Leadership in Projects: Back to High School

Kenneth has 14 years of healthcare experience in government and private industry. Over eight years of experience managing healthcare IT projects, operations, contracts, and personnel. His work experience includes project management, contracts and procurements, data analysis, claims adjudication, business writing, and business process modeling. Kenneth was certified in 2006 as a Project Management Professional.

  Communications Management   Talent Management  

Many project managers have a tendency to get caught up in gantt charts, risks, issues and scope management on big projects. It is important to remember though that project management is about leading a group of people who are supposed to be working together to finish a project. Project teams can be dysfunctional and non-productive without a good leader; it is up to the project manager and the project management office to provide that leadership and make sure that everyone does their part in order for the project to be successful.

Project managers can come from diverse backgrounds, and not all of them have experience leading others. There are developers, analysts and people with many other skill sets who have either chosen to move into project management or, more often than not, been put into that position by management for one reason or another (sometimes willingly, sometimes not). Whether a project manager has a lot of experience or no experience at all leading teams, there are some basic guidelines they can follow in order to lead people successfully.

Going back to high school and looking at the roles of different faculty members will help the project manager. Sometimes the project manager will take on one or two of these roles, but often it is up to the project manager to fill all three…

Teacher
The teacher is the most common faculty member at a …

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