Your first introduction as a team leader...

I see leadership as an essential element to being a project manager. If I have to direct everything on a project, the team is limited by my own bandwidth. If instead I can develop a set of shared expectations among the team and empower them to make decisions aligned with those expectations, they can accomplish far more than the limits of my own vision.

Great point on the safety within the team. We are going to be making some changes which inevitably leads to some problems and discomfort. Working through those problems is going to be critical to leveraging the skills of the team. Accepting up front that trying new things won't always go as planned and that is OK so long as we can still manage the outcome is an excellent expectation to set for the team. I'm going to have to think more on that one.

I thought it might be a fun question. I've been thinking about this all weekend myself. I'm essentially taking on the role of the PM team leader in a small PMO. We have been reorganizing, will be growing the team, and will be making changes to the processes as we go, and my role will be both managing projects, and the evolving team.

I have been trying to think of the question in terms of what I as a PM myself would want to hear from a team leader at the outset of a new project/reorganization, since I have the opportunity to frame the working relationship going forward.

I love your 2nd point. #1 is central to my leadership style, however I'm sure I could personally do a better job of showing how our work aligns not only with the company's objectives, but also to the individuals contributing.

I disagree. Project manager must be a manager, not a leader. One of the first things is to detect who could be or is the leader into the team. Obviously, Project manager can be both, but it is not needed. Lot of people is a great project manager without being a leader. Lot of people and consultants are using leadership as a sell argument and some people think that they can not be project managers because they are not able to be leaders which jeopardizes project management discipline.

I find your perspective very interesting. Is this based on your current position within PepsiCo? If the PM is not the "leader", who then is the leader of the project?

Perhaps due to english is not my first language I am not understanding @Keith post. Indeed the project manager will be the head of the team but it does not mean to be a leader from the point of view of lidership. PM manage and facilitate. Could be the leader? Sure, but if not she/he can perform project manager without problem. That is based on my personal experience, personal research (I have presented papers and performed conferences including the PMI). Just to comment, from the first time I have assigned as project manager I have to lead the team and from that time I always have the possibility to be the leader too. But I hate very much when some people that I helped along this years and today are very successful project managers came to me and said "I can not manage a project because I have not leadership ability". That is totally wrong. Just take a look to sports, Do you think that the coach is the leader of the team? Most of the time is not what you will see. That´s has no impact on the project manager accountability. Sometimes I´d like to make a comparision between the project manager and the orchestra director. Each orchestra could have more than one leader for each instrument and the orchestra director is not the leader, is the integrator, is the facilitator and indeed is how take the decisions about team orchestration.