Project Leadership: Panacea for National Economic Development in Nigeria

Abstract

Nigeria is a country endowed with a lot of human and natural
resources. It is mystifying to know that nations with one source of
resources or endowment are ruling over nations with various forms
of resources. It is as a result of individualistic pursuit of personal
interest often called self-gratification, which can be traceable to
poor leadership quality. This paper relates project leadership to
national economic development and productivity in Nigeria. The
paper reveals the role of leadership and human management with
their unlimited power of wants and needs and how productivity
and project execution play a vital role in fund allocation. And with
the numerous human and natural resources why do we still
experience infrastructure deficit, no developmental projects, the
mind-set of the people contradicting national development, increase
of unemployment and insecurity in the nation, power failure and
finally, a consuming nation. There is the possibility that the set of
people that can create the workable and suitable system are project
managers or a leader that possesses a project manager's quality or
potentials. The paper highlights the major problems facing Nigeria
and effective project leadership role to solve these problems. The
differences between a project manager and a project leader are the
major findings in this paper. The paper concludes that Nigeria will
one day becomes the world's leading economy, if the system created
by the project managers is adopted and managed especially in the
area of developmental projects for productivity and proper
management.