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De Montfort University
Masters of Business Administration (MBA)
Module: Project Management
Module Code: PoPP5013
Report on Leadership and Team Working in Projects
Submitted to: Dr. Kathryn Jones and Dr. Steven Griggs
By: Nwani, Mark Kido
Student ID: P10523986
Date Submitted: 9th May, 2012
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(Word Count: 3,838)
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Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction 4
2.0 Leadership 4
2.1 Key Factors of Leadership that impact on a Project Outcome 5
2.1.1 Vision 6
2.1.2 Emotional Intelligence 6
2.1.3 Motivation 6
2.1.4 Directing and Scheduling 7
2.1.5 Providing Problem-Solving Techniques 7
3.0. Team Work 8
3.1. Key Factors of Team work that impact on a Project Outcome 9
3.1.1. Cultural Misunderstanding 9
3.1.2. Conflicts 9
3.1.3. Implementation of Action Plans 10
3.1.4. Distributed Leadership 10
3.1.5. Communication 10
3.1.6. Innovation 10
3.1.7. Time Management 11
3.1.8. Fragmentation of Assigned Roles 11
4.0. Conflict Management in Project Teams 12
4.1. Suppression 12
4.2. Smoothing 12
4.3. Withdrawal 12
4.3. Splitting 13
4.4. Confrontation 13
3
4.5. Compromising 13
5.0. Personal Reflection 13
6.0. Conclusion 14
7.0. References 15
4
1.0. Introduction
According to Lock (2003, p. 3) the main aim of a project manager is to ensure the
accomplishment of a project meets the expectations of its sponsor within the specified time
indicted without exceeding the budgeted funds and resources set aside for it. Thus, a project
achieves a desired outcome when all parties involved work together irrespective of
differences in their background, portfolio and level of expertise to achieve a common goal. A
project usually is made up of a team of staff led by the project manager whose primary role is
strategic planning, delegation of duties, co-ordination of activities and monitoring of roles
assigned to each member in the team, as well as motivating them to work more effectively by
offering incentives where necessary.
The quest to achieve an anticipated outcome in a project work sometimes result in conflicts
due to the fact that it may be the first time the team is working together or differences that
may arise in the development of action plans to accomplish the project. It is paramount the
project manager develop ways of containing the situation from escalating to the point where
the project fails to meet its completion date by taking certain conflict management policies to
resolve the conflict in order to reach a conclusive agreement that benefits all parties involved.
As such, this report would focus on giving an in-depth analysis of what effective leadership
and team work in a project entails, how they impact on the outcome of a given project, as
well as the conflict resolution avenues open to a project manager to implement in resolving
conflicts that have the tendency to arise in the course of undertaking a project.
2.0. Leadership
Mantel, Meredith, Shafer and Sutton (2001, p. 35) indicted that leadership signifies the co-
ordination of activities of other individuals or groups by giving them directions on how best
to accomplish it, as well as keeping them motivated by ensuring they are enthusiastic, well
informed and well organized so that they are able to integrate their working structure more
effectively and engage in knowledge sharing. Furthermore, the portfolio of leadership is more
facilitative in nature than authoritative due to the fact that its main role is to facilitate the
emergence of sustainable harmony among team members/subordinates being led by way of
not just monitoring and directing their activities, but also communicating efficiently before,
during and after a project.
5
Riaz and Haider (2010, pp. 29-30) held that there are two key types of leadership styles
project managers usually adopt in leading their teams in order to enhance team’s performance
level and unify the working outline for a project. They are; transactional and transformational
leadership styles. According to Avolio and Bass (1991) transactional leadership style entails
the use of rewards/incentives by a leader to team members for accomplishing a project as a
way of influencing and controlling their behaviour, as well as eliminating underperformance
problems by encouraging them to develop a collective vision that focuses on factors beyond
their self-interests.
Transformational leadership style on the other hand as explained by Avolio, Waldman, and
Yammarino (1991, pp. 9-12) is characterized by four elements which they referred to as the
four Is. They include; inspirational motivation, individualized consideration, idealised
influence and intellectual stimulation. They further went on to stress that the end result of the
transformational leadership style encompasses; increased organizational performance, long-
term presence of the organization in the market through strategic policies that have been
developed and sustained, enhanced charisma of team members as well as increased employee
and customer satisfaction due to the creative insight and intuition of the leader.
Leadership as such plays a crucial role in the outcome of a project as it ensures project teams
are well coordinated and focused on accomplishing the project through the adoption of a
number of factors which would be discussed in the next section.
2.1. Key Factors of Leadership that Impact on a Project Outcome
Watson (2008, pp. 181-189) held that a project leader needs to possess certain key leadership
skills in order to have a significant impact on the outcome of a project. They include; vision
for team, emotional intelligence, motivation as so to ensure consistency in project team’s
working momentum, directing and scheduling of team member’s roles in order to delegate a
job description that matches the proficiencies of each team member and providing problem-
solving techniques to cushion the effect of conflicts that may arise during the project in order
to ensure efficiency in service delivery when the project is completed.
6
2.1.1. Vision
According to Hallett (2008, pp. 62-65) vision is a key element in project management a
leader needs to possess in order to effectively plan and organise the allocation of resources
that ensures a project meets its desired outcome. It is the drive that enables a project leader
formulate the right goals, objectives and strategies required to succeed in a project owing to
the fact that it gives him a clear focus on what to do, how to go about generating the right
resources and team to accomplish it and what the desired outcome of the project is likely to
be if this is adhered to and sustained in the project’s duration.
In addition to this Christenson and Walker (2004, pp. 39-45) viewed vision as being an
intellectual work done through substantial creative work for the purpose of generating vital
action plans needed to actualize a project and meet the deadline allotted to it. In essence, once
a leader has a well-detailed vision of how to achieve a project and gathers the right team with
relevant competencies, this would lead to the emergence a mutual satisfaction level of all
parties to the project on its outcome.
2.1.2. Emotional Intelligence
Goleman (1995) contended that empathy has two key attributes which impact on a project’s
outcome. They include; social and personal competencies. Social competency consists of
social awareness and relationship management, while the personal competency deals with
self-awareness and self-management.
A project leader has the responsibility to possess these two traits as they give him an
extensive insight on the feelings of project teams which aids in the decision making process
to be developed so that they are carried along in its formulation in other to avoid conflict or
lowering the working morals of team members who may be uncomfortable with the action
plans devised.
2.1.3. Motivation
Schmid and Adams (2008, pp. 60-71) contended that what distinguishes a management of a
project from general management is the temporal nature of the former, which leads to the
formation of temporal teams (most of which have not worked together before) and also a
temporal leader.
7
In order to ensure the team formed work in harmony, they stressed that the project leader
needs to encourage high intrinsic team motivation despite the fact that the overall
organization policy may create a culture of low motivation. This is due to the fact that project
teams need to be constantly motivated and high-spirited so that it translates to efficiency in
their performance of a project.
2.1.4. Directing and Scheduling
Project teams need to have their roles effectively directed and scheduled by the project’s
leader in order to create a well-structured hierarchy of control which follows a centralised
system of leadership that takes the top-down approach in order to reflect positively on the
outcome of a project because it ensures an adherence of the laid down leadership structure in
place by the project team.
In addition to this, project teams need to be efficiently governed so as not to result in the
project being inconclusive due to the lack of a hierarchical chain of command. Thus,
leadership in a project entails being strong-willed in formulating control measures that
monitor the activities of a team following a particular order so as to meet the requirements of
the project sponsor at its scheduled completion time.
2.1.5. Providing Problem-solving Techniques
The generation of systematic problem-solving techniques that project members need to
implement is a critical aspect of leadership in a project due to its temporal nature and the fact
that the teams selected to accomplish it may be working together for the first time.
Additionally, disagreements are to an extent inevitable as a project progresses through its
lifecycle and the project leader is charged with the responsibility of always proffering
solutions on avenues to be taken to resolving it so as not to affect the project from reaching
completion.
In addition to the above leadership elaborated factors, other important aspects of leadership
that impact on the outcome of a project include; strong level of communication with project
teams, planning effectively on how a project would be implemented and sustained, ability to
listen and address critical issues affecting teams, incorporating the organizational values of
the company into the project so as to reflect the level of competence of the company,
8
strategic decision making on how a project should be carried out, formulation of a
SWOT/PESTEL analysis for the project, being optimistic enough to give a well-detailed
assessment of the project as it progress so as to inquire the level of achievement recorded and
if changes need to be made in certain areas to enhance its value and the creation of risk
management measures to leverage the impact of risks that may arise in the duration of the
project.
3.0. Team work
The ability of a team to work effectively has to a significant extent become an element for
measuring the efficiency of delivery of a project in an organization in terms of their capacity
to work together to actualise a common goal within the duration of the project, while having
strong communication capabilities for the purpose of sharing knowledge and fostering
harmony through joint intellectual effort to achieve a desired result.
According to Welbourne, Johnson, and Erez (1998, pp.540 - 555) team work entails working
with designated people to achieve the stated goals and objectives of an organization by
ensuring each member of the team is carried along in the decision making process in order to
reach a consensus on the likely strategies to the implemented in performing the project. A
team becomes more effective when the project manager makes use of boundary spanners who
are flexible enough to crossover several job descriptions due to their versatile know-how on
various aspects of a project. Conrad (1990) indicted that the concept of boundary spanning
originated from a general system of theory which views an organization as being made up of
several parts and processes which need to be aligned through individuals with flexible skills
capable of switching roles and sharing knowledge with colleagues, thereby not just building
an effective team relationship, but also promoting strong rapport through a cross functional
activities which is what effective team work in a project entails.
Summarily, a strong level of team work in a project leads to the creation of sustainable
knowledge sharing and enhanced communication avenues which strengthens the working
relationships of team members and enable them progress in mutual agreement at each stage
of the project. In addition to this, there are a number of factors which relate to team work that
impact on the outcome of a project and they would be analyzed in the next section.
9
3.1. Key Factors of Team work that impact on a Project Outcome
An overview of factors that relate to team work which impact on the outcome of a project
include; cultural misunderstanding, conflicts, effective implementation of action plans,
mutual understanding of the project, distributed leadership among the project team, consistent
sustainable communication, innovation, time management, organizational bias among team
members and efficient fragmentation of assigned roles.
3.1.1. Cultural Misunderstanding
Earley and Mosakowski (2000) indicated that getting teams to work effectively in a given
project is a major issue not only because they may be working together for the first time, but
because they may also have different backgrounds and ethnicity which affects their roles with
other team members in a project.
In addition to this, Katzenbach and Smith (2003) contended that teams must have a constant
demanding performance challenge to create and sustain themselves regardless of any
differences that exist among them so that they are able to adopt strategies and policies
formulated to achieve a common goal.
3.1.2. Conflicts
Amason (1996, pp. 139-148) and Jehn (1995, pp. 256-282) identified three types of conflict
that exist among teams. They include; relationship conflict which is based on social and
personal issues disagreed upon which have no relation which the project, task conflict which
encompasses disagreement on the task being handled and process conflict which describes
the disagreement on the delegation of roles as well as strategy to be implemented and
resources to be channeled to it.
It is important the project manager and team know the distinguishing features of each of these
conflict types in order to enable them develop techniques of managing the conflict to avoid it
from escalating. Conflicts are inevitable in a project and need to be managed properly by all
parties involved in the project so that the project can be achieved at its stipulated time.
10
3.1.3. Implementation of Action Plans
Project teams are usually charged with the responsibility of coming to a mutual agreement on
the action plans to be adopted towards achieving a project. This is done by having a joint
understanding on what the project entails, carrying feasibility studies to know how best to
formulate strategies to accomplish it and also an assessment at each stage of the project to
ascertain their progression level in order to know areas that need to be enhanced and also if
they are going in line with the expectations for the project.
3.1.4. Distributed Leadership
Deming (1986) took the view that distributed leadership eliminates the emergence of an
unjust system which annually rates team members based on their performance and as such
annihilates the essence of team work because it often tends to nourish rivalries and politics
among project teams which poses a threat to team work efficiency. As such, the aim of
distributed leadership in a project is to empower team members to take responsibility for their
assigned roles and ensure they build a strong working culture by functioning effectively
together to achieve a common goal.
3.1.5. Communication
Quashie (2009, pp. 212-216) contended that the systems of communication need to be well
structured in a way that in a way that is critically managed among project teams throughout
the span of the project from its inception to completion for the project to be successful. In
addition to this, he stressed that a project is performed through the use of entangled systems
and processes within which it is difficult to achieve a strong level of success in a project’s
outcome without team-bonding efficiency using communication as an organizing factor that
is given top priority to be sustained.
3.1.6. Innovation
Innovation and creativity among project teams is a key determinant factor to a project’s
outcome because it adds value to the set goals and objectives, creates a significant level of
uniqueness in accomplishing the project so as to give the project team a competitive
advantage over other groups and also ensures team members maximize their potentials to
enhance the outlook of the project in its completion.
11
3.1.7. Time Management
According to Kasturi and Gransberg (2002, p. 16) time management gives as extensive
insight to the significance of team work in a project’s delivery system as it ensures every
team member is conscious of the timeline given to the project and dedicate more effort in
their responsibilities. Furthermore, time management entails four key elements which are
constantly adopted in project management for teams to be more effective and committed to
actualising the common goal of the project. They include; activity logs, strategic planning,
SWOT analysis and network programming, Kasturi and Gransberg (2002, p. 17-18).
3.1.8. Fragmentation of Assigned Roles
A distinct level of division in team member’s responsibilities is an essential element in team
work owing to the fact that in as much as each team member has an assigned task to handle,
some may not be as efficiently skilled as others and need to have their roles further sub-
divided so as to ensure boundary spanners provide support to them by performing cross-
functional roles that carries the project members along in order to increase their level of
competency, Siu (2006, pp. 9-11).
Summarily, the key factors of team work that have a significant impact on the outcome of a
project need to be adequately managed so that the project successfully progresses in its stages
though the joint effort of the project leader and team members in ensuring the outlined plan is
adhered to, with measures taken increase the cordial working relationship that exists among
them.
4.0. Conflict Management in Project Teams
Thamhain and Wilemon (1975, p. 31-36) held that in the duration of a project’s lifecycle
detrimental aspects of conflict among project teams can be minimised if a project manager
anticipates the tendency for potential conflicts to arise and understands the determinant
factors that led to it so that strategies can be formulated to contain it. Due to the temporal
nature of a project and other factors such as the likelihood the project selected team members
may by working together for the first time, conflicts maybe inevitable and project managers
are charged with the responsibility to effectively manage it so that the main goal of the
project is not altered.
12
According to Meredith and Mantel (2003, p. 295-296) a party to a conflict will be satisfied
when the level of frustration being faced has been significantly lowered to the point where no
action, either present or future is contemplated against the other party or parties in the
dispute. As such, a conflict is said to be resolved when parties involved are jointly satisfied
with the outcome of measures adopted by the project manager to manage it.
Thus, certain critical modes need to be implemented by a project manager to manage
conflicts that arise in among project teams in order to ensure continuity in their job
description which invariably translates to a positive outcome of the project. These modes
according to Blake and Mouton (1964, pp. 18-203) include; suppression, smoothing,
withdrawal, splitting, confrontation and compromising.
4.1. Suppression
This encompasses dealing with the conflict by adopting a “cutting it off” framework, which
implies the project manager deals with the conflict the way he deems appropriate. In this
mode, resistance to working more effectively due to team disagreement is eliminated by the
project manager through the application of the authority-obedience control formula and
letting the disputing parties know any decision made is final and can’t be altered for any
reason.
4.2. Smoothing
This entails the process of striving to talk conflicting parties out of the conflict by persuading
them to come to a mutual agreement on how good things are, as opposed to how bad things
might be. Here the project manager strives to integrate team member’s working structure and
enhance the level of working harmony among the team by even going the extra mile to treat
divergent viewpoints in a generally open way that the parties in the dispute never come to
grips with.
4.3. Withdrawal
Withdrawal as a form of conflict management relates to a situation where the project manager
doesn’t take any action in try to resolve the dispute in a project team as he perceives the
situation is likely to disappear with time. In this mode, when decisions are made and project
13
members question certain aspects of it in a quest to create a tensed atmosphere with regards
their functions in the project, the project manager simply doesn’t insist on implementation
and leaves responsibility on how they choose to undertake the project to them.
The project team always tend to work more closely and better overtime if the mode is
adopted due to the less interference of the project manager in their roles unless it reaches a
state where there is a likelihood of the conflict jeopardizing his portfolio and he needs to take
decisive actions to cushion it.
4.4. Splitting
This deals with keeping the team members to the dispute apart until factors that led to the
conflict’s emergence are addressed and resolved amicably. The idea behind keeping both
teams in distance of each other is designed to enable the project manager find an agreeable
meeting ground by splitting the differences to get a resolution the appeals to the parties
involved so as to ensure their strong working culture is unhindered in carrying out their
assigned roles.
4.5. Confrontation
Directly confronting the project teams involved in a conflict gives the project manager the
ability to correct the causes that led to the conflict and proffer a joint remedy on how best to
avoid its occurrence during the cause of the project. Confrontation enables dialogue to take
place and the team members involved in the conflict air their views on how exactly they feel
which enables to project manager effectively explore resolution avenues open to him.
4.6. Compromising
This entails a process whereby the project manager searches and bargains for solutions to a
conflict which eventually brings a significant satisfaction level to the parties involved in the
dispute on the resolutions reached. Thus it follows a “give-and-take” approach in dealing
with conflicts by finding a desirable meeting point which the conflicting teams are ready to
adopt to resolve the dispute on agreeable terms.
14
5.0. Personal Reflection
Spencer (1993) identified six key personal characteristics of a project manager that ensures a
project is accomplished with the time set for it. They include; helping and human service,
cognitive ability, personal effectiveness, managerial & impact and influence. During the
course of the individual and group reports respectively, I have been able to acquire the
cognitive and personal effectiveness competencies which aided in formulating the right level
of ideas and information channels that where embarked upon to get the relevant materials to
actualize this report, while ensuring consistency in communication avenues among my team
members so that ideas where shared and collated to form a group presentation that had the
joint approval of all parties involved. This process on the long-run had a great impact on the
inputs generated for this individual report and I intend to do a Continuous Professional
Development (CPD) Project Management course in order to further expand my project
management know-how and apply it in my organizational management field in the not too
distant future.
6.0 Conclusion
In conclusion it can be seen that effective leadership and team work plays a significant role
on the outcome of a project as they both have to maintain a consistent level of harmony and
efficiency in carrying out their assigned tasks to meet the stipulated time given for the project
to be completed. Furthermore, project managers are charged with the responsibility of
implementing appropriate conflict resolution avenues as outlined by Blake and Mouton
(1964) in managing conflicts that may arise among team members during a project so that the
stages of the project are unhindered, which translates to a joint satisfaction of all parties to the
project on its outcome.
15
7.0. References
Amason, A. C. (1996), Distinguishing the Effects of Functional and Dysfunctional Conflict
on Strategic Decision Making: Resolving the Paradox for Top Management Teams, Academy
of Management Journal, 39, 1, pp. 139-148
Avolio, B. and Bass, B. (1991), Full-Range Training of Leadership: Manual, Bass/Avolio &
Associates, Binghamton, New York.
Avolio B., Waldman, D. and Yammarino, F. (1991), Leading in the 1990's: The Four I's of
Transformational Leadership, Journal of European Industrial Training, 15, 4, pp. 9-16
Blake, R. R. and Mouton, J. S. (1964), The Managerial Grid: Key Orientations for Achieving
Production Through People, 3rd Edition, Gulf Publishing Company, Houston, U.S.A.
Christenson, D. and Walker, D. H. T. (2004), Understanding the Role of "Vision" in Project
Success, Project Management Journal, 35, 3, pp. 39-52
Conrad, C. (1990), Strategic Organizational Communication: An Integrated Perspective,
Second Edition, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Fort Worth, Texas
Deming, E. W. (1986), Out of the Crisis, Cambridge University Press, Melbourne, Australia
Earley, P. C. and Gibson, C. B. (2002), Multinational Work Teams: A New Perpective,
Mahwah, N. J., London - Earley and Mosakowski (2000)
Goleman, D., (1995), Emotional intelligence: Why it Can Matter More than IQ, Bantam
Books, New York
Hallett, A. (2008), 'From VISION to ACTION', New Zealand Management, 55, 2, pp. 62-65
Jehn, K (1995), A Multimethod Examination of the Benefits and Detriments of Intragroup
Conflict, Administrative Science Quaterly, 40, 2, pp. 256-282
16
Kasturi, S., and Gransberg, D. (2002), Time Management- A Design-Build Builder's
Perspective, Cost Engineering, 44, 9, p. 16-23
Katzenbach, J. R., & Smith, D. K. (2003). The Wisdom of Teams: Creating the High-
Performance Organization, New York: Harper Collins Publishers
Lock, D. (2003), Project Management, 8th Edition, Gower Publishing Limited, Hampshire,
U.K.
Mantel, S. J., Meredith, J. R., Shafer, S. M. and Sutton, M. M. (2001), Project Management
in Practice, John Wiley and Sons, New York, U.S.A.
Maylor, H. (2005), Project Management, 3rd Edition, Pearson Education Limited, Essex,
England
Meredith, J. R. and Mantel, S. J. Jr. (2003), Project Management: A Managerial Approach,
5th Edition, John Riley and Sons Inc., New York, U.S.A.
Quashie, S. (2009), Systems of Communication and Management in the Construction
Industry, Proceedings of the European Conference on Management, Leadership &
Governance, pp. 212-221
Riaz, A. and Haider, M. H. (2010), The Role of Transformational and Transactional
Leadership on Job Satisfaction and Career Satisfaction, Peer Review and Open Access
Journal, 1, 1, pp. 29-38
Schmid, B, and Adams, J (2008), Motivation in Project Management: The Project Manager's
Perspective, Project Management Journal, 39, 2, pp. 60-71
Siu, L. H. (2006), The Boundary Spanner’s Role in Organizational Learning: Unleashing
Untapped Potential, Development and Learning in Organizations, 20, 5, pp. 9-11
17
Spencer, L. (1993). Competence at Work: Models for Superior Performance, John Wiley &
Sons, New York
Thamhain, H. J. and Wilemon, D. L. (1975) Conflict Management in Project Life Cycles,
Sloan Management Review (pre-1986), 16, 3, p. 31-50
Watson, P. (2008), A Methodology for Attaining and Assessing Project Success for
Rehabilitation Projects, Journal of Building Appraisal, 4, 3, pp. 181-189
Welbourne, T. M., Johnson, D. E., and Erez, A., (1998), The Role-based Performance Scale:
Validity Analysis of a Theory-based Measure, Academy of Management Journal, 41, 5,
pp.540 - 555.