Jennifer Whyte

Jennifer Whyte is Director of the John Grill Institute for Project Leadership and Head of School of Project Management at the University of Sydney, Australia. Her focus is on working with industry, policy and government to improve the way projects are conceived, set-up, delivered and add value. She had led research on systems integration, construction transformation, and project analytics.

Jennifer Whyte
Alma mater	University of Cambridge Loughborough University
Scientific career
Institutions	University of Sydney Imperial College London Stanford University University of Reading University of Sussex

She retains a role as a Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Imperial College London. where she was Director of the Centre for Systems Engineering and Innovation, which aims to bring systems engineering and innovation to built infrastructure. Her research interests are in the digital design and delivery of major infrastructure projects. She is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers and held the Laing O'Rourke and Royal Academy of Engineering chair in Systems Integration (2015-2021).

Education

Whyte has a BA from Cambridge in 1994, and completed her PhD at Loughborough University in 2000.

Research and career

Professor Whyte is Head of School of Project Management and Director of the John Grill Institute of Project Leadership at the University of Sydney. She joined University of Sydney in 2021 and retains a fractional appointment as a Professor at Imperial College London.

She was previously a Co-Director of the Centre for Systems Engineering and Innovation at Imperial College London. Whyte joined the Department of Civil Engineering at Imperial College London in 2016 to lead the Centre for Systems Engineering and Innovation, which is developing the next generation of systems engineering tools and methods for infrastructure. She was previously at the University of Reading joining in 2007, and in 2010, founded a Design Innovation Research Centre, with £1.25m funding by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council. She held an Advanced Institute of Management Fellowship. Previously she was a Senior Research Fellow in Imperial College Business School, working with Professor David Gann from 2003-2007. Before that she worked with the same team at SPRU, University of Sussex, from 2000-2003 on research projects including work on design quality indicators.

She is a member of Construction Leadership Council and sits on the UK's Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund 'Transforming Construction' advisory board, leads a strategic theme in the Alan Turing Institute/Lloyds Register Foundation's 'Data Centric Engineering Programme', and in 2018 gave evidence to the Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology on offsite manufacturing for construction. She co-curated the World Economic Forum (WEF) 'Engineering and Construction' transformation map. She sits on the Institution of Civil Engineers' Digital Transformation Panel. She was previously a member of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Research and Innovation Group.

Publications

Whyte has written more than 40 journal papers, publishing in journals including Research Policy, International Journal of Project Management, Organization Studies, Design Studies, and Automation in Construction. In 2018, she published Virtual Reality and the Built Environment (second edition) with Dragana Nikolić.

Selected articles

• Whyte, Jennifer; Comi, Alice; Mosca, Luigi (2023). "Simultaneously Here and There: Situating online organizing in our embodied material practices". Organization Theory. 4. doi:10.1177/26317877231217311.
• Whyte, Jennifer; Comi, Alice; Mosca, Luigi (2022). "Making futures that matter: Future making, online working and organizing remotely". Organization Theory. 3. doi:10.1177/26317877211069138. S2CID 247753028.
• Tee, Richard; Davies, Andrew; Whyte, Jennifer (February 2019). "Modular designs and integrating practices: Managing collaboration through coordination and cooperation" (PDF). Research Policy. 48 (1): 51–61. doi:10.1016/j.respol.2018.07.017. S2CID 88492973.
• Comi, Alice; Whyte, Jennifer (August 2018). "Future Making and Visual Artefacts: An Ethnographic Study of a Design Project". Organization Studies. 39 (8): 1055–1083. doi:10.1177/0170840617717094. hdl:10044/1/48343. S2CID 56469144.
• Brookes, Naomi; Sage, Daniel; Dainty, Andrew; Locatelli, Giorgio; Whyte, Jennifer (October 2017). "An island of constancy in a sea of change: Rethinking project temporalities with long-term megaprojects" (PDF). International Journal of Project Management. 35 (7): 1213–1224. doi:10.1016/j.ijproman.2017.05.007. S2CID 115127891.
• Lobo, Sunila; Whyte, Jennifer (February 2017). "Aligning and Reconciling: Building project capabilities for digital delivery". Research Policy. 46 (1): 93–107. doi:10.1016/j.respol.2016.10.005. hdl:10044/1/42476.
• Whyte, Jennifer; Stasis, Angelos; Lindkvist, Carmel (February 2016). "Managing change in the delivery of complex projects: Configuration management, asset information and 'big data'". International Journal of Project Management. 34 (2): 339–351. doi:10.1016/j.ijproman.2015.02.006. hdl:10044/1/26563.
• Jaradat, Suha; Whyte, Jennifer; Luck, Rachael (February 2013). "Professionalism in digitally mediated project work" (PDF). Building Research & Information. 41 (1): 51–59. doi:10.1080/09613218.2013.743398. S2CID 111209746.
• Larsen, Graeme D.; Whyte, Jennifer (June 2013). "Safe construction through design: perspectives from the site team". Construction Management and Economics. 31 (6): 675–690. doi:10.1080/01446193.2013.798424. S2CID 110288698.
• Whyte, Jennifer (January 2013). "Beyond the computer: Changing medium from digital to physical" (PDF). Information and Organization. 23 (1): 41–57. doi:10.1016/j.infoandorg.2013.01.002.
• Whyte, Jennifer (15 July 2003). "Industrial applications of virtual reality in architecture and construction". ITcon. 8 (4): 43–50. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.13.8842.
• Anumba, C. J.; Bouchlaghem, N. M.; Whyte, J.; Duke, A. (September 2000). "Perspectives on an Integrated Construction Project Model". International Journal of Cooperative Information Systems. 09 (3): 283–313. doi:10.1142/S0218843000000107.
• Whyte, J.; Bouchlaghem, N.; Thorpe, Antony; Mccaffer, Ron (April 1999). "A survey of CAD and virtual reality within the house building industry". Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management. 6 (4): 371–379. doi:10.1046/j.1365-232x.1999.00123.x.