive instruments available in strategic formulation. An exploration of Coca-Cola's resolve in coping with relevant macroeconomic components was also undertaken. The research then underlines the significance of appraising the organization's strategic orientation, as well as the relevance, formulation, execution, and evaluation of strategic management approaches essential in attaining desired objectives and effectiveness over time. Ultimately, a range of leadership models were investigated in order to carry out the strategic management process, whereas establishing relevant effects on organizational performance, retention of corporate values, and fulfillment of the company's CSR constituents.

Back cover text: This book aims to enlarge the understanding of decision-making on mega-projects and suggest recommendations for a more effective, efficient and democratic approach. Authors from different scientific disciplines address various aspects of the decision-making process, such as management characteristics and cost-benefit analysis, planning and innovation and competition and institutions. The subject matter is highly diverse, but certain questions remain at the forefront. For example, how do we deal with protracted preparation processes, how do we tackle risks and uncertainties, and how can we best divide the risks and responsibilities among the private and public players throughout the different phases of the project? - Presenting a state-of-the-art overview, based on experiences and visions of authors from Europe and North America, this unique book will be of interest to practitioners of large-scale project management, politicians, public officials and private organisations involved in mega-project decision-making. It will also appeal to researchers, consultants and students dealing with substantial engineering projects, complex systems, project management and transport infrastructure.

This paper focuses on problems and their causes and cures in policy and planning for large infrastructure projects. First, it identifies as the main problem in major infrastructure development pervasive misinformation about the costs, benefits, and risks involved. A consequence of misinformation is massive cost overruns, benefit shortfalls, and waste. Second, the paper explores the causes of misinformation and finds that political-economic explanations best account for the available evidence: planners and promoters deliberately misrepresent costs, benefits, and risks in order to increase the likelihood that it is their projects, and not the competition's, that gain approval and funding. This results in the "survival of the unfittest," where often it is not the best projects that are built, but the most misrepresented ones. Finally, the paper presents measures for reforming policy and planning for large infrastructure projects, with a focus on better planning methods and changed governance structures, the latter being more important.

Risk, including economic risk, is increasingly a concern for public policy and management. The possibility of dealing effectively with risk is hampered, however, by lack of a sound empirical basis for risk assessment and management. This article demonstrates the general point for cost and demand risks in urban rail projects. The article presents empirical evidence that allow valid economic risk assessment and management of urban rail projects, including benchmarking of individual or groups of projects. Benchmarking of the Copenhagen Metro is presented as a case in point. The approach developed is proposed as a model for other types of policies and projects in order to improve economic and financial risk assessment and management in policy and planning.

TIIVISTELMÄ

Avainsanat: Etelä-Korea, tietoyhteiskunta, strateginen suunnittelu, toimeenpano, tutkimus- ja kehittämistoiminta, kansainvälinen yhteistyö

Taustaa. Korean tasavalta (Etelä-Korea, Korea) on nopean teknologia- ja modernisaatiokehityksensä ansiosta kehittynyt muutamassa vuosikymmenessä köyhästä agraarivaltiosta yhdeksi maailman johtavista tietoyhteiskunnista. Vielä 1960-luvulla Korean bruttokansantuote oli Etiopian tasoa. Nykyisin Etelä-Korea on teknologian käytön mahdollisuuksia, käyttöä ja käyttötaitoja mittaavan IDI-indeksin (ICT Development Index) perusteella maailman teknologistunein valtio (ITU 2012). Etelä-Korea on asettanut kansalliseksi tietoyhteiskuntatavoitteeksi kehittyä maailman ensimmäiseksi ubiikkiyhteiskunnaksi. Ubiteknologia (ubiquitous computing, jokapaikan tietotekniikka) muodostuu laitteet, tietoverkot ja ohjelmistot yhdistävästä tietoteknisestä kokonaisuudesta, joka toimii huomaamattomasti joka paikassa ja joka kykenee tietoja yhdistämällä tekemään itsenäisiä ratkaisuja.

Tutkimusmenetelmät. Tutkimus on toteutettu tapaustutkimuksena havainnoimalla korealais-suomalais-amerikkalaista HiConcept-nimistä teknologiainnovaatiohanketta ja sen toimintaympäristöä osana eteläkorealaista tietoyhteiskuntaa. Toimeenpanotutkimusteoreettiset lähtökohdat ovat ohjanneet tutkimuksen toteutusta. Monipuolinen tutkimusaineisto on koottu pääosin kolmen kuukauden kenttätyöjakson aikana Etelä-Korean Daejeonissa keväällä 2012. Tutkimustulokset perustuvat teoriasidonnaiseen sisällönanalyysiin.

Tulokset. HiConcept-hanke on esimerkki siitä, miten teknologiainnovaatioita kehitetään ministeriön rahoitusorganisaation, tutkimuslaitosten ja teknologiayritysten yhteistyönä. Hankkeen tavoitteena on kehittää älykkääseen ja itsenäiseen päättelyyn kykenevä teknologiaratkaisu, ns. kontekstinhallintaohjelmisto, joka paikantaa, kokoaa, yhdistelee ja muokkaa kodin mittauslaitteissa, asukkaiden puhelimissa tai internetissä olevaa tietoa. Älykkäiden kotiympäristöjen (Smart home) ja kotiautomaation avulla asuinympäristöjä halutaan kehittää entistä taloudellisemmiksi, turvallisemmiksi, terveemmiksi ja ekologisemmiksi. Korean valtio on myöntänyt 4,6 miljoonan euron hankkeelle 72 % avustuksen. Yksi rahoituksen myöntämisen perusteista oli, että innovaatiohanke toteutetaan kansainvälisenä teknologia-alan yhteistyönä.

Johtopäätökset. Korealaisen tietoyhteiskunnan tulevaisuuden tahtotilan voi kiteyttää sanaan älykäs (mm. Smart Korea, Smart City, Smart Ecosystem). Älykkäät ympäristöt muodostuvat huippunopean tietoliikenteen, elektronisten laitteiden ja ohjelmistojen sekä sähköisten palvelujen interaktiivisesta, laajalle levinneestä ja pitkälle automatisoidusta kokonaisuudesta. Korean valtion rooli maan tietoyhteiskuntakehityksen ohjaajana ja mahdollistajana on keskeinen, etenkin kun laitteita, tietoverkkoja ja palveluja halutaan kehittää samansuuntaisesti. Teknologiavetoisen talouskasvun rinnalla tavoitteena on edistää kansalaisten hyvinvointia. Kehitystä edesauttavat teknologiamyönteinen arvomaailma, poliittinen tahto, valtion ja teknologiateollisuuden tiivis yhteistyö sekä teknologioiden käyttöön positiivisesti suhtautuvat korealaiset. Teknologioiden kehittäminen ja  hyödyntäminen eivät ole korealaisille pelkästään itseisarvo vaan kansallinen itsetuntokysymys, ja osa Korean muuhun poliittiseen, historialliseen ja kulttuuriseen kehitykseen liittyvää modernisaatioprosessia.

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ABSTRACT IN ENGLISH
Towards Smart Information Society. A Case Study of South Korea's state-funded technology innovation project and its
environment.

Keywords: South Korea, information society, strategy planning, national innovation system, R&D, international cooperation

Background. The Republic of Korea (South Korea, Korea) has developed in just a few decades from a poor agrarian state to one of the world's leading information societies. In the 1960s, Korea's gross domestic product was at the same level as Ethiopia's. Since 2006, South Korea has been the top country globally as measured by the ICT development index (ITU). Korea was also ranked first in the global eGovernance-survey done by the UN. South Korea has become the world's thirdlargest country for exporting technology products. The South Korea Parliament has a vision to develop Korea as the first ubiquitous society (u-Korea) in the world by using smart and advanced technology widely in in all areas and spaces of society. The word ubiquitous indicates a context of mobile technology devices, services and high speed networks recognizing the user's individual needs. The target of ubiquitous computing is to fade the boundary between humans and technology.

Research methods. In this thesis, the phenomenon of the South Korean information society was studied using the Korean- Finnish-American research and development project (R&D) called HiConcept as a study case. The information society is interpreted as a setting of the strategic information society goals as well as the political process. It is also seen through the strategic planning and the implementation of the strategy, the national innovation system and the context of the institutions. A case study was executed by utilizing the implementation research method and ethnographic fieldwork. The data was collected mainly in the metropolitan city of Daejeon, South Korea during the spring of 2012. The results are based on multiple data and abductive content analysis, which means that the interpretation is based on both the theoretical premises and the data. Results. The aim of the HiConcept project is to develop a smart and deductive home technology innovation, a so-called context management framework which makes easier to monitor, control and manage the home environment. It makes the home environment much more useful, safe, and sustainable as well as easier to be controlled. Developing a smart environment (home, city) and home automation is one of Korea's national technology objectives. HiConcept is a five-year-long project developing ubiquitous mobile applications in the fields as home energy and security, health care, learning and social media using innovative technology. The total cost of the project is 4.6 million euros and the total workload is 41 person-years. The Korean Ministry of Knowledge Economy (MKE) has provided 72% of the funding via the R&D Academy KIAT (Korea Institute for Advancement of Technology). Korea's national leader of IT technology research, the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), manages the project and coordinates the work of the other participants. The other partners involved are the VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, the University of Arizona, USA and two technology companies operating in South Korea. International cooperation in developing innovative technologies seems to be creative, intensive and challenging. The open-minded, not too tight goals give a sense of freedom to the work and enable the participants to generate new ideas. The busy schedule and the evaluation system makes the work challenging. Every year KIAT evaluates the achievements of the previous year’s project work and grants the funds for the next year’s project if the results are valuable enough. The evaluation could also lead to funding cuts or even the discontinuation of the grant. Thus, even though the financier has accepted the proposal of a five-year project, it does not automatically grant 5 years of funding. The financing system increases the motivation to work, but also adds stress. The outcome of project will not be a commercialized software program and it takes a great deal of work to get incomplete software ready for commercialization. The responsibility of continuing product development reverts to the partners involved in the project after the state funding runs out and it is not clear if the R&D process will continue. The parties can work together on how to develop the software, or they can sell the intellectual property rights to another actor or to each other. The result may be also that the development stops completely. Even in that case, the actors can utilize the new innovative know-how created during the HiConcept project in their new R&D projects. When choosing international partners, Koreans prefer to adopt the world best experts. For the Finnish institute VTT, operating in South Korea has meant adapting to Korean business rules and getting used to the Korean living and working environment.

Conclusions. Observing the Korean-Finnish-American HiConcept project and its environment, the Korean information society seems to be premised in the tight co-operation between the strong government, the technology industry and the governmental funded research institutions as well as the Korean people, who have a positive and open-minded attitude towards new technologies. The future vision of the Korean information society can be characterized by one word, smart (for example Smart Korea, Smart City, Smart Ecosystem). Smart urban environments, smart phones used for mobile services, high-speed networks, and developing home service robots are being focused on in national technology development. The national goals of the information society are created by the parliament and implemented with determination by state institutions like the ministries’ financial institutions, and benefit by international cooperation. South Korea emphasizes technology-driven economic growth, but there is increasing interest developing social welfare also.

Out-of-control information technology (IT) projects have ended the careers of top managers, such as EADS CEO Noël Forgeard and Levi Strauss’ CIO David Bergen. Moreover, IT projects have brought down whole companies, like Kmart in the US and Auto Windscreen in the UK. Software and other IT is now such an integral part of most business processes and products that CEOs must know their IT risks, which are typically substantial – and overlooked. The analysis of a sample of 1,471 IT projects showed that the average cost overrun was 27% — but that figure masks a far more alarming “fat tail” risk.  Fully one in six of the projects in the sample was a Black Swan, with a cost overrun of 200%, on average, and a schedule overrun of almost 70%. This highlights the true pitfall of IT change initiatives: It’s not that they’re particularly prone to high cost overruns on average – it is that there are a disproportionate number of Black Swans. By focusing on averages instead of the more damaging outliers, most managers and consultants have been missing the real risk in doing IT. In conclusion, the article outlines ideas as to what can be done to avoid Black Swans.

2008. 352 pp. r150.00 (hardcover). This volume is intended to explain why major investment projects (the so-called mega-projects) often are not completed on time and cost more than originally budgeted. Drawing from experiences of European and North American countries, the book also suggests ways to avoid such failures. Although the topic is rather specific, the book is worth reading for both experts and nonexperts as infrastructure development continues to be a major key to economic expansion across the globe.g row_486 380.. 408 For those who only have a vague idea of what a mega-project is, the book begins by introducing the topic and reviewing the most important recent literature. The first part of the volume, then, provides numerous insights on the complexity of mega-projects, starting from the large number of reasons why mega-projects might fail. For example, the project might be "underdesigned," thus less costly but less robust to unforeseen developments, or it might be "overdesigned," when a large number of weaknesses and possible problems are considered in advance, and solutions are evaluated before the problem actually occurs. Overdesigned projects are more robust, less likely to fail, but are much more costly. The project might involve the use of innovative technologies that have never been applied to a similar context, and that involve more uncertain implementation costs and results. Most projects have an impact on the environment and might face opposition for example from environmentalist groups. If representative of these groups have not been directly involved in the design of the project, they might try to stop it, thus causing delays and increasing costs. Finally, because of incorrect predictions of 380 GROWTH AND CHANGE, JUNE 2009

This paper focuses on problems and their causes and cures in policy and planning for large-infrastructure projects. First, it identifies as the main problem in major infrastructure developments pervasive misinformation about the costs, benefits, and risks involved. A consequence of misinformation is cost overruns, benefit shortfalls, and waste. Second, it explores the causes of misinformation and finds that political-economic explanations best account for the available evidence: planners and promoters deliberately misrepresent costs, benefits, and risks in order to increase the likelihood that it is their projects, and not those of their competition, that gain approval and funding. This results in the ‘survival of the unfittest’, in which often it is not the best projects that are built, but the most misrepresented ones. Finally, it presents measures for reforming policy and planning for large-infrastructure projects with a focus on better planning methods and changed governance structures, the latter being more important.

Reacting to unpredictable situations is one of the main problems in technical automation. This article introduces two developed framework for decision units for embodied autonomous agents. The models are compared to an existing architecture, the BDI architecture. The basis of the described model is using psychoanalytical concepts. Drives, emotions and wishes are the basics that build a reaction due to an existing situation. A concept of strategy planning, using the Freudian wish has been described. Using a concept of thinking of the humans psyche that develops during childhood, the difference between thing presentations and word presentations is shown and based upon that, a possible learning strategy is elaborated.

A major source of risk in project management is inaccurate forecasts of project costs, demand, and other impacts. The paper presents a promising new approach to mitigating such risk, based on theories of decision making under uncertainty which won the 2002 Nobel prize in economics. First, the paper documents inaccuracy and risk in project management. Second, it explains inaccuracy in terms of optimism bias and strategic misrepresentation. Third, the theoretical basis is presented for a promising new method called "reference class forecasting," which achieves accuracy by basing forecasts on actual performance in a reference class of comparable projects and thereby bypassing both optimism bias and strategic misrepresentation. Fourth, the paper presents the first instance of practical reference class forecasting, which concerns cost forecasts for large transportation infrastructure projects. Finally, potentials for and barriers to reference class forecasting are assessed.

Dan Lovallo and Daniel Kahneman must be commended for their clear identification of causes and cures to the planning fallacy in “Delusions of Success: How Optimism Undermines Executives’ Decisions” (July 2003). Their look at overoptimism, anchoring, competitor neglect, and the outside view in forecasting is highly useful to executives and forecasters. However, Lovallo and Kahneman underrate one source of bias in forecasting—the deliberate “cooking” of forecasts to get ventures started. My colleagues and I call this the Machiavelli factor.

Results from the first statistically significant study of the causes of cost escalation in transport infrastructure projects are presented. The study is based on a sample of 258 rail, bridge, tunnel and road projects worth US$90 billion. The focus is on the dependence of cost escalation on: (1) the length of the project‐implementation phase, (2) the size of the project and (3) the type of project ownership. First, it was found, with very high statistical significance, that cost escalation was strongly dependent on the length of the implementation phase. The policy implications are clear: decision‐makers and planners should be highly concerned about delays and long implementation phases because they translate into risks of substantial cost escalations. Second, projects have grown larger over time, and for bridges and tunnels larger projects have larger percentage cost escalations. Finally, by comparing the cost escalation for three types of project ownership - private, state‐owned enterprise and other public ownership - it was shown that the oft‐seen claim that public ownership is problematic and private ownership effective in curbing cost escalation is an oversimplification. The type of accountability appears to matter more to cost escalation than type of ownership.

This paper explores how theories of the planning fallacy and the outside view may be used to conduct quality control and due diligence in project management. First, a much-neglected issue in project management is identified, namely that the front-end estimates of costs and benefits – used in the business cases, cost-benefit analyses, and social and environmental impact assessments that typically support decisions on projects – are typically significantly different from actual ex post costs and benefits, and are therefore poor predictors of the actual value and viability of projects. Second, it is discussed how Kahneman and Tversky’s theories of the planning fallacy and the outside view may help explain and remedy this situation through quality control of decisions. Third, it is described what quality control and due diligence are in the context of project management, and an eight-step procedure is outlined for due diligence based on the outside view. Fourth, the procedure is tested on a real-life, multibillion-dollar project, organized as a public-private partnership. Finally, Akerlof and Shiller’s recent discussion in economics of “firing the forecaster” is discussed together with its relevance to project management. In sum, the paper demonstrates the need, the theoretical basis, a practical methodology, and a real-life example for how to de-bias project management using quality control and due diligence based on the outside view.

Disaster rescue is one of the most serious social issue which involves very large numbers of hetergenious agents in the hostile environment. RoboCup-Rescue intends to promote research and development in this socially signicant domain by creating a standard simulator and forum for researchers and practitioners. While the rescue domain intuitively appealing as large scale multi-agent domains, it has not yet given through analysis on its domain characteristics. In this paper, we present detailed analysis on the task domain and elucidate characteristics necessary for multi-agent systems for this domain.

Resumen La planificación estratégica es un proceso formal para identificar proyectos, procedimientos y formas de organización que debe entenderse como permanente para la elaboración e impulso de una estrategia. Dichos elementos surgen desde el ámbito empresarial y se pueden extrapolar hacia dinámicas territoriales, ya sean ciudades o municipalidades. La planificación estratégica territorial puede ser un instrumento adecuado para propiciar gobernanza local, puesto que nos permite, a partir de la participación ciudadana, conocer con claridad una serie de pasos lógicos que se deben plantear para llevarlos a cabo y para esperar resultados futuros deseados. Este artículo trata de centrarse en una temática concreta: la planificación estratégica territorial, puesta al estudio de la realidad salvadoreña y al intento de facilitar métodos y propuestas de actuación encaminadas al fomento de visiones compartidas y propósitos comunes. Palabras clave Planificación, estrategia, estrategia territorial. Title From corporate strategic planning to strategic planning for cities: Lessons from the Salvadorian praxis. Abstract The territorial planning is fundamentally a formal process to identify projects, procedures and forms of organization, it must be understood as standing for the development and promotion of a strategy; these elements arise from the business world and can be extrapolated to territorial dynamics likes cities or municipalities. Strategic territorial planning can be an appropriate instrument to foster local governance, because it allows us, based on citizen participation, to know clearly a series of logical steps that must be taken to carry them out and to expect future desired results. This article tries to focus on a specific topic: the territorial strategic planning, commissioning the study of the Salvadoran reality and to attempt to provide methods and proposals for action aimed at promoting shared visions and common purposes.

E-business has a significant impact on managers and academics. Despite the rhetoric surrounding e-business strategy formulation mechanisms, which support reasoning of the effect of strategic change activities to the maturity of the e-business models, are still emerging. This paper describes an attempt to build and operate such a reasoning mechanism as a novel supplement to e-business strategy formulation exercises. This new approach proposes the utilization of the fuzzy causal characteristics of Fuzzy Cognitive Maps (FCMs) as the underlying methodology in order to generate a hierarchical and dynamic network of interconnected maturity indicators. By using FCMs, this research aims at simulating complex strategic models with imprecise relationships while quantifying the impact of strategic changes to the overall e-business efficiency. This research establishes generic adaptive domains -maps in order to implement the integration of hierarchical FCMs into e-business strategy formulation activities. Finally, this paper discusses experiments with the proposed mechanism and comments on its usability.

E-business has a significant impact on managers and academics. Despite the rhetoric surrounding e-business strategy formulation mechanisms, which support reasoning of the effect of strategic change activities to the maturity of the e-business models, are still emerging. This paper describes an attempt to build and operate such a reasoning mechanism as a novel supplement to e-business strategy formulation exercises. This new approach proposes the utilization of the fuzzy causal characteristics of Fuzzy Cognitive Maps (FCMs) as the underlying methodology in order to generate a hierarchical and dynamic network of interconnected maturity indicators. By using FCMs, this research aims at simulating complex strategic models with imprecise relationships while quantifying the impact of strategic changes to the overall e-business efficiency. This research establishes generic adaptive domains -maps in order to implement the integration of hierarchical FCMs into e-business strategy formulation activities. Finally, this paper discusses experiments with the proposed mechanism and comments on its usability.

Eine Wahlkampagne ist ein kommunikativer Feldzug. Sie ist vorrangig eine Serie von Kommunikations-Ereignissen mit dem Ziel, eine psychologische Verbindung zwischen Kandidat und Wähler zu schaffen und den Wähler zu einer Entscheidung (Ja/Nein) und Handlung (Wählen gehen) zu motivieren.

ZUM BUCH: Amerikanisierung und Politmarketing sind die Schlagwörter, wenn man die Modernisierung der bundesdeutschen Wahlkämpfe betrachtet. Was ist eigentlich modern an dem modernen Wahlkampf?
In diesem Buch werden insbesondere Einblicke in die Techniken der modernen Wahlkampfgestaltung vorgestellt, wie z. B. Elemente des Projekt- und Kommunikationsmanagements, die Vermarktung der politische Aussage, der Personalisierung u. a.
Daneben werden heute aktuelle Wahlkampfmethoden der Antike, wahlsoziologische Überlegungen und zukünftige Entwicklungspotentiale aufgezeigt - insgesamt alles Aspekte des modernen Wahlkampfs.

Na década de noventa assistiu-se em Portugal a uma intensa produção de documentos de ordenamento territorial, com particular destaque para os designados Planos Directores
Municipais (PDM’s). Tendo em consideração a urgência da sua produção (recorde-se que os municípios que não possuíssem PDM aprovado e plenamente eficaz, não teriam acesso a determinados apoios, enquadrados, por exemplo, sob a forma de contratos programa) e o quadro temporal em que decorreu a sua elaboração, percebe-se que as questões de planeamento físico assumissem uma clara primazia em desfavor de outro tipo de leituras territoriais, com particular destaque para o domínio estratégico.

Dez anos decorridos após a segunda vaga de PDM’s, os municípios portugueses lançam-se, desde já, no processo de revisão destes mesmos planos. A leitura crítica do processo de
elaboração dos PDM’s em vigor e o ganho de consciência que não é possível desligar uma política de planeamento físico de uma reflexão estratégica determinaram, em grande parte,
que no quadro das revisões se atribua um peso considerável ao domínio do desenvolvimento.

Practitioners participation in strategy formulation has a significant influence in strategy implementation. Formulation and implementation are interdependent processes. Although historically formulation has received more attention, any devised strategy without execution is useless. Execution also means adaptation to the reality of business and frequently it creates new strategy, more feasible and realistic. The whole process from formulation to results, from vision to change effectiveness, pass by execution, a difficult part of the process that includes change, adaptation, challenge ... resistance. Resistance -implementation barriers- may be envisaged, forecasted in some extent. This work intends to add to the existing knowledge some insight about a mechanism to facilitate implementation, a mechanism within the reach of any company: managers participation in formulation, but not any managers, those that have to execute the strategy or be in charge of strategy execution. Participatio...