Course Report: IT Project Managers - Ethics, Leadership, Technology

This report delves into the multifaceted role of IT project managers, examining their responsibilities in organizational leadership, including maintaining staff and supporting strategic plans. It identifies three key human resource factors – technological, social, and economic – that impact project management, along with recommendations for conflict resolution techniques like withdrawal/avoidance, smooth/accommodate, and compromise/reconcile to enhance team productivity. The report also outlines three leadership approaches: laissez-faire, participative, and supportive leadership, emphasizing the importance of ethical considerations such as human rights, safety standards, and fair selection processes. Finally, it assesses the crucial role of technology in supporting project managers in managing teams, improving communication, and ensuring projects stay on schedule and within budget, highlighting the use of project management software and cloud-based data storage.

Running head: ASSIGNMENT 3
Assignment 3: IT Project Managers – Balancing Ethics, Leadership, & Technology
Student’s Name:
Professor’s Name:
Course Title:
Date:

1ASSIGNMENT 3
Table of Contents
1. Discussion of two different roles of IT project manager in organizational leadership.......2
2. Three human resource factors affect project management.................................................2
3. Recommendation of three conflict resolution techniques that IT project manager take to
keep project team members productive......................................................................................3
4. Three leadership approaches...............................................................................................4
5. Three ethical situations that IT project manager faces in role within the organization......5
6. Assess role of technology in the project management........................................................6
References..................................................................................................................................8

2ASSIGNMENT 3
1. Discussion of two different roles of IT project manager in organizational
leadership
Following are the different roles of the IT project manager towards the organizational
leadership such as:
a. Maintain staffs by recruitment, selection, orientation and training of the
employees (Meng & Boyd, 2017). There is also maintaining of effectiveness
of organization by delivering plus supporting strategic plans to implement the
information technologies.
b. Maintain professional as well as technical knowledge through educational
workshops, review and establish personal networks and participate into the
professional societies (Rezvani, et al., 2016).
2. Three human resource factors affect project management
The human factors are those which can help to improve the performance of project
team and personal performance. Following are the human resources factors which are
affecting the project management such as:
Technological factors: Into the business organization, there is usage of various
technologies and the technical group can develop the project which require only usage of
particular technologies. The technical group is appointed to work with new technologies
so that they should learn development and collaboration with the project (Harrison &
Lock, 2017). Hiring of technical employees as well as providing project to the third party
is a time consuming process which affect both time as well as money of the business
organization.
Social factors: Into the business organization, all the members into project group are
from various backgrounds, therefore collaboration as well as communication to each

3ASSIGNMENT 3
other becomes difficult. Sometimes, it is seen that experienced employees have to work
with non-experienced employees. The junior employees are taking time to complete the
project work which will lead to increase cost (Netland, 2016). Communication problems
are raised which affect the organization.
Economic factors: The organization spends money to provide technical training to
the staffs, salaries of human resources and extra payment for extra hour’s shifts.
Sometimes, the organization is running out of budget when the employees are suddenly
asking for hikes. The employees are sometimes switch their jobs which lead to again
selection and recruitment of new employees (DeCenzo, Robbins, & Verhulst, 2016).
Therefore, cost is one of the main factor which affect the organization performance.
3. Recommendation of three conflict resolution techniques that IT project manager
take to keep project team members productive
The conflict resolution technique is making a difference among the positive as well as
negative outcomes of the project. The project manager is responsible for monitoring as
well as resolving the conflicts in the earlier stage before it provides a huge effect on the
business organization (Wehr, 2019). Conflict resolution can enable the employees to
solve the problems rapidly as well as effectively so that it can allow flow of the project
activities to be continued into the workplaces without any extended disruptions because
of conflicts which goes unresolved.
Following are the conflict resolution techniques which are recommended to keep the
team productive such as:
Withdraw/avoid: Into this conflict resolution technique, the project manager will
avoid the project conflicts so that it can save the time of project manager which will they
invest into the team productivity. Apart from the benefit, the disadvantage of this conflict

4ASSIGNMENT 3
resolution technique is that it can weaken the position of project manager which provide a
negative effect on project manager and team’s relations.
Smooth/accommodate: The manager tries to find out areas of argument so that the
can take smooth decisions based on it. This technique can provide sufficient time to find
out the solution of conflicts, brings harmony and creates goodwill. When the project
manager is concern regarding taking a decision of conflict, then third party can taking
advantage of that particular situation (Singer, 2018). Therefore, the project manager can
weaken its position as authority leader.
Compromise/reconcile: In this conflict resolution technique, the project manager
takes suggestions from third party and tries to compromise with the situation. The parties
are involved into the conflict resolution so that all the conflicts are resolved on time. This
technique brings faster result as well as lowers the stress of people. The disadvantage of
this technique is that it is not bringing trust among the project members in long run.
Using the above three conflict resolution techniques, the conflicts among the project
team members are being resolved. It can allow for constructive changes to be occurred.
The struggles will help everyone to involve into conflict to work throughout the problems
while there is development of stronger relations. The benefit of those identified methods
are that it can facilitate towards achievement of project goals (Gren & Lenberg, 2018). It
can make progress towards accomplishment of project goals. A better conflict resolution
can help to develop skills which are useful in this areas.
4. Three leadership approaches
In the business organization, the subordinates are working efficiently with those
project manager those have leadership style to take project related decisions. In order to

5ASSIGNMENT 3
get success into the project, the leaders are required to have skills to take decisions.
Following are the three leadership approaches which are used:
Laissez faire leadership: This type of leadership approach can hand off by means of
minimal directions as well as supervision from the project manager to the staffs. This
approach is used when the leader is well trained and worked as intermediaries among the
project manager plus employees (Northouse, 2018).
Participative leadership: The project manager can hand off to allow people to tap
with creativity as well as think critically by using their own initiative. The leader is
maintaining control for guiding its visions to the project team without imposing its
decisions on the employee’s decisions. They should be more trusted in their decisions.
Supportive leadership: The leader should be supportive by concerning about the
employees and encourage them to involve into the decision making processes so that they
can take project related decisions (Antonakis & Day, 2017). Based on the situations, the
leader can take decisions and they gave authority to delegate the employees engaged into
decision making.
In order to get success into the project plan, leadership approaches are required to
improve success, understand the leadership style is vital as it is analysing based on the
strengths as well as weaknesses of persons. A good leader has stronger communication
skills, passion and commitments, positivity plus better collaboration with the project team
members to understand them and their needs.
5. Three ethical situations that IT project manager faces in role within the
organization
The project manager is always facing ethical issues in their role and the main issue is
that they are not provided with proper training regarding solving the ethical issues. The

6ASSIGNMENT 3
ethical issues are related to the workplace and if those are not mitigated on time then it
results to decrease efficiency of the project team members. Following are the ethical
situations which are taken into consideration by the IT project manager in the
organization such as:
Violation of the human rights: The IT project manager can misuse its powers by
violation of the rights of humans and workers. Sometimes, they engaged the project team
members in their work even after the working hours. It will decrease the motivational
level of the team members (Ferrell, 2016).
Ignore the health and safety standards: The organization is protecting their workers
or employees by setting strict health as well as safety standards but most of the project
manager ignores this standard and lead to safety issues to the workers.
Selection of wrong people: The project manager hires family members, relatives as
well as friends as a project team without focused on their lack of skills plus qualifications
to work in the project (Mason, 2017).
When the project manager can overcome with those ethical issues, then the project
can get success and they can play a key role into the project as a leader.
6. Assess role of technology in the project management
The technology plays a key role to support the project manager for management of the
project efficiently. It is used to determine role of project manager to manage the project
team members as well as improve performance of project.
a. By means of technology, the project management platform keeps the project
team to follow a strict project deadlines (Meng & Boyd, 2017). With support

7ASSIGNMENT 3
of technology, collaboration can help to complete project tasks on scheduled
time.
b. Project management software tool makes the team to calculate and track time
spent on each of the project tasks. The project software helps to measure if the
project is on right track and also determines the project progress so that the
project can complete in scheduled timeframe.
c. It has improved accessibility plus prompt instant communication among the
project team members.
d. Storage of data on cloud plus hard drive makes it possible to take back up of
data and secure to keep those records on the file when the computer is
encountering the issues (Harrison & Lock, 2017).
e. Excel spreadsheets are used to keep track of the business expenses and
business revenue. The project management software should solve the budget
issues which excel is not.

8ASSIGNMENT 3
References
Antonakis, J., & Day, D. V. (Eds.). (2017). The nature of leadership. Sage publications.
DeCenzo, D. A., Robbins, S. P., & Verhulst, S. L. (2016). Fundamentals of Human Resource
Management, Binder Ready Version. John Wiley & Sons.
Ferrell, O. C. (2016). A framework for understanding organizational ethics. In Business
ethics: New challenges for business schools and corporate leaders (pp. 15-29).
Routledge.
Gren, L., & Lenberg, P. (2018). The Importance of Conflict Resolution Techniques in
Autonomous Agile Teams. situations, 10, 23.
Harrison, F., & Lock, D. (2017). Advanced project management: a structured approach.
Routledge.
Mason, R. O. (2017). Four ethical issues of the information age. In Computer Ethics (pp. 41-
48). Routledge.
Meng, X., & Boyd, P. (2017). The role of the project manager in relationship
management. International Journal of Project Management, 35(5), 717-728.
Netland, T. H. (2016). Critical success factors for implementing lean production: the effect of
contingencies. International Journal of Production Research, 54(8), 2433-2448.
Northouse, P. G. (2018). Leadership: Theory and practice. Sage publications.
Rezvani, A., Chang, A., Wiewiora, A., Ashkanasy, N. M., Jordan, P. J., & Zolin, R. (2016).
Manager emotional intelligence and project success: The mediating role of job
satisfaction and trust. International Journal of Project Management, 34(7), 1112-
1122.

9ASSIGNMENT 3
Singer, L. (2018). Settling disputes: Conflict resolution in business, families, and the legal
system. Routledge.
Wehr, P. (2019). Conflict regulation. Routledge.