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Paper short abstract:

Though executive sponsors generally drive project execution, confusion remains regarding their specific job tasks. This paper compares two cases in the US and Kazakhstan to better analyze their tasks.

Paper abstract:

Although an active and engaged executive sponsor is typically the most important driver of project implementation success, according to a report by the Project Management Institute (PMI, 2018), an average of 38% projects do not have active executive sponsorship. The Executive Sponsor is generally defined as someone who is in touch with the mission of the team. That mission is something they care about and is related to their core business operations. While a project manager’s role is traditionally focused on day-to-day execution, executive sponsors typically have more high-level responsibilities and often focus on strategy development and creating conditions for success instead of implementation. An effective executive sponsor is especially critical to the success of IT business programs.

There seems to be much confusion as to what the executive sponsor is expected to do as part of their leadership job and their specific roles greatly vary in different organizations (Perkins, 2005). Thus, in an attempt to fill this persistent gap, this paper seeks to conduct a comparative analysis of two IT case studies - the case of Zenly, a social media location sharing app developed by local software engineers in Kazakhstan, and the case of Healthcare.gov, the US federal health insurance website established under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) - to better understand the specific roles executive sponsors should actually play in IT business project implementation processes.

The findings of this research should not only help fill the gap related to the role of executive sponsors in project implementation but also contribute to comparative studies of developed and developing nations.

References:

Perkins, B. (2005, Sep 12). Executive Sponsors: What They Really Do. Retrieved from: https://www.computerworld.com/article/2557218/executive-sponsors--what-they-really-do.html#:~:text=There%20are%20widely%20differing%20opinions,protection%20and%20problem%2Dresolution%20skills.

Project Management Institute (2018, Feb 15). $1 Million Wasted Every 20 Seconds By Organizations Around the World. Retrieved from: https://www.pmi.org/about/press-media/press-releases/2018-pulse-of-the-profession-survey