Email: portico-services@ucl.ac.uk
Help Desk: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/ras/portico/helpdesk
- Lecturer
- The Bartlett Sch of Const & Proj Mgt
- Faculty of the Built Environment
Ilias is full time Assistant Professor in Enterprise Management at UCL, with a PhD from Loughborough University. He has worked as policy advisor to the Industrial Strategy at BEIS. He has received a policy fellowship from the Higher Innovation Education Fund, a research fellowship and a lectureship from UCL.
He joined UCL in 2017 as Research Fellow. Ilias’ civil engineering degree is from Greece, while his MSc and PhD degrees are from the UK. Prior to joining academia, Ilias worked in consulting and was responsible for delivering multi-million infrastructure projects for a global engineering firm. In the UK, he led projects funded by London Underground, Highways England, Crossrail and Network Rail.
Member of the Association of Project Management (Membership number - P0345743)
I study the administration of practices that create increased performance in terms of efficiency and effectiveness within organisations. This includes investigating aspects of planning, organising and supervising in the contexts of production and the provision of services.
I work with organisations and industry leaders to bring practical issues into light and develop solutions with a theoretical substance.
Applied research interests include:
-Organisations (continuous improvement, organisational change, strategic flexibility)
-Projects (planning, appraisal approaches, performance)
I am second supervisor to 3 PhD students.
Currently accepting self-motivated PhD students which share similar research interests.


*MSc Students*
If you are interested in doing your dissertation with me, I offer two subjects. Both are rooted in practical issues found in consulting and infrastructure development.
Operations
The issue we are dealing is rework and scope creep. There is plenty of research in this area. There are theories that explain why this is happening. The below papers are a good starting point.
Love, P.E., Smith, J., Ackermann, F. and Irani, Z., 2018. The praxis of stupidity: an explanation to understand the barriers mitigating rework in construction.
Love, P.E., Smith, J., Ackermann, F. and Irani, Z., 2019. Making sense of rework and its unintended consequence in projects: The emergence of uncomfortable knowledge.
Love, P.E., Ika, L.A., Ahiaga-Dagbui, D.D., Locatelli, G. and Sing, M.C., 2019. Make-or-break during production: shedding light on change-orders, rework and contractors margin in construction.
Pinto, J.K., 2014. Project management, governance, and the normalization of deviance.
Strategy
The issue we are dealing is futureproofing complex infrastructure investments. Decision-makers think about the short term wins (cost, time) and neglect the long term performance of their investments. These lead to obsolescence. The theory that helps explain how we can navigate such complex decision-making is real options theory.
Krystallis, I., Locatelli, G. and Murtagh, N., 2020. Futureproofing Complex Infrastructure Projects Using Real Options.
Krystallis, I., Locatelli, G. and Murtagh, N., 2020. Talking About Futureproofing: Real Options Reasoning in Complex Infrastructure Projects.
Gil, N.A., Biesek, G. and Freeman, J., 2015. Interorganizational development of flexible capital designs: the case of future-proofing infrastructure.
Gil, N., 2007. On the value of project safeguards: Embedding real options in complex products and systems.
Gil, N., 2009. Project safeguards: Operationalizing option-like strategic thinking in infrastructure development.
Have a read at the articles and let me know if this is something of interest to you.
Modules I lead on our taught programmes:
BCPM0080 Built Asset Management
BCPM0048 The Management of Large Projects and Programmes
BCPM0078 Work Placement Year
Modules I contribute to:
BCPM0007 Managing Professional Practice in Construction
BCPM0035 Project Management
BCPM0021 Risk Modelling and Asset Management in Infrastructure Projects
01-AUG-2020 | ATQ03 - Recognised by the HEA as a Fellow | UCL, United Kingdom | |
2019 – 2019 | Policy Fellow | Industrial Strategy | BEIS, United Kingdom |
2018 | Lecturer | School of Construction and Project Management | UCL, United Kingdom |
2018 | Member | Association for Project Management, United Kingdom | |
2017 – 2018 | Research fellow | School of Construction and Project Management | UCL, United Kingdom |
2015 – 2015 | Regional BIM lead | Sheppard Robson, United Kingdom | |
2015 – 2017 | Manager | CH2M, United Kingdom | |
2014 – 2014 | Research assistant | Architecture, Building and Civil Engineering | Loughborough University, United Kingdom |
2014 – 2014 | Lecturer | NCN College, United Kingdom | |
2008 – 2010 | Construction Site Manager | MALCO Hellas, Greece | |
2006 – 2006 | Civil engineer (placement) | Department of Environmental planning, Greece |