Leadership and project success in development sector

Aim/purpose – The study aims to investigate the relationship among the leadership, operational efficiency and project success in general and the impact of transformational leadership and operational efficiency on project success in particular. Design/methodology/approach – Mean comparison from descriptive statistics and multiple linear regression from inferential statistics was used to determine the association between variables and further impact of the transformational leadership and operational efficiency on project success in the development sector. The paper presents the results of a survey conducted among 200 employees from the top, middle & lower management levels of various national & international development organizations working in Pakistan like Microfinance Banks and other Rural Support Programs. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) was used to process data. Findings – The result shows positive association among transformational leadership, operational efficiency and project success. In addition, it was found that transformational leadership and operational efficiency have a positive and statistically significant impact on the project success. It is concluded that both transformational leadership and operational efficiency are vital to achieving the optimum level of success in any project, especially in the development sector. Research implications/limitations – The integral limitation of the study was the respondents because most of the development organizations have their operations in rural areas where access was difficult because of limited time and resources. In addition, such organizations are always reluctant to provide survey feedback. Originality/value/contribution – The paper contribution is in the theoretical and practical knowledge of the project success factors in the development sector which is still a somehow unexplored area. Regulators of the development sector may be benefited from this study.