Emotional Intelligence as a Success Factor for Project and Project Manager

Abstract   This research paper examines the importance of emotional intelligence skills for project manager communication skills and project success. The main problem is that the number of complex projects has increased across different sectors such as aerospace and infrastructure. In addition, the projects are different in nature and each project requires certain skills and resources, and most companies focus on hiring people based on their experience or technical skills without paying attention to their soft skills. The research is based on gathering various data from primary and secondary sources. The primary data were collected through formal interviews with three managers in the ministry of health and prevention while the secondary data were obtained from different academic articles and e-books. The results showed that the ministry of health and prevention started focusing on emotional intelligence skills during the last few years only. Also, some managers consider it as an additional skill that can add value to project manager communication skills, and it is not an important factor for the project success. On the other hand , other managers from human resources department confirmed that recruiting a project manager with high understanding of emotional intelligence is important for them .Also , results showed that top-managers focus mainly on the organizational performance (50%) .However , they must improve their listening skills which were represented by 35% of the sample size, and they should focus more on creativity and empathy to enhance their interrelationships .