OPINION OF What knowledge, skills, experience and personality make for an ideal project manager? The ideal project manager knows how to acquire, manage, motivate, and empower the project team. They also understand internal/external factors that can affect an organization and know how to identify and engage stakeholders. The ideal project manager are natural team builders. Developing effective project teams is one of the primary responsibilities of the project manager. The ideal manger also knows how to navigate through am organization's political environment. They understand the strategies of the organization and understand who wields power and influence. The ideal project manager also has the ability to identify and engage stakeholders. The ability of the project manager to correctly identify and engage all stakeholders in an appropriate way can mean the difference between project success and failure.

Project managers need to be able to achieve high team performance and to meet the project's objectives. Some of the skills that is required to make this happen includes interpersonal/team skills. Regarding interpersonal/team skills, a project manager must be observant, an active listener, skilled leader, skilled motivator, skilled negotiator, skilled networker and are culturally/politically aware. Stakeholder engagement relies heavily on interpersonal skills, including taking initiative, integrity, honesty, collaboration, respect, empathy, and confidence. These skills and attitudes can help everyone adapt to the work and to each other, increasing the likelihood of success. Regarding team skills, a project manager that understands team dynamics can move their team members through all stages of a project in an effective manner.