Should project manager leadership competencies defer by project phase?

Asked by Shanaz Dawood on 17 February 2012

Hi All... Shanaz here. I am currently working on my dissertation for my final year of BSc Hons Project Management. The subject of study is “The association of project manager leadership competencies with project phase and project success or failure”. Essentially, this investigation aims to identify whether project managers should apply different leadership competencies in different phases of the project lifecycle, and whether this correlates with project success.

What are your views on this please? I currently have very male orientated views so would be nice to see a woman's take on it.

Please could you also be so kind to spare 15 minutes to complete a questionnaire to help my dissertation. . It is designed to be anonymous, all the data gathered is confidential to the investigation and will not be shared with any other source.

You can access the questionnaire at the below link:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?hl=en_GB&formkey=dDV4a1V1RzZCUnc3TDdFY3ZSVjBsZXc6MA#gid=1

Please aim to complete by Monday 27th February.

Thank you in advance

Shanaz Dawood

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Answered by patw, 9 March 2012 - 07:25

Leadership competencies are innate to the person, their character and style.  Leadership is context sensitive but project phasing is only likely to be one relatively irrelevant element compared to elements such as industry and organisational culture.

 

Having said that, the stakeholder community the project manager needs to lead will change as the project evolves through its various phases/stages and therefore the people to be lead will vary and because of their personalities and interests the leadership skills deployed may change.  For more on leadership see: http://www.mosaicprojects.com.au/WhitePapers/WP1014_Leadership.pdf

Answered by Shanaz Dawood, 9 March 2012 - 11:14

Thanks Patrick. Part of this study also looks at what affect project type and industry has on leadership and also the success criteria to be met. Didn't conisder organisational culture, one to definitely think of.

Thanks

Shanaz

Answered by Andrew John Wells, 9 March 2012 - 11:23

Yes I believe so but perhaps because of the construction design environment I work in. At the start of a project it is important to have people with good imagination to conceive strategy and better ways of the usual means of implimentation. I think Belbin would describe them as 'Shapers'. We then get into the delivery in the 'completer/finsher' should be more dominant.