Comunicarea - Factor Cheie în Managementul Proiectelor

Abstract

Nowadays project management refers more to freedom in expense of rules, communication and sharing information and knowledge with team members. Taking into consideration the latest trends in this field and the fact that in the IT Department of Economics And Business Administration Faculty from University of Alexandru Ioan Cuza Iasi the number of projects funded and accesses has constantly grown in the past few years, the aim of the present paper is to establish, through interviews with project managers, to what extent the working environment was permissive and collaborative and contributed to the fulfillment of project objectives.

Likewise, we conducted the study to analyze the perception of project managers concerning the communication with the project team, the awareness of their leading style and its adaptation according to this flexible environment. On the other hand, we also interviewed the project members, in order to compare the viewpoints of both „sides” and to make recommendations for a better cooperation in the future.

Communication is so important to project success that it has been referred to as the „lifeblood” of a project by more than one practitioner.

1. Introduction

Nowadays, in the world of project management, it has become increasingly more important to turn our efforts toward more effective means of communication, taking into consideration the effect of globalization and the fact that many project managers are faced with more and more virtual teams operating around the globe.

This paper deals with communication’s issues between project managers and team project members having as starting point the projects that involved the professors from the IT Department of Economics and Business Administration Faculty from Iasi. Although the projects were different, we focused only on conducting communication, communication problems and solutions found either by project managers or team members as well.

2. Project managers’ type

In practice of organizations there are many variants of management styles available for project work. There is no ideal management style, leading directly to successful projects but, depending on your situation, the phase of project, process; there is a management style more or less adequate to solve the tasks to be solved.

For project work, management style will be more cooperative and participatory but, depending on the problem to be solved, it can be advisory or authoritative. Also, compared to some members of the team, the manager will be democratic and participatory, if they are ready to assume responsibility for decisions. In cases of urgency, the management style should lead to rapid decision (authoritarian management style).

The management style is always adapted to the situation and person that is leaded.

The freedom of decision of the manager

The freedom of decision of the team

authoritarian patriarchal consultative cooperative participative democratic

The manager decides everything The manager decides everything; he tries to convince the employees before making decisions The manager decides; he consults before making decisions, with employees The manager informs the team, the team says it’s point of view before making decisions The team makes proposals; the manager decides on the proposals and chooses the best The team decides after settled the decisional limits; the manager is a coordinator

Figure 1: The management style (Staehle)

A project team is evolving. Working closely with members of the project team requires a common language. Therefore, a key point is finding the common language, which allows working united in purpose to accomplish the objectives of the project. The task of project manager is to drive forward the establishment of a climate conducive to free without tensions between project team members. The quality of project results, the degree of involvement and motivation of staff depends on the mode of communication and awareness of staff of project.

Communication has to take into account the individual's role within the team. These were summarized in the table below: