Project-Oriented Leadership

From the perspective of delivering successful projects, the value of a skilled project sponsor and project manager outweighs many other factors. Projects need leaders who can give them vision, identity, keep the stakeholders and the project team on board and make the difficult decisions that will enable the project to continue (or, if necessary, be terminated). These are human skills that don't necessarily feature large in the project management bodies of knowledge. Ralf Müller and Rodney Turner's Project-Oriented Leadership explains the key leadership models of managerial, intellectual and emotional leadership and shows how they can be applied within projects to lead processes, functions and people, and ensure an ethical and inclusive approach within projects and programs.

About the Authors

Dr. Ralf Müller is Associate Professor in Project Management at Umeå University in Sweden and Adjunct Professor of Project Management at the Norwegian School of Management BI and at SKEMA Business School in France, as well as visiting faculty member at Tiasnimbas Business School in The Netherlands. He lectures and researches in project, program, and portfolio management, in project governance, and in research methodologies. His research is published in more than 80 scientific publications, including four books, and a large number of book chapters, peer reviewed journal and conference papers. He is engaged in the further development of the profession as founder of two Project Management Institute chapters in Europe and as an active participant in the development of the Project Management Institute standards for program management, portfolio management, and the Organizational Project Management Maturity Model (OPM3). Prior to his academic career he was the worldwide Director of Project Management at NCR Corporation's Teradata Business Unit. He has consulted organizations and governments in 45 countries worldwide and frequently speaks at academic and practitioner conferences, such as those of the Project Management Institute, the International Project Management Association and NASA.

Rodney Turner is Professor of Project Management at the SKEMA Business School, Lille. He is visiting professor at The Centre for Project Management in the Kemmy Business School, Limerick, and the Henley Business School. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Technology Sydney. He lectures on and teaches project management world wide. Rodney was for twelve years a member of Council of the UK's Association for Project Management. He is now an Honorary Fellow and Vice President. He has also been President and Chairman of the International Project Management Association, the global federation of national associations in project management. Rodney is the author or editor of sixteen books, including The Handbook of Project-based Management, the best-selling book published by McGraw-Hill, and the Gower Handbook of Project Management. He is editor of The International Journal of Project Management and has written articles for journals, conferences and magazines.