The role of leader behaviour on project team performance in the execution of construction projects

Abstract

Much study has been made on the leader, leadership and the impact of behaviour of the leaders on the workforce and the expected resulted performance. The difficulty with leadership is that it is largely contingent on the organisation, the leader involved, the workforce that is to be led and ultimately the tasks to be performed. Inevitably this brings about the cultural and religious diversities within the context of the racial groupings in the South African context. The purpose of leaders in a project is to execute effectively and efficiently the project processes within the iron trial, as a measure of successful implementation. The team is comprised of diverse skills, outside of the cultural and religious values, thus leaders need to navigate the different power bases within a team and build synergy in the team. The behaviour of the project leader and the leadership style have a strong impact on the motivation of the project team members to perform. The project team members interpret the behaviour within their context of what constitutes good and acceptable behaviour within their own context, and this makes them decide on whether to accept (get motivated) or merely tolerate (they do just enough not to run into trouble). The study focused on the team members because they are the “recipients” of the behaviour and it is them who can tell what they feel about the leadership. The nature of the study required an understanding of (description of) the phenomenon in order to interpret it correctly, hence a descriptive research design. This was combined with the use of mixed research methodology which allowed for the simultaneous use of both qualitative and quantitative research methodologies. The use of these two enabled both breadth and depth in the understanding of the phenomenon, data of which was gathered through the use of a structured questionnaire. The collected data was edited, coded and captured onto an Excel Spread Sheet from which illustrations were constructed, interpreted and conclusions made. The behaviour of the leader was considered to have a critical impact on the morale and performance of the project team.