Research Journal of Recent Sciences _________________________________________________ ISSN 2277-2502 Vol. 2(5), 44-48, May (2013) Res. J. Recent Sci. International Science Congress Association        
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The Essence of Project Leadership is Significant to Project ManagementRiaz Ahmed1*, Noor Azmi2 and Muhammad Tahir Masood1*COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Islamabad, PAKISTAN  Faculty of Management (FM), Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Skudai, Johor Bahru, MALAYSIA Department of Leadership and Management Studies, National Defense University, Islamabad, PAKISTAN  Available online at: 
www.isca.in
Received 9th December 2012, revised 1st January 2013, accepted 21st February 2013 Abstract  The objective of this research is to explore the significance of project leadership from literature which has been emerged as a child of leadership and management in last ten years. The motivation factor to conduct this study rise through fascinating observation revealed in literature that still there is limited research on project leadership in the field of project management even though calls have been made for more research on project leadership for more than one decade.  To determine the effect of project leadership performance on success or failure of project, understanding the differences between project leadership and project management becomes important. It perceived through literature review that the role of project leadership in coming years will be more fascinating, demanding and critical.  The role of professionals working on projects as manager, coordinator, and director is rapidly evolving from managing or directing to leading the projects who must possess essential skills and competencies of project leadership concept. Further research is suggested to consider project leadership in future.  Keywords: Project leadership, essence, project management, leadership, project manager. Introduction The aim of this paper is to explore the significance of project leadership in the area of project management. The issue of project leadership needs more attention in project management literature, even though calls have been made for more research on project leadership. It is apprehended on the basis of literature that there is a vital need of effective role which must be able to lead and manage simultaneously in complex and challenging working environment. Project leadership is critical to overcome this challenge, which has been cultivated as a brainchild of leadership and management in last decade. Therefore, it becomes important to understand the differences between project leadership and project management, to determine the effect of project leadership performance on success or failure of project. The role of project manager’s leadership on the project outcome and success is vital which is often discussed in literature, in context of  leadership and management which are dissimilar to certain extent from each other but complementary and cannot function without each other in the competitive and challenging environment. There is very limited research to address the issue of project manager’s leadership and its contribution to project success. It has generally been recognized in management literature that performance of functional manager’s leadership contributes to project success in organization but the performance of project manager is ignored while identifying the project success factors2,6. The performance of leadership is reported as most explored  part of human behavior which is fundamental for the project team to work together. This article is an attempt to address phenomenon of project leadership that is emerging leadership and management. The leadership competencies may play various role during different activities of organizational change implementation which has largely been ignored by the leadership literature. It is becoming difficult to differentiate between the roles of project manager and leader in context of leadership and management as well as project management.  Therefore, it becomes important to understand the differences between project leadership and project management, to determine the effect of project leadership performance on success or failure of project. The essential leadership and managerial knowledge, skills, competencies and characteristics ensure successful completion of projects through right decisions at right time and employing right people at right places. Leadership is a process which creates change and uncertainty in organization involving: developing vision for organization, supporting and communicating with the people for achievement of vision, and motivating people for action through fulfillment of basic necessities and empowerment10.   A large number of studies have been explored to identify leadership traits and characteristics, including personality, abilities, physical factors, knowledge, dominance, and self confidence, as the list goes on, but there are no common traits, behavior or processes which can identify the qualities of an effective leader11. The  leadership fundamental function is to produce change and set direction to cope with change which is not similar to planning or long-term planning, but perplexity between both often take place among people10 . Leadership style and personal traits have been determined as critical success 
Research Journal of Recent Sciences ______________________________________________________________ ISSN 2277-2502Vol. 2(5), 44-48, May (2013)                             Res. J. Recent Sci.   International Science Congress Association 
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factor for failure or success of a project, in most of research2,12-15.  Two perspectives exist in literature on broader context about what managers do in which first stipulates what managers do16, in recognized role-based approach17,18, and other entail to portray the work of manager19.  Leadership is about “the process of creating an environment in which people become empowered”20. Leadership is the ability to inspire others to achieve objectives actively which binds the human factor together into a group and motivate towards goal. Though, leadership is a part of management but not all of it.  The prominent definition of leadership is “an influence relationship among leaders and their collaborators, who intend real change that reflects their shared purpose”21. Management is “the ability to work through others” and most of today’s management definitions are similar to Courtland Bouee who offered in his book Management: “...it is a process of attaining organizational goals through effective and efficient planning, organizing, leading and controlling the organization’s human, physical, financial and informational resources”21. Linking Leadership and Management with project management It is commonly assumed that everyone in management position is a leader and leaders are not concerned to manage but leadership is performed by the people even though not in management positions22. In contrast to leadership, management is a process which diminishes uncertainty and stabilizes the organization involving: planning and budgeting, organizing and staffing, and controlling and problem solving10. Though, management is a function comprises on implementing the direction and vision provided by the leaders, handling day-to-day problems, and coordinating and staffing the organization23. In latter part of the last century, management’s two “children” evolved into leadership and project management fields21. Management practices are considered for many centuries as planning, organizing, directing, and controlling. Management skills were required for all mega events including building Great Wall of China, preparing armies for battle, and running the Roman Empire. Traditionally, management was viewed as an art that transferred from generation to generation until late nineteen centuries and science of management has also developed in last hundred years21. The definition and functions of management are substantially agreed while there is a little agreement on definition and functions of leadership, or whether it is a discipline or not but mostly scholars agree that it is a discipline21.  Kotter, a professor of leadership at Harvard Business School argued that both leadership and management are distinct but still complementary systems of action in organizations.  The management is about dealing with complexity in projects while leadership is about coping with the change through projects10. Leadership is not different from management just due to like and dislike of people and leadership is not numinous and inexplicable. The difference between roles of leadership and management in any organization is that a project manager act as a problem solver by finding the best options to achieve defined project objectives and ensure to perform assigned responsibilities efficiently by the project team. On the contrary, leaders create vision and wisdom, and build up strategic guidelines for long-term problems24. There is a significant aim for research on project leadership due to field of project management which include leadership theories and models. It is essential that project management field must take the responsibility for development of apt theories of project leadership either using deductive approach or inductive approach25.  In project management literature, there has been written little about more common question of “what project managers do”19,26. In fact, literature focused much about what project managers should do but less noticed about what they actually do and how can teach, improve and help through project management26. The new approach in project management is strategic project leadership which is focusing to create competitive advantage through projects and providing opportunities for winning in the market place24.  In project management perspective, project managers are basically planning agents as they are the architects of project plan27.  Accordingly, it is fair argument in project management theory  that ‘plan your work’ and then ‘work your plan’19.  An accepted proverb among researchers and project manager is that “failing to plan is planning to fail”27. Effective planning play key role for project managers to deliver project successfully including customer satisfaction and successful implementation 19.  For every successful project, planning and scheduling are seen cornerstone as well as key predictor and contributor of project success28. The prediction about functions of the project managers in future to become key players in organizational world26, has been come to reality19. The project managers are required to be focused towards achieving the success and winning the market place by expanding the role from just getting the jobs done24. Firstly, the project manager essentially plan to ensure project success and secondly perform the task of “getting things done” in standard project management19.  The project managers perform similar functions like other mangers in narrow terms which include planning, motivation, scheduling and controlling29.  It is the project manager’s responsibility to ensure properly planning, implementation, and completion of the project30. Project managers mostly do planning irrespective of project type  as “planning is the first step a project manager should take in beginning of a project”31. The project managers must efficiently handle all aspects of project leadership including strategic, operational and human, in order to grow and become a real leader24. The fundamental question of “what mangers do”16 has obtained constructive debate among researcher and practitioners17 and the role of project managers is similar to other managers19. There are some key differences between roles of managers and project managers, while projects are not permanent and their temporality might impact on work performance of project 
Research Journal of Recent Sciences ______________________________________________________________ ISSN 2277-2502Vol. 2(5), 44-48, May (2013)                             Res. J. Recent Sci.   International Science Congress Association 
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managers19.  The ‘project-as-practice’ school of thought strives to address performance of projects in general and practices of project managers in particular32. There is a real difference exist between leadership and project manager  in complex working environment but yet a complementary relationship between these two roles are supposed to be performed by the project manager.  An intrigue distinction between leader and project manager roles identified by Bennis33 is that ‘a leader does the right things (effectiveness); a manager does things right (efficiency), while project leader create vision for project, bring together the resources, and provide motivation and inspiration to project stakeholders in doing the right things to achieve the project objectives.  Leaders focus on what needs to be done while managers focus on how things get done, namely ‘leaders do the right things and managers do things right’24.  Leaders and managers are very different as leaders develop entrepreneurial culture while managers create managerial culture in organization34. Warren Bennis35 highlighted the difference between leaders and manager through the statement “To survive in the twenty-first century, we are going to need a new generation of leaders – leaders, not managers. Successful project managers and successful leaders are not complement of each other in exceptional successful projects24. The distinction is an important one. Leaders conquer the context – the volatile, turbulent, ambiguous surroundings that sometimes seem to conspire against us and will surely suffocate us if we let them – while managers surrender to it”. Bennis36 most recently summarized his quotations as “Managers do things right, while leaders do the right things”. Leaders focuses on people and looks outward while mangers focuses on things and looks inward22.   Significance of Project leadershipResearch on Leadership progressed in last century while research on project management evolved in latter part of the last century21, and as a result, project leadership evolved in 21st century to cope with competitive challenges. Project leadership is about knowledge and creation of learning37,  which occurs during project execution and across the projects in organization24. Project leadership is the ability to lead in most powerful manner while leading the others in project work 38. Project leadership impact on improving project management practices in order to reduce uncertainty and complexity associated with project pursuit39.  A strong project leadership is required to deal with administrative or bureaucratic projects but it does not mean that strong leader is always a more successful leader40.  Any strong leadership with week management and vise versa is always not better for good results but actual challenge to use combination of strong management and strong leadership for balancing each other. Though some people have the ability to be a strong manager but cannot be an excellent leader, in contrast, some people have great leadership capabilities but find difficult to become a strong manager due to certain reasons29. Project leadership is about leading others in project which is different and additive to project management but there may some overlap. Project management focused on managing the project work whereas leading others is focused more towards individuals on their ways of working to perform best work on projects38. All project leaders must face any of the three issues related to variety of task, personnel and commitment situations which are more complex in projects than in on-going operations due projects exceptional demands of their temporary nature and unique outcomes21. To understand that project leaders must make timely decision is the science of project leadership due to its perspective – that decision must be made21.  The project management will be totally different in coming years than last five decade as it is evolving rapidly24. Project leaders must be able to facilitate subordinates for making sense of changes and provide guidance and support for ambiguous changes41.  The organizations initiate projects for business success and ‘getting the job done’  is not sufficient24.  Today, there is a need to find out new ways of vibrant and competitive business environment to make the projects more competitive and powerful tools42. Project leaders try to improve development process in decision making as required by the art of project leadership21. There is also a need of new leader, or leaders at expense of managers which is need of people who can be both43. A move have been made from task perspective to a leadership perspective within project context in recent project management literature review44. The ability of project leader is essential for successful management of projects40. The duties of project leader’s include gathering and distributing information, leading, planning, coordinating, moderating, and controlling the project team43. Project leadership is becoming important due to increase of project-based organizations in industrial importance as well as due to lack of studies within project management literature22. Obviously, it is not possible for everyone to be effective for both leading and managing29.  Essence of Project Leadership  It is mandatory for the project leadership during planning and execution of project to apply sound project management practices38. Project leadership rather than just focusing on time and budget, they consider customer needs on day-to-day basis, future market and competitive advantage to manage project strategically24. In project leadership, the essence of leading others focus on empowering the individuals in order to create the situations and environment for effective and efficient performance38. Project leadership is supposed to access needs of project team and help them for best project performance by meeting the team members frequently and by providing more empowering environment38. To achieve outstanding results and 
Research Journal of Recent Sciences ______________________________________________________________ ISSN 2277-2502Vol. 2(5), 44-48, May (2013)                             Res. J. Recent Sci.   International Science Congress Association 
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overcome gigantic obstacles, peoples are transformed and inspired by the visionary project leaders24. The first principle of strategic project leadership is to develop the project managers of yesterday to learn the power of leadership for motivating, inspiring and coaching right intelligence24. Effective project leaders are capable to articulate an inspiring project vision and build an appropriate project spirit or spark aligned with project strategy which create energy, excitement, and commitment24 among the project team to perform efficiently to ensure project success. Project leadership assert own wisdom to make difficult decisions by using leadership techniques and give directions to the project team according to the situations38.  The project leadership strategically focus on projects for creating competitive advantage as well as winning the market place rather than focusing on “getting the job done”  and the strategic project leadership approach provide step-by-step guidelines for projects turning into successful competitive weapons, to project managers and business organizations.   Often project leadership is concerned to perform following three common types of responsibilities performed by project leaders. First, project leaders need to continuously make decisions according to changing situations and aware of project details. Second, project leaders must identify project priorities and continue to insist that these priorities must be adhered. Finally, project leaders must see and communicate with key stakeholders to integrate the project into grander scheme of things which benefited to both within the performing organization as well as customer organization21. Now time has come to move truly toward strategic project leadership to lead and manage the projects effectively and efficiently. The project leadership must address project spirit properly and must know how to define and cultivate vision for energizing and bringing out the best people24. Conclusion The essence of project leadership is significant to project management while professionals must acquire fundamental skills and competencies of both leadership and management to ensure accomplishment of project and organizational objectives. An effective project leadership always have right competencies and skills for right jobs at right time which necessitates for an ample need of research on project leadership. Therefore more comprehensive research is desired to appraise benefits generally related to project leadership and especially project manager’s leadership associations with project performance and teamwork through different empirical studies at industry, sector and country level to address the emerging challenges of the 21stcentury. 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