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The success of organizational change lies on people, in this regard on employee's commitment to change. On the other hand, there are many variables that can influence the success of organizational change, such as the content of the change, the process of the change, individual characteristics, leadership, external environment and organizational context. The objective of this study is to identify the major contributor to people's commitment to change, namely psychological empowerment (individual characteristics), and organizational trust (organizational context). The study was conducted at state owned organizations with 539 respondents. Data was collected using Commitment to Change Inventory, Psychological Empowerment, and Organizational trust Inventory. The data were analyzed using Multiple Regression and Structural Equation Model (SEM). The results of the study showed that both Psychological Empowerment and Organizational Trust have positive and significant correlation and contribution to Commitment to Change. The study also showed that both Organizational Trust and Psychological Empowerment have higher impact to affective commitment to change compares to other dimensions of commitment to change. The implications of the study can be used for organizational change practitioner, to create trustworthy organizational climate, and to develop Psychological Empowerment, in order to create high commitment to change.

Currently, as a result of the recession, governments are deeply involved in public investment projects to promote economic growth. Public building projects (museums, universities, theatres), compared with private investments, have a range of specialist requirements. Among others, public project should serve political, cultural, social and urban interests. In the preparation phase, those interests are dominant, and overall cost-efficiency is only a secondary level decision factor. However, this factor must be taken into account and together with all other requirements, is an essential part of the project design phase. This process must be a part of a well-established feedback mechanism, which incorporates public requirements, building cost calculation, and other decision making factors related to the public investment project.A number of methods are well known for operational cost optimisation such as LCC analysis, Value Engineering, and benchmarking. After close investigation of the scientific literature, the author will describe potential organisational models, which incorporate evaluation and optimisation of building operational costs. The article suggests further research directions.

This article presents the history of Belarusian national development in the light of Miroslav Hroch's theory and demonstrates how the initial process of national awakening typical for small nations in eastern and central Europe in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century described by M. Hroch continued under Soviet rule after the Bolshevik revolution. Changes which were brought to Belarusian society together with socialist modernization in the Soviet state constituted "Phase D" (a term coined by Terry Martin) in Belarusian nation-building. As the history of Belarusian nation-formation illustrates, Hroch's scheme of three phases of national movements within small nations ignored a specific mode of small nations' development in a multiethnic state and within the socialist formation. At the same time, the question about the status of the Soviet era's achievements in Belarusian national development appears to be an important issue for understanding the current political development in the country.

Kuntien rakennuskannan hallinnan on todettu olevan haasteellista monissa maissa. Tästä todisteena ovat lukuisat huonokuntoiset ja toiminnallisesti epäkäytännölliset kuntien rakennukset. Monesti rakennuksia pyritään korjaamaan, mutta korjaukset ovat vain osittaisia, toteutetaan viiveellä tai niillä ei saavuteta haluttua lopputulosta. Korjausrakennushankkeiden hallintaa on selvitetty laajasti kirjallisuudessa, mutta kunnallinen toimintaympäristö sekä kuntien korjaushankkeisiin liittyvä epävarmuus luovat tutkimusaiheeseen uuden näkökulman. Tutkimusaukon täyttämiseksi tämä väitöskirja pyrkii lisäämään tietoa ja ymmärrystä kunnallisten korjausrakennushankkeiden hallinnasta. Tavoitteeseen pääsemiseksi aihetta on tutkittu useista eri näkökulmista: niin korjaushankkeiden hallinnan, päätöksenteon, kunnallisen ympäristön ja hallinnon kuin korjaushankkeisiin liittyvien epävarmuuksienkin kautta. Korjaushankkeen merkittävimmät päätökset tehdään hankkeen alkuvaiheessa, minkä vuoksi väitöskirja keskittyy erityisesti tähän vaiheeseen. Tutkimuksessa käytettiin kirjallisuusselvitysten lisäksi useita laadullisia menetelmiä, joihin kuuluivat tapaustutkimus, toimintatutkimus ja haastattelut. Väitöskirjassa tunnistetaan monia nykyisiä haasteita kunnallisten korjaushankkeiden hallinnassa ja käytänteissä. Ongelmat liittyvät erityisesti monitasoiseen ja epäselvään päätöksentekoon sekä epäjohdonmukaiseen politiikkaan. Myös osaamisen puute korjaushankkeiden läpiviennissä aiheuttaa epätoivottuja lopputuloksia. Väitöskirja esittää kunnallisen korjaushankkeen kehittämiseksi pitkänaikavälin näkökulman korostamista korjausvaihtoehtoja tuotettaessa sekä hankkeiden päätavoitteiden ja -linjojen määrittelemistä korkeammilla hallinnollisilla portailla hanketason sijaan. Lisäksi lähtötietojen perusteellinen selvittäminen sekä eri korjausvaihtoehtojen rinnakkainen kehittäminen yhden jo aikaisessa hankevaiheessa päätetyn vaihtoehdon sijaan voi olla hyödyllistä. Väitöskirjan tulokset tuovat esiin kunnallisten korjaushankkeiden hallinnan haasteita ja voivat näin hyödyttää sekä kuntien rakennushankkeissa mukana olevia viranhaltioita että päättäjiä. Lisäksi tuloksia voi käyttää kunnallisten korjausrakennushankkeiden hallinnan kehittämiseen. ; Municipalities all over the world encounter, currently, serious challenges in managing their building stocks. These apparent difficulties are shown by an extensive number of municipal buildings in a poor condition and with unfunctional facilities. Even if multiple refurbishment actions are implemented, they are often delayed, only partial or fail to reach the project targets. The theory of the management of building refurbishment projects is broadly addressed in literature. However, the municipal environment as well as high uncertainty related to the implementation of these projects provide new features to be considered. Due to this apparent gap in the research domain, this dissertation aims to extend the understanding of management of the municipal building refurbishment project, focusing on school refurbishment. With this target, the research theme is addressed by combining the aspects of various disciplines, including the management of refurbishment projects, decision making, the municipal environment and hierarchy, and uncertainty related to refurbishment projects. This dissertation focuses on the early project phase since the most crucial project decisions are concluded then. For obtaining the target knowledge, qualitative methods, including a case study, an action research study, and interviews, were used. This dissertation identifies multiple challenges in the current project management practices and processes of municipal building refurbishment, including multi-layered and inconsistent decision-making processes, and discontinuous municipal policy. Furthermore, a lack of competence in implementing timely actions to a proper extent was recognised to result in poor outcomes. The adoption of a long-term perspective when generating refurbishment alternatives and determining the key decisions and the targets on a high administrative level instead of the project level are, in this study, suggested as the methods to advance current management practises. Moreover, devoting a great effort to initial data acquisition of an existing building under refurbishment appears to be beneficial, as well as creating alternative proposals of project implementation instead on following a certain proposal, chosen already in the early project phase. The results of this dissertation may be beneficial for both municipal practitioners and policymakers, as they highlight the current management challenges, and utilised to develop the management process of a municipal building refurbishment.

It is well known that there is a need to develop technologies to achieve thermal comfort in buildings lowering the cooling and heating demand. Research has shown that thermal energy storage (TES) is a way to do so, but also other purposes can be pursued when using TES in buildings, such as peak shaving or increase of energy efficiency in HVAC systems. This paper reviews TES in buildings using sensible, latent heat and thermochemical energy storage. Sustainable heating and cooling with TES in buildings can be achieved through passive systems in building envelopes, Phase Change Materials (PCM) in active systems, sorption systems, and seasonal storage. ; The work partially funded by the Spanish government (ENE2011-22722 and ULLE10-4E-1305). The authors would like to thank the Catalan Government for the quality accreditation given to their research group (2014 SGR 123). The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreement no. PIRSES-GA-2013-610692 (INNOSTORAGE). Alvaro de Gracia would like to thank Education Ministry of Chile for Grant PMI ANT1201.

Nowadays, European policies are promoting low energy buildings because of the high amount of energy consumption of the building sector. Phase change materials (PCM) have been studied in building implementation as a passive system to reduce the energy demand. Based in the experience obtained in the experimental set-up of Puigverd de Lleida (Spain), this paper pretends to analyze experimentally the PCM performance in a scenario with internal thermal gains. The experiments were done in three different cubicles with the same internal dimensions. The selection of the constructive systems used in these three cubicles allows the authors to evaluate the impact of using PCM in a typical Mediterranean building. A domestic heat pump for summer and an electric radiator for winter were installed to control the internal temperature of the cubicles. The results of summer period experiments show that the PCM cubicle stored the heat produced by the internal loads limiting the heat dissipation to the outer environment. Therefore, the energy consumed by the HVAC system of the PCM cubicle during the cooling period is higher than that of the other cubicles that dissipated the thermal loads according to the thermal resistance of their envelopes. Therefore, the PCM selection should take into account not only the comfort temperature but also the activity and functionality of the building. ; The work partially funded by the Spanish government (ENE2011-28269-C03-01) and the European Union (COST Action COST TU0802). The authors would like to thank the Catalan Government for the quality accreditation given to their research group (2009 SGR 534) and the city hall of Puigverd de Lleida.