Leadership is different in projects. Typically, project managers do not have disciplinary power like line managers. Leadership WITH disciplinary power means to hold a couple of tools in your hands, including but not limited to allowing for vacations, offering training opportunities, raising the salary or promoting employees to the next level. However, a means could also be the opposite of the aforementioned. People working under this kind of leadership know about that tools and usually obey.

Team members are temporarily assigned to a project by their line managers. The project manager leads WITHOUT disciplinary power, which is definitely more difficult. The aforementioned tools are not available. How can a project manager lead instead? Most important, a project manager needs to describe the vision, the purpose and the goals of the project. It needs to make sense for the team to be engaged, they need to understand why the project is important and what´s in for them individually. Leading without disciplinary power does not work by telling the team: “just do it”. Tasks need to fit to the individuals, they need to bring the right (intrinsic) motivation, the right competence and experience as well as the time for the project. The latter is something, a project manager needs to negotiate with the line manager and get a commitment. But talking to the team members is crucial, getting a better understanding how to make best use of their motivation, competence and experience.

Another means of leadership WITHOUT power is to make people accountable for what they are doing. Team members like to be challenged and perform much better if they get tasks which are exceeding their capabilities (a bit). It will give the team an opportunity of achieving something more important than they can achieve in their line functions. Appreciate the efforts and the achievements. The team will definitely like it. Furthermore, offer feedback to each team member regarding the things that went well and others that could be improved. Thus, team members can learn, develop and grow through project-related work, more than in their line functions. A project manager can offer support, by giving advice how to perform tasks, training on the job or coaching. The team will be grateful and recognizes, that they benefit from being engaged in a project. However, it´s also important to impose control on the project team and their performance. Control is meant to analyze the “as is” state of the project, to compare with the “to be” state and to impose corrective actions if necessary.

A project manager should climb on the “commander´s hill”, with an overview and the ability of seeing the big picture, whether the project is on track or corrections are needed. It is crucial that the project manager is – at least from time to time – on the hill and helps the team to recognise better the developments. On the other hand the team can see the project manager much better on that hill, address questions or approach her / him with issues identified during the project lifecycle. A project manager should also be a “good example”. By showing this kind of behaviour to the team helps them to understand what is important for a successful completion of the project and they´ll follow. Finally, a project manager can help the line managers to better understand the performance of their employees, e.g. by writing a reference letter or a performance appraisal, by recommending individual team members for a promotion, a raise, a development opportunity or another project assignment.

Leading project teams without (disciplinary) power might be more difficult, in my view it is the leadership of the future and will open many opportunities for a leadership career in your organisation. It might feel like to be on stage in a circus, acting like an animal tamer or acrobat. Try it, it´s the most interesting job in the world!