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Eight traits or skills associated with being an effective project manager
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Introduction
It is true that a project manager required numerous skills in order to lead a team to a solution or project completion. Leading a project to its successful implementation requires many skills and traits that range from common project management abilities to unique knowledge and experience. (Wu) The qualities Wu suggest that a project manager has similar, if not the same, definition as a leadership. Knowledge, experience, communication, organization, and leadership skills are qualities and traits for both. I will conduct a self-assessment and be assessed by a subordinate using the Project Management Skill Set Assessment (PMSSA) to either confirm or expose any dissimilarity of my project management skills.
Looking Back
Outstanding project managers possess numerous characteristics that are fostered from their educational background and continuous professional education, and are influenced from previous experiences. The common characteristics of an outstanding project manager are those traits that distinguish them from their peers. The outcome of a project rests with the project manager and his/her ability to navigate the political currents of the organization with the support of the project sponsor and steering committee while creating an information solution from disparate technologies and diverse business requirements. (Wu) I strongly agree that the outcome of a project rests with the project manager.
With my routine in place and responsibilities understood, I find that I may not be the same person I was a short year ago. Previously I was that leader, that project manager who was at the deck plate level ensuring the organizations missions and goals were completed or executed. Currently I find myself more ...
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...y. My performance as project manager is scrutinized and observed by my subordinates and supervisors on a daily basis. I is vital to perform at the level expected. As I reflect on the assessments, either my own or conducted by others, I begin to think that either my characteristics and traits have improved or others are not truly giving me their opinion. Either way, as I progress through my organization I have learned through experiences how to react, perform, and lead others though completion of goals.
Works Cited
Pines, A. M. (2005). The Burnout measure: Short version (BMS), International Journal of Stress Management, 12, 78–88.
Wu, J. (2005) Characteristics of an Outstanding Business Intelligence Project Manager. Information Management Magazine, May. Retrieved September 16, 2011, from http://www.information-management.com/issues/20050501/1026063-1.html
Ivancevich, Konopaske, & Matteson, 2011 defines burnout as a psychological process, brought about by unrelieved work stress that results in emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and feeling of decreased accomplishment. Examples of emotional exhaustion includes; feeling drained by work, fatigue in the morning, frustrated, and do not want to work with others. Depersonalization is when a person has become emotionally hardened by their job, treat others like objects, do not care what happens to them, and feel others blame them. A low feeling of accomplishment also results from burnout. A person is unable to deal with problems effectively, identify or understand others problems, and no longer feel excited by their job. (Ivancevich et al., 2011).
It is important to explore the repercussions of burnout left untreated. In extreme situations, burnout can lead to death or suicide. Individuals in the helping professions experience high turnover rates due to the termination of employment, either from the helping professional themselves, from not taking care of burnout as it happens, or from their employer, if the burnout accidentally leads to mistakes made at work. Therefore, exploring how burnout affects the world can help provide an understanding for importance of mitigating burnout.
Burnout is termed as the exhaustion of an individual’s overall well-being. To put it simply, it is experienced when there is too much stress, generally in the work environment. This leads to emotional, mental, and physical strain, making it difficult for one to perform his or her job proficiently (Ericksen, 2015). Adriaenssens (2015) indicates, that burnout impacts emotional aspect the most. In correlation with nursing, negative effects of this ordeal include poor patient outcomes, and compromised safety for both patient and nurse. Evidently, these are precipitating factors that contribute to the deterioration of the healthcare system stemming from the direct and indirect damage that
Graham, R. J. & Randall, L., Creating an Environment for Successful Projects: The Quests to Manage Project Management, second ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 65-113, 2003.
Burnout has become a major social, cultural and health issue. It has also become globally significant. It affects all kinds of people regardless of their age, race, gender, etc. It can occur at any stage in one’s life and affect them on a physical, emotional, social or cultural level. There is a lot of stigma associated with burnout in the society. Education is key to break the stigma. The risk for burnout has risen significantly in certain occupations, notably in the field of human services. Self-awareness as well as awareness of others is important to identify the problem and treat it in the most suitable manner. This paper considers understanding burnout by examining a few
Crawford (2000) suggests that project leadership is the highest ranking category among project management competence factors. Project management leadership style affects overall project performance. Recent research supports the idea that successful projects are led by individuals who possess not only a blend of technical and management knowledge, but also leadership skills that are internally compatible with the motivation of the project team (Slevin and Pinto, 1988; Turner et al., 1998). Zimmerer and Yasin (1998) found that positive leadership contributed almost 76% to the success of projects. Negative or poor leadership contributed 67% to the failure of projects. Project leaders need both, relationships and task oriented leadership styles, to cope with the challenges within different phases of project (Slevin and Pinto, 1991). In projects, project leaders must lead their teams towards completing defined goals with in a fixed time scale. Verma (1997) states “Achieving the goal or final aim is the ultimate test of leadership”. Goals and tasks are achieved through people thus making people an important resource for
Project management is said to be completed within time when it completed within the “triple constraints”: cost, time and quality. And in a lot of causes, one them is sacrificed so as to meet the other two. Project managers prioritize which ones are the most important.
A project manager should be aware of the key challenges and threats an organization would face as well as he/she should have the skills to tackle the crises effectively and efficiently. In addition to that, a project manager should also be able to convey the thoughts and ideas in a convenient manner who is responsible to make a framework for an effective communication to ensure clear communication between the team members even though the style of communication would be different based on the situation.
In the globalized economy, Successful project managers are in much demand across many industries. Organizations strongly need experienced project managers to lead their staff to accomplish their business goals and deliver successful projects. In an increasingly complex environment, project managers need to turn into many roles and have all kinds of responsibilities at each level of management within an organization. Good project managers are not born. They need to be trained. They develop their skills through study, practise and experience. They become better project managers after they finish a successful project each time. They learn new techniques and apply them on their projects. They learn their lessons from failed projects and then improve to be better project managers in the future.
Burnout is a response to chronic emotional stress due to those factors, resulting in reduced job productivity, and emotional and/or physical exhaustion. (Perlman & Hartman, 1982). Many studies consider burnout to be a job-related stress condition or even work-related mental health impairment, with the ICD-10 closely tying burnout with the diagnosis of work-related neurasthenia (Awa et al., 2010; Maslach, Schaufeli, & Leiter, 2001; World Health Organization, 1992). Numerous conceptualisation of the burnout phenomenon has been posited but most researchers favour a multidimensional definition developed by Maslach and colleagues (1993; 1996) that encompasses three aspects: emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation, and reduced personal accomplishment at work.
Project managers are typically responsible for planning, directing, and completing projects and with that come a high level of responsibility. Leadership abilities must be strong, as the project manager will be tasked to lead several teams. They must be able to delegate tasks and responsibilities impartially that will maintain cohesiveness among teams throughout the project. Experience plays a role in leading teams and being able to manage conflicts is a key leadership trait. Furthermore, the ability to use a variety management styles will benefit the project manager throughout the course of a project.
Over the course of my professional life, I have become increasingly involved in project management roles. Doing so has made me aware of the many varied challenges that can face projects and the project managers who are charged with bringing them through to completion. The success or failure of projects, in whatever economic, political or social field, rests not just on the quality of the project’s goals, but also on the abilities of those involved in the project – and above all those who are managing it – to bring it to successful completion. To do this, project managers need to be equipped with a very wide range of skills, many of which are unrelated to the type of project itself. So, for example, a project manager of an engineering project must not only have engineering
Another, as a project manager, you should also have leadership skills, team building skills, and trust building. In my opinion, these three links with each other. In order to lead, you have to know your team well and to build their trust in order to work well together. You don’t put people in a team because they know each other, but because of the specific skill set they can bring to the table. You should know their strengths and weaknesses and assign a certain people in a team that will complete it.
Project Management is one of the most crucial parts of an organization and to execute this area there is the need for the project management skills. Today, for the project managers across verticals need to possess the calibre and potential to acquire their career goals and higher position in the organization.
When planning a new project, how the project will be managed is one of the most important factors. The importance of a managers will determine the success of the project. The success of the project will be determined by how well it is managed. Project management is referred to as the discipline that entails the processes of carefully planning, organizing, controlling, and motivating the organization resources so as to foster and facilitate the achievement of specific established and desired goals and meet the specific criteria of success required in the organization (Larson, 2014). Over the course of this paper I will be discussing and analyzing the importance of project management.