Project leadership and project management do not require the same skills, competencies and behaviours. Likewise, the success factors for project leadership are not the same as the success factors for general leadership. A new study identifies the unique skills, knowledge, behaviours and values at the heart of superior project leadership.
Leadership prowess is elusive, despite the enormous amount invested in it and written about it. This is partly because we require different types of leaders for different types of situation but tend to seek and act out a single leadership style, all too often the charismatic, strong, opinionated one. This inability is partly because we have few effective metaphors for leader that resonate with us, both telling us what they do and that we can relate to. Servant leader never quite rings true as a metaphor as we struggle to envisage leading as a servant; agile/adaptive leadership does not...
Time and expertise limitations can cause steering committees (SCs) in charge of major and complex strategic projects to make errors in judgement and decision-making. The result: such common but serious problems as being late and over-budget. Proactive steps and awareness can help SCs avoid the traps.
A series of psychological experiments reveal that people will imitate others’ preferences, but not their actions — a revelation that can have marketing implications. For example, Facebook ‘likes’ are more influential than lists of best-selling products.
Project managers must manage the tendency of project workers to procrastinate, which leads to delayed efforts and, subsequently, quality problems. Understanding the behavioural biases of project workers leads to solutions to procrastination — solutions related to compensation, team composition and the management of information.
A career with a heart goes beyond job satisfaction. It means being delighted with every job in your career. It’s waking up every morning excited to get to work. A career with a heart is a career that is self-directed, generates positive emotions and is integrated with overall life of the individual. Developing such a career takes hard work — and is built on a series of mindful negotiations.
Financial incentives for managers of innovative projects, a firm’s tolerance for failure, and the number of managers involved in the projects all influence resource allocation (and chances for success) for those projects.
Academic literature has provided valuable insights into ways to manage the uncertainties inherent in new ventures — but failed to produce a consensus. Some scholars advocate an approach in which critical decisions are delayed and early commitments avoided, others one that ‘marries’ (to a greater or lesser extent) commitment and flexibility. ‘Re-conceptualisation’ of the main models can help reconcile the different schools of thought — and provide clearer guidance for entrepreneurs.
Traditionally, industrial production has moved in only one direction: from small to large. ‘Scaling up’ was the best way to maximize productivity and lower per-unit costs. A fleet of 100 ten-ton dump trucks requires more drivers than a fleet of 10 hundred-ton dump trucks. But automation and communication technology has evolved to the point where a large number of small units may be cheaper, better and more efficient than a small number of large units.
Pooling the ideas, resources, commitment and efforts of many is more effective than relying on the few best individuals in an organization. Here, the example of CERN and their successful collaborative model of project management is used to illustrate the ways to lead through collaboration and harmony - collaborative leadership lessons from CERN: the world’s largest physics experiment.
