Allison Stewart is a DPhil student in the BT Centre for Major Programme Management. Allison is supervised by the Director of the BT Centre, Professor Bent Flyvbjerg, as well as by Professor Steve Rayner from the Institute for Science, Innovation and Society (InSIS). Her research focuses on sharing knowledge and ignorance between major programmes, with an empirical focus on the Olympic and Commonwealth Games.
Allison is the recipient of both the BT Centre’s DPhil studentship and the InSIS DPhil studentship. While earning her DPhil, Allison has been awarded a Lectureship in Management at Christ Church, teaching General Management to Economics and Management undergraduate students.
Allison completed her MSc in Management Research at the Said Business School at Oxford, where she received the Dean’s certificate for best overall performance in her MSc class and was jointly awarded the Dan Gowler prize for best MSc dissertation. She also received the prize for best poster presentation in the MSc as judged by faculty and peers. Allison earned a Bachelor of Commerce degree with a major organisational psychology from McGill University in Canada. Allison also has several years of practical work experience at a number of global consulting organisations including Deloitte and Accenture, where she focussed on organisation design and change management for private and public sector clients.

How do major event programmes manage information across organisational boundaries?

This research seeks to investigate the implications of organisational boundaries in major programmes on the transfer of critical information about planning and operations processes, particularly related to budget, scope and delivery. Major event programmes represent a significant and increasing investment of public funds in many diverse locations around the world. The premise of this research is to investigate the mechanisms by which these programmes are planned and how they gain information about budgeting, scoping and delivering their programmes from other organisations both inside and outside of traditional organisational boundaries.

To do so, this research explores the empirical environment of the organising committees of the Olympic and Commonwealth Games. Two prongs of research are being investigated: first, a historical analysis of past Games to determine their cost profile based on the work of Flyvbjerg, Holm and Buhl (2002, 2005); and secondly, field research with six current organising committees in Vancouver, Delhi, London, Sochi, Glasgow and Rio. This is intended to provide a comparative and practical perspective on the issues faced by these committees.

The intention of this research is to contribute to both the scholarly examination of major event programmes as well as to develop critical insights into their planning and operations that would be of practical use in delivering these programmes.

- Flyvbjerg, B. and A. Stewart (In progress) An Analysis of Olympic Costs. <Audience: Academics, Practitioners>

- Rayner, S. and A. Stewart (In progress) The Future of Olympic Host Cities: The Legacy of Urban Development. <Audience: Academics, Practitioners>

- Molloy, E. and A. Stewart (January 2010) Exploring the Popularity-Failure Paradox in Projects. Presented at the International Research Network on Projects (IRNOP) IX Annual Conference in Berlin, Germany.

- Stewart, A. (2009) MSc Dissertation: Constructed failure? A cultural theory of sensemaking on projects. Available in Sainsbury Library, Saïd Business School, University of Oxford.

- Molloy, E. and A. Stewart (October 2009) Exploring the Popularity-Failure Paradox in Projects. Presented at the 5th Making Projects Critical Workshop in Bristol, UK.

- Sabin, N. & A. Stewart (2009). Rethinking Boundaries: Leadership, Innovation and the Global Recession. Winner of the 2009 Oxford Leadership Prize. <www.oxfordleadershipprize.org>