Leadership Traits and Characteristics for Project Life Cycle Success

This report analyzes leadership traits and characteristics crucial for project success across all phases of the project life cycle, from initiation to closure. The analysis emphasizes the importance of leaders' ability to manage emotions, communicate effectively, inspire teamwork, and foster innovation. Key qualities include open-mindedness, forward-thinking, and the capacity to create lasting relationships with employees. The report also explores how leadership traits such as creativity, learning ability, and enthusiasm contribute to a positive work culture and team performance, even after the project's completion. The study references academic sources and highlights the critical role of leadership in achieving organizational objectives and developing project management competencies. Effective leaders inspire creativity and facilitate opportunities for business growth.

Leadership Traits
2019
Student’s Name
7/4/2019

Leadership traits 1
Introduction
The concept of leadership focuses on influencing the behaviour of the members to achieve
the goals of the organization. The leaders motivate the members towards the vision of the
company. The leader performs in the key role in four-step project life cycle .i.e. from
initiation to closure. The success of the project depends upon the characteristics and traits of
leaders (Dess and Picken, 2001)
Traits and characteristics of leaders
The characteristics that help in measuring the effectiveness of the leaders include the ability
to manage their emotions and awareness about the strengths and weakness. The self-
managing quality will allow the leader to effectively plan and execute the strategies. The
leader must be open-minded and a forward thinker to handle the uncertain complexities and
allows the leader to make the best strategic decisions. The leader has good communication
skills to effectively interact with the members and able to bring clarity in the roles and the
responsibilities (Kissi, Dainty and Tuuli, 2013). The leader must have the quality of inspiring
its workforce and promotes teamwork by collaborating the efforts and should be able to
create long lasting relations with the employee to effectively manage the complexities and
drives innovation in the organization. The leader must have the quality of empathy under
which it develops long term relations with the employees. The qualities under the
transactional style of leadership .i.e. ability to motivate and creates a positive working culture
will help with the successful implementation of the phases of life-cycle. The transparency of
the leader and engagement of employees in the decision making will allow motivating the
employees and effectively achieving the vision of the organization (Mir and Pinnington,
2014).

Leadership traits 2
Leadership characteristics that affect the team
The innovative and creative quality of the leader will help the team to take the risk and
experiment for the development of the new opportunities. This creative quality of a leader
will allow motivating the team and developing the opportunities for the business. This quality
of leader will help the employees to be persistent in their goals and develops the quality of
brainstorming and innovate new ideas for business projects. It will also develop the capacity
of accepting the change and allows flexibility in operations (Nixon, Harrington and Parker,
2012)
The learning ability quality of leader also helps to inculcate the attitude of learning among the
employees and critically applies the thinking skills to develop the creative solutions of the
completion of the projects and acceptance of the uncertainty in the accomplishment of the
objective. The enthusiasm and the competency of the leader help in creating a positive
working culture and integrating the efforts for the continuous growth of the business. This
quality of leader motivates the members to be committed towards the organization and
achieve the common goal (Yang, Huang and Wu, 2011).
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it is critical to note that the traits and characteristics of leader
allow the organization to achieve its objectives and develop the competency for completion
of stages at project life cycle. The characteristics of a leader motivate its team to foster
creativity and develop opportunities for growth of the business.

Leadership traits 3
References
Dess, G. G. and Picken, J. C. (2001) ‘Changing roles: Leadership in the 21st century’,
Organizational Dynamics, 28 (3), pp. 18-34.
Kissi, J., Dainty, A. and Tuuli, M. (2013) ‘Examining the role of transformational leadership
of portfolio managers in project performance’, International Journal of Project Management,
31 (4), pp. 485-497
Mir, F. A. and Pinnington, A. H. (2014) ‘Exploring the value of project management: linking
project management performance and project success’, International Journal of Project
Management, 32 (2), pp. 202-217.
Nixon, P., Harrington, M. and Parker, D. (2012) ‘Leadership performance is significant to
project success or failure: a critical analysis’, International Journal of Productivity and
Performance Management, 61 (2), pp. 204–216.
Yang, L.-R., Huang, C.-F. and Wu, K.-S. (2011) ‘The association among project manager’s
leadership style, teamwork and project success’, International Journal of Project
Management, 29 (3), pp. 258–267