ABSTRACT
Service-based project leaders are experts at project management but also need to demonstrate knowledge and familiarity with the customer’s need. Customers attempting to create unprecedented strategic change desire a relationship based on mutual respect and common understanding. The risk of failure may be so great or the benefits so important to the organization that their personal association with this endeavor is irrevocable. These projects increasingly make up organizational project portfolios as the value of project management in achieving strategic objectives becomes apparent. However, sponsors, customers, and team members recognize that these projects are anything but standard. These projects can carry a legacy of failure or at least diminished expectations from previous strategic efforts and sponsors, customers, and team members approach these initiatives with trepidation.
