Investigation of Leadership Competences of Project Managers in Construction Industry

Abstract

Leadership has been widely studied both in business schools and by scholars. However, little attention has been given to leadership specifics in project-based organizations, especially in the construction industry. Aiming to decrease the gap in aforementioned body of knowledge, this article intended to contribute by identifying competences that are crucial to the success of project management as well as by revealing their manifestation in future construction project engineers. Therefore, theoretical framework of this article offers a literature review on variety of leadership theories. Building onto that, empirical part investigated importance of different leader competences, as perceived by future project managers, being graduate civil engineering students. The use of the mixed method research has been chosen as the most appropriate for this study. It combined the use of qualitative methods with survey obtained data based on a Likert scale. In respect of that, theoretical framework was constructed relying on the research of secondary data sources, whilst empirical part data were processed using descriptive statistics and nonparametric tests. Findings show that there are no significant differences in opinion among students in respect of their gender and almost none in respect of study course. The lowest rated competence concerns indecisiveness, suggesting high level of students' self-confidence and self-awareness. The highest rated competence indicates students' tendency to have things under control. Such reluctance toward risk taking has been found as potentially harmful for their personal and professional growth. Although their propensity to risk is expected to increase with experience, fostering emotional intelligence related competences has been advised as a tool of smarter risk perception.