Balance between hard and soft managerial skills in construction projects management in Sudan

Abstract

Despite the importance of management skills hard and soft, but not all of the members of engineering community aware of their importance, role and impact on the performance of projects and job satisfaction . Hard skills are the technical or cognitive skills needed by the manager in his work either soft skills are personal skills or interpersonal skills or the personality traits of the manager Personal skills are as important as technical skills in managing construction projects and construction organizations want to recruit managers who have both these skills and can balance these skills. The ability to effectively manage projects has become an increasingly important skill. However, a number of managers are unable to successfully manage projects due to a lack of management skills. This research aims to know how to balance administrative skills through, Learn about different types of management skills , Identify differences in project performance depending on the type of management skill, Studying the impact of personal skills and technical skills on the performance of projects and Study how to balance management skills. In order to achieve this objective, a questionnaire was designed and distributed to group of people in construction industry in Sudan who are concerned with management skills and affected them, fill out the survey questionnaire the data were analyzed and results extracted. The results showed Work experience directly affects the understanding of management skills and the recognition of their importance ,managers are more familiar with the terms on the management skills then the employees and then students. Manager’s skills directly affect project performance and employee job satisfaction in the organization, Employees hard skills have a relationship with their employment and soft skills have a direct relationship to their promotion and lay off work , Hard skills make the manager good while soft skills create an effective manager and Balancing hard management skills and soft skills is a product of practical experience as it needs training and development. Based on these findings a set of recommendations were developed to increase understanding and grasp the importance of management skills and recommendation for future researches.