Marco Sampietro

Project Management is nowadays a vast discipline: over the years it has developed original contents while also embracing contributions coming from other fields which have proved to be relevant. The book sets out to identify the key elements of effective project management, starting from the observation of how important it is to oversee both methodological and organizational aspects. Usually, these two perspectives are the subject of separate sections or chapters, with few or no points of contact. The peculiarity of this book is precisely the integration between the two dimensions. Project Management methodologies are in fact used by people and the way they interpret, use and disseminate them has a great impact on their effectiveness. Separating methodologies from people would not represent how project management works in the real world. The book lends itself to different levels of reading: the aim of the author is to support readers in improving project performance.

Although project team members play crucial roles in projects, they often do not possess the required mastery of project management methodologies. As a result, dialog between project managers and team members is not as effective as it can be and can quickly become a source of stress and tension. Empowering Project Teams: Using Project Followership to Improve Performance improves on this situation by presenting the project environment from the perspective of project team members. Re-interpreting project management methodologies and behaviors using a bottom-up approach, it explores the application of project followership in the key stages of project management. It details the methods and techniques that all project team members need to know and outlines the behaviors they should adopt to be successful in each stage of the project. The book is divided into five sections:Introduces and explores the basic concepts of project management and project followershipExamines project start-up—the all too often underestimated set of activities that make it possible to make future activities less problematicHighlights the importance of project planning Focuses on execution and control of the projectConsiders project closure and transfer and explains why this is an ideal time to determine if efforts invested have been rewardedDespite an understanding that project success is directly proportional to the entire team’s ability to act as a managerial center of excellence, there has long been a need for a book dedicated to the individuals that participate in projects. Filling this need, this book is an ideal resource for anyone who regularly works as a member of a project team. Complete with case studies in each chapter, the book also includes exercises on the topics covered to facilitate understanding.