Managerial leadership and the organizational environment must be conducive to the professional needs of the project team. I reached this conclusion after conducting a field study of 80 technology-intensive project teams in 27 companies. This paper aims to improve the project management field's understanding of team performance as it is influenced by the organizational environment and managerial leadership. The results of this research suggest that many of the factors that drive project team performance, such as commitment and the ability to deal with conflict and risk, originate in the work environment. While effective management of the technical aspects of the project is critical to success, team leaders must also pay close attention to managing relations across the entire work process, including support functions, suppliers, sponsors, and partners. In this paper, I discuss the implications of — and criteria for — effective team leadership.
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