Impact of leadership behavior of a project manager on his/her subordinate's job-attitudes and job-outcomes

Abstract Purpose Aim of this research is to investigate people issues in project management that fail projects in obtaining desired results, in doing so the author investigated the impact of different leadership behaviors of project managers on driving job attitudes and job outcomes of project employees. Design/methodology approach Data was obtained from 757 project workers working in 67 groups in 15 different projects in Asia mostly from China and Middle East. Data on the respondents' leadership behaviors, and how these affect the subordinate's job attitudes, was collected using Northouse's Leadership Style Assessment, Williams and Anderson's employee's job performance along with Michael Jalbert's Job Retention scale. Subordinate's job satisfaction, measured with the scale developed by Agho, Price and Mueller, Job involvement measured using Richardson, H. A., & Vandenberg's job involvement scale and Porter's job commitment scale was used for measuring subordinate's job commitment. Findings The findings lend support to the view that leadership behavior is an antecedent of a project employee's job attitudes like job satisfaction, job involvement and job commitment and job outcomes like job retention and job performance. Originality/value The study although conducted in Asian perspective, however the findings have relevance with broader scope of the project management. The outcomes of this research will be helpful for project managers in maximizing workforce potential by adopting right behavior.