Assessment task details and instructions:
‘Groups are not teams, but a leader can create a team’.
You are a newly appointed project manager to a delayed and failing Digital Marketing project who has been given a project team that does not seem to be working effectively; first there is Kevin who is middle-aged and highly experienced but who shows little interest in the team or project and who comes to work late, goes early and spends much of his day talking and surfing the Internet – he also comes into work smelling of alcohol and looking as if he has spent the night sleeping in his suit. You have been informed by the outgoing project manager that Kevin has not responded to suggestions he gets down to work or improve on his appearance. Secondly, there is Isabella who is a new hire with an impressive academic CV but she has also shown little interest in this project and continuously called in sick or claimed she has ‘family issues’. This Digital Marketing project is a vital one for the organisation and for your career development so you need to act decisively, but the organisation is highly unsettled and sensitive due to Covid-19 lockdowns, furloughs and the threat of redundancy after the Pandemic is over. The Digital Marketing Project is vital to the organisations survival.
Critically discuss the role of leadership, group development and motivation in project management utilising appropriate theoretical models to identify how this situation can be turned around. Include in your answer a discussion of the way teams develop and the role of leadership and communication in this process. The focus of your answer must be on your own organisation (or one that you have worked within) and ways that you might deal with Kevin and Isabella.
You will need to take the following into account when completing your assignment.
• Establishment of relevant theory (e.g. what do we mean by leadership, how can leaders be classified, what is the relationship between leader and team and project in theoretical terms?).
• Allocation of credit and sources used; (have I included references and citations to the material I have used?);
• Clarity of argument and relevance to the project management context
• Overall report presentation including spelling and grammar;
• Adherence to nominated word limit.
This coursework should follow a structured approach and should be prepared and presented as a professional business report. You should undertake a relevant literature review that helps inform your investigation. Please also ensure that the Harvard Referencing System is adhered to and fully complied with.
Please follow a report format. Therefore, you should have a title page, abstract, contents page, numbered sections and sub-sections, page numbers, appendix section etc. Please note if you are uncertain on how to present and structure a report then visit the university library website and ask for assistance.
Please do use diagrams, illustrations, tables, graphics etc. wherever these are helpful, and remember that these do not count towards your word limit. If you do use these, please do not put them in the appendices if they are part of your discussion. Appendices are the appropriate places to put supporting material, however, remember if the reader is satisfied with the main points of your discussion; the supporting information within the appendices may not even be reviewed.
Please try to use theory explicitly at all stages, but do not spend too much time describing a theory. While you must be explicit about the theories, models, techniques etc. that you use, you can assume that the reader is familiar with them. What the reader requires is evidence of your ability to understand and apply the theory and learn from in order to support the development of your findings and/or ideas.
You must cite all sources on which you have relied, for example textbooks, journal articles, web pages etc. using the Harvard referencing system. If you do not cite all sources, then you may be accused of plagiarism, and that may endanger your success in passing the module. If you are in any doubt about how to reference your work, please obtain guidance from the library and/or your academic librarian(s) for this module.
Word count
The maximum word count is 3000 words (+/- 10%). Your word count is from the introduction to conclusion sections. Therefore, it does not include title page, abstract, contents page, references section, appendices etc. If the assignment exceeds these limits, the work in excess is not marked.
