Clients' perception of construction project leaders in the Nigerian banking industry

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to promote full involvement of construction project leaders in the attempt by Nigerian banks to develop new branches and expand the scope of their services to customers whose banks were either liquidated or merged after the 2005 consolidation exercise.Design/methodology/approachStructured questionnaires are used to collect data on status, professions, services and leadership roles of construction project leaders from a sample of 80 clients' representatives selected randomly from the 24 Nigerian banks that survived the liquidation exercise.FindingsThe study discovers that Nigerian banks appoint mostly their staff who may not be project managers as project leaders and engage them mostly with services which relate to the day to day running of their new projects. It also discovers that the authority giving to project leaders is not full rather the control over the delivery of banks' projects is shared with the banks and this does not influence the banks' perception of the performance of project leaders. While this finding may appear as if the control giving to project leaders is not important in their performances, the study reveals that the performances of project leaders have significant influence on the performance of other project team members.Research limitations/implicationsAlthough, there have been studies on project leadership in the construction industry generally, specific attention has not been given to project leadership in the banking industry as done in this paper.Practical implicationsThe study considers the development as unhealthy because it will not encourage construction project leaders to regard the success or failure of the projects as their responsibility and will not motivate them to perform their duties effectively. It therefore advocates that clients in the Nigerian banking industry should adopt a practice whereby project managers instead of any construction professionals are the ones to be appointed as construction project leaders and that more authority and leadership functions on the delivery of the projects than those retained by clients be delegated to them.Originality/valueThe results of the study have identified some of the shortcomings in project leadership practice in the Nigerian banking industry which will spur changes that promote greater achievement of the goals of the banks for developing new projects.