The focal point of this proposal revolves around an interdisciplinary exploration of the HYGGESTRARMODEL—a comprehensive framework designed to assess self-management motivation within organizational contexts. This interdisciplinary inquiry aims to elucidate various facets of the newly conceptualized HYGGESTRARMODEL, spanning theoretical underpinnings, practical applications, and empirical validation. The project addresses a salient HR and managerial problem of how to efficiently motivate Generation Z to engage and perform in the workplace. A pivotal component of this endeavor involves the development of a novel measurement instrument, namely the Universal Hygge Star Questionnaire (UHSQ), tailored to capture the multifaceted dimensions of organizational motivation. Strong empirical verification will be conducted within the Bayesian Averaging of Classical Estimates (BACE) framework, in which we can combine some prior knowledge about model distribution and data. Thus, BACE serves as an example of a Bayesian pooling approach, wherein posterior results are averaged over the entire model space . Furthermore, the proposal entails the formation of a cross-sectoral research team tasked with devising test protocols and rigorously validating the outcomes derived from the HYGGESTRARMODEL. Termed as “Hygge Star Model – a New Perspective and Application” (HYGGESTARMODEL), this project aspires to offer fresh insights and practical implications for enhancing organizational motivation and effectiveness.

CORAL aims to unpack the latent dynamics and impacts of collaborative workspaces (CWS) in rural and peripheral areas and integrate them as development tools in local and regional policies to open up new potentials for socio-economic development. Whereas we have observed the rapid rise of CWS in urban agglomerations the past 15 years, there is now a gradual rise of CWS in rural and peripheral areas too. However, there is no clear evidence about their functions, impacts and the ways that policymaking should promote the rural CWS wave and assist in linking the development of CWS with processes of local socio-economic development. In fact, that policy link is much needed for those disadvantaged places (places that don’t matter) , as only a few EU policies (e.g. Interreg) have assisted, in a fragmented way, the development of CWS in peripheral and rural areas. At the same time, there is an urgent need for qualified professionals in academia and the policy arena, in order to effectively promote CWS in the lagging parts of the EU and by that, open up new development futures. CORAL envisages to provide specialized and tailor-made training to 15 young researchers to better understand and support the development processes of CWS in rural and peripheral areas, their wider impacts at the local and regional level, as well as at the level of the individual worker and the enterprise. Moreover, through different means of dissemination and exploitation (knowledge exchange days, CORAL schools, digital platform), the impacts of CORAL aim to reach a wider audience ranging from public policymakers to private stakeholders and CWS communities across the EU. The CORAL consortium consists of nine beneficiaries (five academic and four non-academic) and 6 partner organisations (four academic and two non-academic) from six EU Member States.

Today, RW is mostly conceived as an arrangement enabling flexible work organization. However, REMAKING contends that RW can be more than that. If the multiple effects induced by RW on individuals, business models and the socio-economic sphere are properly understood and addressed by policymakers, it might become a lever contributing to shaping ongoing social, economic, and spatial structural changes. At the basis of REMAKING there is a profound consideration of the ongoing megatrends (i.e., digital transformation, flexibilization of production models) that have initiated RW and of the recent shocks (i.e., the pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine) that have consolidated the diffusion of different forms of RW. Through this angle, the multiple effects induced by RW call for rigorous analyses to support decision-makers in balancing opportunities and problems linked to RW for a potential rethinking of territories, namely in rural areas. REMAKING aims at delivering a policy-oriented framework reflecting the new and multi-faceted realities of RW, facilitating policymakers to adopt place-based policies balancing the opportunities and risks of RW and sharing practices to foster mutual learning on RW in the novel scenario of megatrends and shocks. These objectives will be achieved through participatory research activities across 4 case studies, each addressing a different form of RW (digital nomadism, post-pandemic, high-skilled in hi-tech sectors and enforced remote workers). The 4 case studies encompass overall 7 countries(Italy, Greece, Portugal, Germany, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Ireland): for each country, 1 second-tier city and 1 rural area will be studied. REMAKING generates an impact on socio-spatial transformation processes across second-tier cities and rural areas in terms of improved planning, design and implementation of multi-level policy, promotion of territorial socio-economic resilience and development, and advanced understanding of RW multiple impacts.

The EU generates 12.6 million tonnes of textile waste per year, with only 22% currently collected for reuse or recycling—the rest often incinerated or landfilled. With mandating separate textile collection across the EU by 2025, the collected amount is expected to increase and we must upscale sorting and recycling capacity and efficiency to ensure sustainable recovery of the material. SORT4CIRC’s overall ambition is to improve value creation and cost efficiency through automated sorting and innovative recycling. This will generate new revenue streams for sorters and recyclers by turning non-re-wearable textiles into valuable feedstock for high-value recycling. The project will strive to unlock the current technological gaps for textile identification and value-chain traceability, while providing an overall sound business case driving circularity within the textile value chain (TVC). The use of modern digital technology in the sorting process will make it easier to achieve comprehensive information of the materials and fabrication process steps and integrate it to automated presorting and sorting for recycling processes. The different & complementary techonolgies are interlinked with each other with interoperable architecture to achieve complete traceability. Results generated are cross-checked to ensure reliability and consistency, to make decision over its optimal channel for reuse or recycling. SORT4CIRC gathers all relevant expertise to develop a systemic transformative solution enabling a traceable, circular textile industry: industrial collector and sorter, design for recycling by allowing disassembly, technology developers (machine learning, Artificial Intelligence (AI), imaging, hyperspectral, NIR, multisensors), recyclers (chemical, thermo-mechanical and mechanical), along with specialists in supply chain traking and tracing, digital passports, blockchain technology and IoT, textile business models, trade and LCC/LCA.

ProCleanLakes targets to combat the combined impact of various disruptive factors that generate continuous pressure on the lake's ecosystem status and facilitate the accumulation of emerging, non-regulated, chemical contaminants and nutrient enrichment. The project will design and demonstrate the feasibility of integrated nature-based emerging approaches for joint protection and restoration of European Natural Lakes (ENL) and their biodiversity, considering scenarios which imply the presence of various pressures that affect the aquatic ecosystems' status. The holistic transdisciplinary approaches that are to be used in the project, based on the synergic effect of the economic-environment-social nexus, targets to support the improvement of ENL ecological and chemical status in association with major EU instruments, sustainable development goals and policies related to freshwater ecosystems. The project engages multiple sites affected by the presence of various pressures and stressors, that will be the subjects for the demonstration of integrated protection and restoration solutions efficiency. A replication roadmap powered by the necessity of assuring upscaling and universality of the optimal integrated solutions (IS) will be developed to prove the replicability. An IS support platform which merges a business accelerator with an adaptive artificial intelligence (AI) solution for empowering citizen science related to lakes protection and restoration will assure the collaboration between the municipalities and citizens and will offer capacity-building and encourage co-development and co-design towards natural lakes protection and restoration. Tools such as mobile decision support platforms, serious games for digital readiness, e-learning and augmented-based modules for reinforce-learning and multiple AI machine learning analytical frameworks will be developed to assure the synergic approach toward the maximization of integrated solutions impact and replicability.