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Topic: Project leadership
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Project Leadership
Project leadership is a process that involves requirements that have been set for the project, to
achieve this there should be an application of techniques, skills, tool, and knowledge (Krog &
Govender, 2015). This means that project management is an interconnected assemblage of
procedures that make the project team to meet the set objectives. These procedures control inputs
to the process and results to output from the process from particular activities. The advancement
from input to output is the fundamental basics of the project management that need iteration and
integration. For instance, a report regarding feasibility could be treated as input to a proposal
phase and the output of the proposal phase could be treated as a set of specifications and plans.
This advancement needs project management expertise, acumen, techniques and tools consisting
of contingency development, change control, and risk management. In addition, for project
management to be successful the leadership must be excellent, this means that manager must be
efficient and qualified to lead the management team effectively. A leader is a person who leads
other by setting direction and convinces people to follow that direction. Another aspect that
makes a good manager is skills that the manager should possess such as education, interpersonal
skills charismatic, eloquence, good communication skills, and understanding (Krog & Govender,
2015). This research will focus on self-audit focusing on my short life history outlining the
experiences that have given me the insight on project leadership. Second, a description of a time
a showed leadership qualities in any aspect of my lifetime and finally an analysis based on
interviews.
Implicit leadership theory states that people contain implicit theory, for instance, assumptions,
beliefs and convictions concerning the behavior and characteristics that differentiate leaders from
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the rest, ineffective leaders from effective ones, and evil leaders from moral ones. The theory
tries to influence the morals that people place on the chosen leaders’ attributes and behaviors,
and their intentions appropriate for approval and enactment of leader conduct. From the above
explanation, it is clear that some of the leaders in our society influence the next generation of
leaders basing on how they conduct themselves. For example, a society that is known for
producing charismatic political leaders like the case in U.S where F. Kennedy could have
influenced many young people with his powerful speeches. In my family there, several leaders
with my father who portrayed moral leadership characteristics that made me emulate him. He
was a manager in an insurance company as a manager during his tenure the company achieved so
much from acquiring other companies, commanding the largest market share to invest in other
countries. It is through his great leadership qualities that I accepted him as a leader and my role
model. His assertiveness acted as human motivational to me. In addition, my mother was also
very strict she is a teacher, and she demanded nothing less than above average performance, this
means that I was brought up in a family that put pressure to perform and be the best. The
pressure instilled some leadership in me such as time management, goal oriented, and
aggressiveness. Our society shapes how they perceive leadership. A society with moral leaders
motivates more people to join leadership. During my high school days, the management used to
invite leaders to come to motivate us to have a purposeful life. The leaders come from the
corporate world with a vast understanding of what is required, so they provided us with what was
expected from us. The student who followed their advice becomes successful. Again the school
library had motivational books such as purpose by Myles Monroe; Think big by Ben Carson and
Rich Daddy and Poor Daddy by Kiyosaki and much more. Through reading, those books made
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me be determined and focused. Another society aspect that shaped my leadership skills is
working in accountant firm and leadership positions in high school. In accountant firm, I met
many charismatic that admired to be like them; this made me work very hard just to them and at
some point, I requested some them to be my role model. They advised me accordingly, and I
followed what they told me keenly. As a leader, I viewed those who were head of me as my role
model.
A leader is an individual who identifies a problem and goes ahead to fix it. In addition, a
leader identifies something that needs to be done and provides leadership to accomplish it. Some
of the characteristics of a good leader are an opportunist, knows can’t do it alone, sees a different
future and better, encourager, a coach, embrace change, coordinator, listener, a risk taker, a
learner, passionate, values result and makes a difference in the life of others. According to John
Kennedy, leadership is indispensable to learning. This definition is suitably applicable in the
field of project leadership. The majority of people are not born with all characteristic of an
excellent leader, but those characteristic are acquired over time through learning. In many cases,
people acquire knowledge concerning leadership skills and leadership through written materials,
from experiences of others and personal experiences.
I will focus on personal skills that I have acquired over time from high school leadership to
management in my profession. Throughout my entire life in high school, I have been a leader.
One of the reasons that made me outstanding among other students is my ability to participate in
decision-making. I could make a decision on my own and the influence other to adopt the idea.
Another method that I used is to listen to others then find the most viable decision that suits
everyone through this trait I become very famous among my colleagues. For example, during my
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first year in high school, I pioneered the formation of wildlife club. The primary objective of the
club was to create awareness of the poaching that was so rampant and more specifically from
Africa. The club started with a very low number of students most of them from my level as those
of us could not see any value in joining the club. However, with time, I was to convince more
students and the number increased tremendously. The club visited many national parks and got
many help from school management and non-governmental organizations as well as writing
school magazines. There were several characteristics that I inherited from the club and by
practicing, made the club a success. One of those characteristics is group maintenance behaviors
as such behavior ensures that the group members are satisfied. This reserves the social stability
of the team, and develops and upholds harmonious work relationship. I made sure that happen by
focusing on member’s comfort and feelings, and stress reduction and appreciation. The other
discipline that I maintained in the group is by ensuring that the set targets are achieved on time.
To achieve this, I made sure that the members adhered to regulations, time management,
quantity, and accuracy. In addition, I have also worked in a professional field where I was an
accountant and a member of management. In the field that I was exposed to more advanced
characteristics of leadership, such loyalty due to confidentiality involved with the financial
matter of any organization. I was required to demonstrate honesty by accepting my errors this
enabled other members of the management to believe and trust my loyalty. Integrity is another
leadership attribute that I acquired in when working as an accountant. When dealing with
financial, integrity is inevitable and as a leader people will measure your words and actions since
leaders who do not demonstrate what they say with what they are not seen as good leaders.
Finally, all those fields I have worked on have made me knowledgeable in accounting you are
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required to the interpretation of a large amount of data daily as well as updating yourself with
daily developments especially with advancement in technology.
Leadership is a vital part of project management. Leadership is considered as that at of giving
others direction and at the same time influencing them to follow that direction and achieve the
desired results. Leaders give direction by setting the key processes, vision and direction. In the
same way, leadership has a huge encouragement on the entire project process, including the
action by other members of the team. According to Jack Welch, a good leader does not manage
they lead. The art of leadership opposes that of management as it recognizes the requirement for
special expertise sets that a leader must have and bring to a project or an organization. Many top
executives, supervisors, and administrators perform the duties without being great leaders. The
majority of managers concentrates on shallow activities and be concerned about profit on stock
prices and short period. However, there few who have come up as leaders who focus on
innovation and the achievement of long-term objectives. On the other hand, many managers
maintain status quo, the few who emerges as a leader focuses on significant decision even if they
are not getting enough support. Leadership skill is the most important aspect of project
management (Krog & Govender 2015).
In some researchers on the growth of leadership skills, that have recognized some of the most of
the commonly known expertise that a strong leader must possess. These abilities include good
communication skills, identifying and good use of group resources, sharing leadership,
supervision of group performance, and counseling, acting as a role model, effective teaching,
representing the group and evaluating. These abilities have been analyzed below.
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Leadership Theory
This theory is divided into three categories, which are the behavioral approach, trait-based,
seasonal. These categories are traditional methods of comprehending leadership.
Behavioral Approach on leadership
This theory does concentrate on the abilities that the leader is born with but rather on what the
leader does. It has three categories.
Task performing Behaviors: This involves the effort that the leader to ensure that the
organization team achieves its goals. Such behaviors consist of accuracy and quality, work
efficiency, adherence to regulations and quantity of output.
Participating in decision-making, the behavior shows up during the making of the decision,
during the process a leader may show either of the following behavior. That is autocratic or
democratic. Autocratic is a behavior where a leader arrives at the decision then makes it known
to the team. Democratic is a habit that a leader portrays when he or she seeks the ideas of the
subordinate (Shenhar, 2015).
Group Maintenance Behaviors: This habit is maintained to ensure members of the group are
satisfied. This can be ensured when a leader focuses on the individuals’ feelings and appreciating
them.
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Situational Approaches to Leadership
This theory differentiates leaders on the basis on how they treat the situation at hand. Leaders
adjust their orientation, motivational approaches, and decision-making based upon a specific
combination of a different situation in their hand. These situations include; types of project,
personal preferences, attributes of followers, the influence of the upper-level management and
organization structures. Leaders change their method of management so that they can control
different situations.
Trait Approach
Trait models are leadership perceptions that concentrate on personal leadership and determine
the personal skills that the leader shows. The following are some of the traits.

Loyalty: leaders who show honesty and loyalty, always accepts their error, demonstrates
main characteristic that other members of the team look in their leader such leader
increases his or her influence.

Integrity: Leaders’ shows integrity demonstrates, by their action and words. Leaders
who fail to do what they say are not considered as good leaders.

Leadership Motivation: good leaders prefer to be in leadership positions, they are
known for their enterprising spirit, and urge to lead.

Self-confidence: It is important for a leader to have self-confidence due to challenges the
leader is likely to face. In addition, setbacks are common in a leadership position. Selfconfidence enables leaders to instill confidence in others, make a decision regardless of
the situation and overcome obstacles.
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
Knowledge: Excellent leaders have a high level of understanding in their relevant fields
such as companies, technical matters, and industries. Leaders must have the knowledge to
understand the huge quantity of data.
In addition to the characteristic mentioned above, there are others such as competent, forwardlooking, intelligent, inspiring and charismatic.
Interviews and Survey Results Analysis
The survey is tailored to implore input from individuals in the field of project management and
construction regarding leadership skills and leadership. Questions focuses on the significance of
most commonly used skills, leadership and leadership abilities that individuals should seek. The
interviewees are chosen from the relevant project management or the construction. They include
colleges’ professors, researchers and managers of large firms. Questionnaires were sent via
email, interviews in-person and telephone. Fifty percent of the interviews were responded.
Data collection
The first step of the survey is task the definition of the project definition, this helps in identifying
those interviewees will be sampled. The questions have been designed in such a way that it will
be possible to enquire input in order to identifying main leadership abilities. The following are
question that were asked together with their data analysis.
Project Success in role of leadership
Leadership is important aspect in the entire project process and the significance of leadership in
developing with the additional magnitudes of international projects. Individuals work
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collaboratively across the globe to archive project objectives. A good environment and
leadership are required for success. Interviewees were asked to examine the significance of
leadership in the survey question that follows.
Question 1: The necessity of the leadership in successful projects completion
The interviewee were inquired whether they partially agree, disagree, agree or no idea on the
above question.
According to the result, 87% of the respondents agree 11% partially agree an only 2% denied
with the question. This shows that majority accepted that leadership is important for the project
to succeed.
Level of leadership
Interviewees were required to state their view concerning the link between leadership skills and
successful managers
Question: It is said that excellent project managers possess leadership abilities of high level
The interviewees were required to state whether they disagree, have no opinion, disagree,
partially agree or agree.
70% agreed, 10% partially agreed, 10% disagreed while 10% had no opinion. The result showed
that leadership abilities are good for smooth learning of project. However, the manager is not
guaranteed for success.
Job satisfaction
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The interview was to examine if leadership skills leads to job satisfaction to the rest of the group
members.
Question: I get satisfaction working with project manager.
The interviewees were required to state whether they disagree, have no opinion, disagree,
partially agree or agree.
40% agreed, 31% partially agreed, 9% disagreed while 20% had no opinion. The result showed a
lot dissatisfaction the reason might be the reason of many of the managers are not considered as
excellent managers or they lack leadership skills.
Promotion
The survey wanted to examine the link between leadership and advancement in career.
Question: I feel that it is vital for manager to show leadership ability for him or her to be
promoted.
The interviewees were required to state whether they disagree, have no opinion, disagree,
partially agree or agree.
95% agreed, 3% partially agreed, 2% disagreed while 0% had no opinion.
Nearly everybody agreed this shows that quality leadership is important.
In conclusion, leadership is a vital factor in successive project management. Leadership does not
only involve organizing people but rather is an art of influencing other members of the team so
that the set objectives get achieved successfully.
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The result of the survey illustrated that manager who shows quality leadership abilities gets
promotion so fast. Therefore, workers require these skills in order to accomplish their career
objectives. Quality leadership skills are not only vital to the individual but because they
influence the entire project process.
References
Shenhar, A. (2015). What is Strategic Project Leadership? Open Economics and Management
Journal, 2(1).
Krog, C., & Govender, K. (2015, November). Servant Leadership and Project Management:
Examining the Effects of Leadership Style on Project Success. In ECMLG2015-11th European
Conference on Management Leadership and Governance: ECMLG2015 (p. 201). Academic
Conferences and publishing limited.