Evaluating the Role of Leadership to Achieve Productivity in Small and Medium Size Projects Execution

Abstract

A project is a critical undertaking for any business organization that requires full dedication by all participants as the failure or success of the business. Projects influence the direction that the organization takes in the future. Leaders have a unique role to play in ensuring the productivity and success of projects in their organization especially in the contemporary business environment where change is inevitable. Many times, the overall success of a project is attributed to the leadership, given the authority and control they have over the processes as well as their role in decision-making. On the other hand, the failure of projects to accomplish their goals and objectives can be attributed to ineffective leadership. Businesses undertake projects to achieve specific objectives such as to enhance business process for high productivity, and other aspects of business success. Therefore, successful project execution is a crucial role that leaders play in any project. Leadership is a critical factor in the accomplishment of projects. During project implementation, organisational leadership play a variety of roles including setting clear goals, communicating the goals, motivating the project team, monitoring the achievement of project goals and other roles. These roles contribute to the productivity of the project team in one way. Leaders are significantly involved in PM. Projects have a lot of complexities and moving parts that requires management to monitor and take control in order to achieve high productivity while meeting deadlines and staying in the project’s scope. The study examines how organisational leadership influences productivity in SMEs during project implementation. The purpose of the study is to investigate the role of leadership in project implementation in small and medium scale businesses, investigate how leadership motivates productivity in a small and medium organisations during project implementation, assess how leadership styles and leadership behaviour influence productivity and propose strategies for motivating teams in small and medium size enterprise. The study utilized a systematic review of literature design. The research design is the most suitable for the proposed study as there exists a dearth of literature focused on the research topic. The choice of research design also influences the data collection method. The researcher will identify relevant literature on the topic by searching a range of databases using key terms and a combination of key words. Qualitative Data Analysis (QDA) software facilitated the analysis process since it helped in providing a detailed account of the results and also increased the trustworthiness of the study findings. The data obtained from literature was analysed descriptively to identify the role of leadership in achieving productivity in small and medium size projects. The study found out that productivity is crucial for an SME since it ensures the survival of a firm. As such, it is important to ensure that SMEs improve their productivity so as to guarantee the success of the organization in the market. A firm’s productivity is highly dependent on employee performance. As such, improving employees’ performance would be the first step in improving a firm’s productivity.