Project Leadership: Good And Poor Behaviour Cases – Analysis

Exemplary good project behaviour

The aim of the assessment is to select some project based case and analyse them properly to identify project behaviour and classify then according to good, bad and ugly. Here the case studies that have been selected is drawn from personal experience and interaction with a project. The categorization of the behaviour has been done as per the standard project management practise. The analysis for each of the behaviour has been done in three section. In one section the context and the case has been discussed, then in the next section the justification for the categorization of the identified behaviours as good, bad or ugly has been provided. Then in the next section the lessons that have been learned from the case has been listed as well.

The context of the case is related to a personal experience of team building and team work for organizing cultural fest at the college.

As per the requirement we need to work in team and we also decided the roles and responsibility for each and every team. Leader for the team was also set. The leader impressed all the team members with his brilliant leadership skill. Although the roles and responsibility was decided, the leader individually interacted with each and every team member to identify if all the people has properly understood the responsibility and things they need to do. However there was conflict between some team members as they thought that role distribution is not proper as their position of student coordination is not significant as the position of financial management. Even though they have greater experience in this. The argument even reached to such an extent that it could hamper the project progress and hence the project success as well. However the leader was quick to identify this as he kept very close interaction with the team members.

The he called for meeting with those team members which thought that roles and distribution is not proper and then explained in details the details behind the distribution of the role and responsibility. He explained in details that 3 of the team members who have been assigned for the finance team does not have the  experience student coordination and how this should be done of the tech fest which they have as they have already executed this role previously and have proper experience need for the post. He also explained that their evaluation of student coordination post is not correct either. Even this post is as important as the post of financial management. So he wanted someone who can justify the importance of the post with experience. As he properly explained the importance of the position and he have chosen then for the post, they were convinced and agreed to serve the position with respect and dedication.

This case is a good example of project behaviour and leadership .if the leader did not identified the issue, not only there would be difference and conflicts within team, it would have hampered the project progress and success (Aga, Noorderhaven and Vallejo 2016) . However the early inspection of the leader have helped to identify the issue and resolve that effectively. The roles and responsibility of the leader is not only limited to team formation and team distribution, he or she should keep close interaction with the team as well (Todorovi? et al. 2015). It would help to identify issues or conflict within the team and resolve that as well.  Here the leader has shown transformational leadership skill effectively (Anon 2018).

Critical reflection for identifying the behaviour as good, bad or ugly

When roles and responsibility with a team, it is distributed as per the experience and evaluation of the team members decided by the leader and higher authorities of the project. But that evaluation is not always clear to the team members and hence does not agree with the decision leading to conflict and differences within team members (Humphrey et al. 2017). Hence leader should identify these issues and make them accounted with the process so that conflicts are managed more efficiently. Communication and interaction with team is an important responsibility of any leader to successfully lead a team without conflict. Proper communication and interaction hence serve as an important project behaviour.

The context of this case is also related to the same project identified in the previous section.

The progress of the project was running smoothly. The estimated budget was also secured from funding and sponsorship. However two team members informed few days before that they would not be able to appear for 2 days. As there was not any prior information and backup was not available to substitute their work. Now it was poor behaviour form the team member but the project manager should be accounted for this as well. Because it is always important to have proper backup plan as project based work should always have plan b if plan have some issues and need to be modified for project progress.

The behaviour of the team members is obviously bad in this case as they did not followed the professionalism needed for executing team based work (Lee et al. 2015). As a team member it is always important to think of the team, respect each and every team members and should also ensure that their activities do not hamper the overall team performance (Anon 2018). Here the team member who was absent during the project execution should have notified it earlier so that it is easier to arrange backup for their work. But they did not show that professional attitude.

However the decision of the project manager not to have a backup plan or alternative plan is example of poor behaviour as well. It shows that project manager lacks leadership skill especially transactional leadership qualities which enhances problem solving skill and deriving solution based on project issues (Anon 2018).

Some key lesson regarding project leadership and project execution has been learned in this case. Transactional leadership is an effective quality that project manager should have. It helps to derive solution based on project issues.

In addition to that one important lesson that is also learned in this case is that project based work, especially where team effort plays an important role, often need to address various issues and lack of resource is one of them. Hence there should be proper estimation of the resource for the project and also develop plan for the alternative solution if project needs to deal with some issue so that project progress is not affected.

When there is resource scarcity like if team members is not available project manager should be able to arrange substitute for that and this is only possible if proper plan is developed before execution of the project is started. Only then it is possible for the manager to execute the project without interruption

The lessons learnt for project management practice

The context of these case study is based on the project discussed in the previous sections. The same project has been considered here as well to discuss a project behaviour considered as ugly as it is not justified at all with reference to standard project management principle.

The finance team for the cultural event project was really working well and they even brought many sponsorship for the event. Though it was team effort, the leader to inspire the less experienced team members appreciated them more. However this did not work well with the other team member who was the most experienced than all in the finance team. So he decided to manipulate the less experienced team members so that he can prove that the it is because of him that other team members was so successful in acquiring sponsorship for the event of the cultural festival. However it was quickly identified by the team leader and he tried to solve the issue within the team by arranging team meeting.

Although the issue could not hamper the project as it was identified effectively, but the intention was to hamper the project. When there is such intention within the team, even it is for a single person it has the capability to affect the overall team work. When team work is not proper it encourages destructive conflict which means decision for the project is not proper and strategies are not executed properly (Yeung, Fung and Chan 2015). In team based project intention and motive of each and every team members matter as collective team effort needs participation from each and every team members (Pinha and Ahluwalia 2018). Hence such behaviour from the senior team member is not expected at all and hence it should be considered as an ugly behaviour with reference to the project management standard and principles (Anon 2018).

It is important to appriciate team based on their performance. However when a team leader apprciate team effort, it should be taken into account that the appriciation should be based on their performance and nothing else (Kerzner and Kerzner 2017). special care should also be taken for the fact that each and every team member effort should be recognized properly so that there is no misconception of biasness among the team . When team members think that the apprciation is proper, it inspires them and they feel motivated to improve their work. However when they fell that the team leader is biased thowards certain team member, it not only demotivates them it creates destructive conflict which hampers the project and affect the team effort as well which means less effective project decission and execution specially when team effort plays an important role in project planning and execution.

Conclusion:

Several lesson has been learned for the case analysis. From the analysis of the first case the report concludes that leadership plays an important role in the project execution. As a team leader it is duty of the leader to identify team conflict and resolve that properly to ensure smooth execution of the project and ensure project success. Conflict in team is a common issue in team based work. However if the conflict is ignored it has the potential to affect the project execution significantly. One of the effective strategies for solving conflicts within the team is to ensure that each and every team members is able to identify the assigned roles and responsibility and they do not have any differences with team members regarding distribution of roles. This has to be make sure by the leader and hence it is important for the leader to have transformational leadership skill.

Another important assessment is about project based work is that it has several issues and one of them is resource scarcity. If the project lacks resource it is the duty of the manager to ensure that the project progress is not affected. The manager should arrange for alternative resource and hence having a backup plan is necessary. This also test the transactional leadership skill of the manager and it is important to have this skill is essential as this helps to derive solution for a problem effectively when it is needed for the project. Transactional leadership skill is important for any manager who aspires to be project leader.

Showing biasness to some team member is not an effective option as it gives rise to destructive conflict. Hence these should be avoided as it affect the quality of the team work. While constructive conflict benefits the project progress, destructive conflict demotivates the team members to share knowledge and improve work environment which means team work sin highly completive environment that is not meant for constructive input. It creates completion between team members and the team member only thinks for personal development rather than team development and team progress. Hence any kind of performance related appreciation should be free for all kind of biases to ensure effective team collaboration and project success through effective team effort.

References:

Aga, D.A., Noorderhaven, N. and Vallejo, B., 2016. Transformational leadership and project success: The mediating role of team-building. International Journal of Project Management, 34(5), pp.806-818.

Anon, (2018). [online] Available at: https://web.stevens.edu/ses/documents/fileadmin/documents/pdf/Project%20characteristics%20and%20project%20leadership.pdf [Accessed 5 Dec. 2018].

Humphrey, S.E., Aime, F., Cushenbery, L., Hill, A.D. and Fairchild, J., 2017. Team conflict dynamics: Implications of a dyadic view of conflict for team performance. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 142, pp.58-70.

Kerzner, H. and Kerzner, H.R., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.

Lee, C.C., Lin, Y.H., Huang, H.C., Huang, W.W. and Teng, H.H., 2015. The effects of task interdependence, team cooperation, and team conflict on job performance. Social Behavior and Personality: an international journal, 43(4), pp.529-536.

Pinha, D.C. and Ahluwalia, R.S., 2018. Flexible resource management and its effect on project cost and duration. Journal of Industrial Engineering International, pp.1-15.

Todorovi?, M.L., Petrovi?, D.?., Mihi?, M.M., Obradovi?, V.L. and Bushuyev, S.D., 2015. Project success analysis framework: A knowledge-based approach in project management. International Journal of Project Management, 33(4), pp.772-783.

Yeung, D.Y., Fung, H.H. and Chan, D., 2015. Managing conflict at work: comparison between younger and older managerial employees. International Journal of Conflict Management, 26(3), pp.342-364.