Rii Forum 2024 Tracks
The following five (5) tracks have been proposed. Their convenors invite you to submit your panel and/or paper proposals alligned with the thus outline content of respective tracks. Please, use the on-line paper/track submission file to share your ideas with the Rii Forum 2024 organizing team.
TRACK 1: The AI revolution and its implications for business and society
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been the hot topic of 2023. Following the introduction of ChatGPT at the end of 2022, the topic has raised not only substantial interest in academia and among public- and private-sector professionals, but also doubts and fears. Given the wealth of developments related to and debates surrounding generative AI, the objective of this track is to demystify the topic by studying and overviewing its true present and future impact on organizations and society. Accordingly, the track is open to papers overviewing AI readiness, i.e. the preconditions of its successful adoption in industry and society; technical and organizational challenges to AI adoption, e.g. data, interpretability, scalability, and security, as well as talent attraction, integration, and change management; AI and its potential benefits for collectivities and citizens in the Global North and Global South; and AI and its global implications in terms of job content, organizational setting, inclusion, sustainability, and innovation emergence.
Keywords: artificial intelligence (AI), generative AI, business, industry, society, AI readiness, data, interoperatibility
TRACK 2: Digital transformation in education: from course content, through instruction, to managerial implications
Retrospectively, the switch to remote learning most frequently associated with the Covid-19 pandemic represents but a minor part of the transition and transformation that higher education institutions (HEIs) have been through over the past few years. In the often-heated debates on HEIs, the digital transformation and the inroads of information and communication technology (ICT)-based tools and applications tend to be pointed out as the next big challenges that HEIs need to face. The objective of this track is to encourage conversation and research that recognize the value and hazards of digital transformation in HEIs today yet look beyond it in an attempt to understand how digital transformation impacts the course content, the modes of course content delivery, and the art of managing people and organizations in the context of HEIs. As such, the objective of this track is to shed light on people in HEIs, i.e. the faculty, the students, the administrative staff, and the managers and inquire into the combinations of factors and strategies necessary to attain resilience and sustainability in HEIs.
Keywords: quality education, quality assurance, digital transition, sustainability, evaluation, assessment, curriculum content, innovative teaching, and learning methods, internationalization, education
Track 3: Smart society: cities, urbanism, platforms, participation, democracy, sustainability, resilience
Advances in science and sophisticated information and communication technology (ICT) and the emergence of ever more disruptive technologies provide tools with which to improve the capabilities and organization of society in many areas of management. This evolution is moving towards the construction of a ‘smart society’, viewed here as a citizen-centered model of management and social organization that seeks to integrate and balance technology-driven initiatives for the economy, public governance, and social development. The key strategy that characterizes the smart society is based on enhancing a collaborative work perspective that distributes responsibilities and decision-making capacity, and takes into account all agents of society, especially citizens, who are established as the focus of that society. Considering the scope of the challenges to reaching these objectives, the key questions that need to be addressed include the following: How can societies use new technologies to evolve towards smart societies? What are the key dimensions of a smart society? How can the degree of ‘smartness’ of a society be measured? Are there KPIs for this? How can citizens be empowered to make decisions on issues that affect them? How can architecture and urban planning collaborate for the benefit of the citizens of a society? How can this be measured? What AI-based applications can be developed for the benefit of a society? How can such concepts as sustainability, livability, well-being, resilience, innovation, etc. in the smart society context be reconciled? How can Industry 5.0. and Innovation 5.0. be conceived in the smart society context?
Keywords: smart society; smart urbanism; breakthrough technologies for the government and the public sector; architecture and design; e-democracy, trust, and governance; society innovation; AI-based solutions for society management; citizen-centric solutions; digitalization and e-government initiatives
TRACK 4: Innovation management for human-centric and sustainable digital transition
In the era of disruption, companies are striving to redefine organizational structures, strategies and processes to enhance innovation management in line with the pressing demands of technological evolution and with environmental concerns. Thriving in times of digital and green transition requires the recognition that innovation and its application in the domain of services, products, and business models should support the triple imperative of being digital, sustainable, and human-centric. The challenges associated with the transition towards digitized, but at the same time inclusive and sustainable, innovation management processes necessitate an all-encompassing transformation that should integrate digital technologies that support the smartification of services with the redefinition of entrepreneurship, the promotion of human resources and talent management, and the strengthening of digital skills and knowledge. Hence, innovation management research should explore the mechanisms for encouraging the emergence of innovation in times of twin transition by identifying the criticalities and opportunities entailed in the evolution from a techno-centric to a human-centric view that also considers the social and environmental aspects of innovation. This shift has multi-faceted impacts on several fields related to innovation management (entrepreneurship, knowledge management, human resources/talent management, and ecosystems) and industries in which the key levers for redefining innovation management need to be further explored. The objective of this track is to encourage research addressing these ideas and considerations.
Keywords: Innovation management, management, digital transition, smartification, green transition, sustainability, human-centric view, best practice
TRACK 5: Regulation, investment, and accounting for the twin technology and sustainability transitions
Given the apparent changes in temperature and rainfall patterns, including seasonality, amidst heated and frequently overly politicized debates on the causes of climate change, the objective of this track is to encourage a sober debate on how modern regulatory, accounting, and investment practices can address issues and concerns most frequently associated with climate change today. While the centrality of digital transformation in generating corresponding tools and responses is recognized, the spotlight in the panel is directed also on public and private sector ways of embracing the challenge and the imperatives inherent in the twin technology and sustainability transitions. Accordingly, the following topics and issues fall within, but are not limited to, the scope of the panel’s focus: the evolution of energy markets, the evolution of energy consumption patterns, energy production, innovation in the energy sector, energy communities, sustainability (ESG) accounting, equities and sustainability.
Keywords: the evolution of energy markets, the evolution of energy consumption patterns, energy production, innovation in the energy sector, energy communities, sustainability (ESG) accounting, equities and sustainability
