Lex localis - Journal of Local Self-Government_11(1)_January

L EX LOCALIS - J OURNAL OF L OCAL S ELF -G OVERNMENT H. Wanivenhaus, J. Kovač, A. Žnidaršič & I. Vrečko: Vienna Construction Projects: Redirection of Project Management Critical Success Factors—More Focus on Stakeholders and Soft Skills Development 343 with stakeholders. As the project environment in the public sector often involves many different stakeholders and complex organizational structures, we can assume that the highest need for the further development of project management systems in the public sector should be oriented into those directions. Thus, we offer the following: Hypothesis 3: Project managers in the public sector’s competitive environment see the development of soft project management skills and cooperation with stakeholders as the most important elements for further development of the project management environment. Müller & Turner’s (2010) research on the relationship between project managers’ leadership styles and project success showed that, across all projects, no matter what project type, the competency of motivation (addressing the interpersonal and social dimensions of leadership) and the competency of managing resources (guiding and controlling people for the effective achievement of objectives) relate significantly to projects’ success and explain about 9% cent of a project’s success. Hypothesis 3 derives from previous studies by different authors emphasizing the importance of soft skills in project management (e.g., Englund & Bucero, 2012; Turner & Müller, 2005b), but none of their research focused on the public sector. Thus, we focus our research on the public sector—namely, the City of Vienna and its project management system developed for managing and implementing construction projects. 3 Research 3.1 City of Vienna and Project Management in Vienna’s Construction Projects Vienna is the federal capital city of Austria and one of the country’s nine federal provinces (Bundesländer). With 1.8 million inhabitants, it is currently the seventh largest European cities, second only to Berlin among the largest German-speaking cities. Given that experts project that the city’s population will increase to 2 million within the next 15 years, responding to population growth is a key challenge for the city’s administration and government. City of Vienna’s Executive Group for Construction and Technology. The Executive Group for Construction and Technology is part of the Chief Executive Office of the Vienna City Administration (Figure 1). It is responsible for directing and coordinating technology projects and related matters in the interest of the local population, with due consideration of technological, ecological, cultural, and societal innovation. In particular, this applies to technical and social infrastructure projects in all fields, including building construction (e.g., children’s daycare centers or schools), public works (e.g., road construction and traffic