Harvard Business Review Project Management Handbook

9.

Project Leadership

Competencies for Effective Project Management and Sponsorship

This chapter looks at the competencies required to become an effective project manager or project sponsor. It examines how people in both positions can transcend the customary outlines of these roles to become successful project leaders.

Traditionally, the focus of the project manager role was to develop a detailed plan and to monitor a team of experts who get the work done. These are essentially the hard, technical skills of project management. The project sponsor also had a primary focus on the technical aspects of the project—ensuring that the project manager would deliver the project on time, on scope, and on budget. Both these aspects of project guidance ...