EFFECT OF EMPLOYEES’ LEADERSHIP SKILLS ON PROJECT PERFORMANCE IN THE ENERGY SECTOR IN KENYA
Annastacia Katumbi Kavita Musembi - PhD in Project Management, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Kenya
Dr. Wario Guyo - Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Kenya
Dr. Dorothy Ndunge Kyalo - University of Nairobi, Kenya
Dr. Aflonia Mbuthia - Kenyatta University, Kenya
ABSTRACT
The purpose for this study was to investigate the effect of employees’ soft skills on project performance in the Kenyan energy sector. The objective of the study was to establish the effect of employees’ leadership skills on project performance in the Kenyan public energy sector. The study employed both cross-sectional and correlation design. Purposive sampling technique was employed to select the projects that were studied. The population comprised all the project supervisors who led the project teams in the ongoing projects in the energy sector ending between January2016 to December 2018. In particular the study focused on the transmission projects, the generation projects, nuclear projects and the distribution projects. A total of 85 ongoing projects were selected. Out of these 9 were used in the pilot study. Therefore 76 projects were chosen for the study. A Questionnaire comprised of closed and open-ended research questions taking the format of five-point Likert-type interval scale was used to assemble primary data from project supervisors. The study established that employees’ leadership skills positively affect project performance in the energy sector in Kenya (R²=0.668, P=0.00). The study highlights the essential components of employees’ soft skills that would inform effective project performance. The study differed from other studies by empirically showing how comprehensive integration of leadership skills can affect project performance and also offers the possibility of contributing to change the way projects are planned, designed and implemented. On the basis of findings, the study recommends that both transactional and transformational leadership styles should be used in the management of projects with a greater emphasis on transformational leadership style. The study also suggests that further studies should be carried out in other sectors and countries and they should involve more soft skills.
