Zhao Zhai

Dr. Zhao Zhai


Research Focus & Metrics

Academic Career Length

11Years (2016-Present)

(Calculated once Scilit publication data is synced: current year − year of first publication + 1)

Representative Publications

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2 June 2022 in Buildings
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
WLWenque Liu
Wenque Liu
Ming ShanMing Shan
Ming Shan
SZSheng Zhang
Sheng Zhang
Xianbo ZhaoXianbo Zhao
Xianbo Zhao
ZZZhao Zhai
Zhao Zhai
When encountering crisis events, systems, organizations, and people must react and handle these unpredictable events. Under these circumstances, important social functions and infrastructures must be restored or adapted as quickly as possible. This capacity refers to resilience. Although considerable research has been conducted on the resilience of infrastructure systems over the past years, a critical review of these studies remains lacking. Therefore, this study aims to bridge the knowledge gap by presenting a comprehensive review of infrastructure research conducted in the past decade, namely, from 2011 to 2021. On the basis of a systematic search, this study identified 222 journal articles investigating infrastructure resilience. A review of the identified papers revealed five research streams in the area of infrastructure resilience (IR), namely, the assessment of infrastructure resilience, improvement of infrastructure resilience, conceptualizing infrastructure resilience from various perspectives, factors influencing infrastructure resilience, and the prediction of infrastructure resilience. This study also presented some directions that future research can pursue. These directions include analyzing factors influencing infrastructure resilience based on simulation, assessing the resilience of green infrastructure, improving the resilience of interdependent infrastructure, and predicting the resilience of infrastructure based on empirical research.

1 February 2017 in Project Management Journal
Verified
Journal Article
Closed access
ZZZhao Zhai
Zhao Zhai
TATuomas Ahola
Tuomas Ahola
YLYun Le
Yun Le
JXJianxun Xie
Jianxun Xie
While the governance of Western megaprojects is indirectly influenced by governments through legislation and regulations, the Chinese state actively oversees and controls projects of societal importance. To provide clarity on the role of the state in Chinese megaprojects, we carried out a case study focusing on EXPO 2010 Shanghai. Our analysis revealed that through a project-specific organization Construction Headquarter (CHQ), the Chinese state executes administrative strength, forces authorities to temporarily integrate their processes for the benefit of the project, influences contractor and resource selection decisions, induces leadership accountability, and promotes shared project values.

15 April 2021 in Sustainability
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
ZZZhao Zhai
Zhao Zhai
Ming ShanMing Shan
Ming Shan
Amos DarkoAmos Darko
Amos Darko
Albert ChanAlbert Chan
Albert Chan
Corruption has been identified as a major problem in construction projects. It can jeopardize the success of these projects. Consequently, corruption has garnered significant attention in the construction industry over the past two decades, and several studies on corruption in construction projects (CICP) have been conducted. Previous efforts to analyze and review this body of knowledge have been manual, qualitative and subjective, thus prone to bias and limited in the number of reviewed studies. There remains a lack of inclusive, quantitative, objective and computational analysis of global CICP research to inform future research, policy and practice. This study aims to address this lack by providing the first inclusive bibliometric study exploring the state-of-the-art of global CICP research. To this end, a quantitative and objective technique aided by CiteSpace was used to systematically and computationally analyze a large corpus of 542 studies retrieved from the Web of Science and published from 2000 to 2020. The findings revealed major and influential CICP research journals, persons, institutions, countries, references and areas of focus, as well as revealing how these interact with each other in research networks. This study contributes to the in-depth understanding of global research on CICP. By highlighting the principal research areas, gaps, emerging trends and directions, as well as patterns in CICP research, the findings could help researchers, practitioners and policy makers position their future CICP research and/or mitigation strategies.

1 January 2020 in Advances in Civil Engineering
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
ZZZhao Zhai
Zhao Zhai
Ming ShanMing Shan
Ming Shan
Amos DarkoAmos Darko
Amos Darko
YLYun Le
Yun Le
Over the past two decades, project governance has attracted increasing attention from researchers and practitioners worldwide and has become an important research area of project management. However, an inclusive quantitative and systematic analysis of the state‐of‐the‐art recently available research in this field is still missing. This study attempts to map the global research on project governance through a state‐of‐the‐art review. A total of 285 bibliographic records were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection database and analyzed by the visual analytic tool—CiteSpace. The results indicated that there has been an increasing research interest in project governance. The most productive and the most highly cited author in the area of project governance is Müller R., and most of the existing project governance research achievements are from Australia, China, USA, and Norway. By synthetically analyzing the keywords, future research might focus on governance of megaprojects and project success. Additionally, 9 knowledge domains of project governance were identified, including conceptual framework, public projects, governance structure, governance context, megaproject governance, contractual and relational governance, sustainability, portfolio governance, and project success. This study contributes to the body of knowledge by mapping the existing project governance research. It is particularly helpful to new and early‐stage researchers who plan to do research on project governance, as it can provide them an overview of project governance research, including key authors, main institutions, hot topics, and knowledge domains. Moreover, the findings from the study are beneficial to industry practitioners as well, as they can help industry practitioners understand the latest development of governance theory and practice and thereby help them locate the best governance strategies for project management.

11 January 2025 in Sustainability
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
SGShiying Ge
Shiying Ge
Ming ShanMing Shan
Ming Shan
ZZZhao Zhai
Zhao Zhai
Urban rail transit is one of the vital lifeline projects of megacities worldwide. While it brings convenience and economic growth to the city, the construction of urban rail transit projects is often associated with safety accidents. Emergency preparedness plays a significant role in the prevention of safety accidents and emergency rescue in urban rail transit construction projects. However, the extant literature rarely looks into this topic. The aims of this study are to review the emergency preparedness of current urban rail transit construction projects in China, to summarize their key elements, to identify their advantages and limitations, and to make recommendations accordingly. To achieve these goals, this study systematically investigates the emergency preparedness documents implemented by 52 cities in mainland China; from these, five key elements of emergency preparedness are systematically reviewed: organization; monitoring and early warning; emergency response; post-disaster recovery and reconstruction; emergency support. The advantages and limitations of existing emergency preparedness are examined, and recommendations for updates to emergency preparedness are made based on the experience and knowledge of advanced economies. The findings of the study can enhance understanding among authorities and industry practitioners of emergency preparedness as it is implemented in current urban rail construction projects. It can also provide a practical reference for the improvement of emergency preparedness of urban rail transit construction projects in the future, thereby contributing to the resilience and long-term sustainability of urban rail transit systems.

1 July 2025 in Scientific Reports
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
PDF file
ZZZhao Zhai
Zhao Zhai
SGShirong Gao
Shirong Gao
MSMing Shan
Ming Shan
Environmentally responsible behavior (ERB) of contractors in megaprojects is crucial for promoting sustainability, but how to trigger and predict it remains unclear. This study integrates moral identity and corporate green culture into the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to develop an extended TPB (ETPB). Based on a questionnaire survey (N = 181) from Chinese megaprojects, we found that (1) contractors’ attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control positively influence their intentions to engage in ERB; (2) perceived behavioral control, intentions, moral identity, and corporate green culture positively influence ERB; and (3) the explanatory power (R2) and predictive power (PLSpredict, CVPAT) of the ETPB model are superior to those of the TPB model. These findings offer novel theoretical insights through the ETPB model in the context of megaprojects and provide practical guidance for promoting ERB among contractors.