{
  "title": "Complex management in the canton of Lucerne: when should a project backed by senior management be stopped?",
  "url": "https://shr.swiss/blog/management-complexe-canton-lucerne-quand-arreter-projet-deficit-en",
  "language": "en",
  "datePublished": "2026-06-12",
  "publisher": {
    "name": "SHR — Swiss Human Resources",
    "url": "https://shr.swiss",
    "address": "184 route de Saint-Julien, 1228 Plan-les-Ouates, Suisse"
  },
  "summary": "A disappointing project does not necessarily need to be abandoned. But how can managers distinguish justified persistence from commitment maintained to defend a past decision?",
  "section": "Research",
  "topic": "Complex Management",
  "place": {
    "name": "Lucerne",
    "region": "Lucerne",
    "country": "CH"
  },
  "keyPoints": [
    {
      "heading": "What the literature establishes: responsibility can strengthen commitment",
      "point": "Barry Staw (1976, Organizational Behavior and Human Performance) demonstrates experimentally that personal responsibility for an earlier decision can encourage further investment after negative outcomes."
    },
    {
      "heading": "A mechanism: defending a decision to preserve credibility",
      "point": "Joel Brockner (1992, Academy of Management Review) offers a theoretical review of escalation of commitment and emphasises that self-justification alone cannot explain every situation."
    },
    {
      "heading": "The hasty conclusion: stop as soon as results disappoint",
      "point": "It would be premature to conclude that every project encountering difficulties should be stopped."
    },
    {
      "heading": "The limits of the evidence and of simply seeking an outside opinion",
      "point": "Staw's experiment does not reproduce the timescales, contractual obligations and relationships of an actual business; Brockner's review is not a study of the canton of Lucerne."
    },
    {
      "heading": "A practical check in Lucerne",
      "point": "Within the “[Complex Management](/formation-management-complexe-lucerne)” programme, one possible exercise would be to reassess an actual project: hypothetical examples in Lucerne could include an off-season hotel offering, a new regional financial service or equipment for an industrial SME."
    }
  ],
  "sources": [
    {
      "authors": "Staw",
      "year": "1976",
      "source": "Organizational Behavior and Human Performance"
    },
    {
      "authors": "Brockner",
      "year": "1992",
      "source": "Academy of Management Review"
    }
  ],
  "wordCount": 456,
  "image": "https://shr.swiss/img/blog-Training-Complex-Management-Lucerne-management-complexe-canton-lucerne-quand-arreter-projet-deficit-en.jpg?v=4",
  "translations": {
    "fr": "https://shr.swiss/blog/management-complexe-canton-lucerne-quand-arreter-projet-deficit",
    "en": "https://shr.swiss/blog/management-complexe-canton-lucerne-quand-arreter-projet-deficit-en",
    "de": "https://shr.swiss/blog/management-complexe-canton-lucerne-quand-arreter-projet-deficit-de",
    "it": "https://shr.swiss/blog/management-complexe-canton-lucerne-quand-arreter-projet-deficit-it"
  },
  "relatedPages": {
    "programme": "https://shr.swiss/formation-management-complexe-lucerne",
    "city": "https://shr.swiss/formations-ville/lucerne",
    "blog": "https://shr.swiss/blog"
  },
  "citationPolicy": "Citation autorisée avec mention « SHR — Swiss Human Resources » et lien vers l'article."
}