Understanding leadership roles and competencies for public-private partnership
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JABS-01-2019-0027 |
| Pages | 541-560 |
| Published date | 12 February 2020 |
| Date | 12 February 2020 |
| Author | Rafedzah Mohd Som,Zoharah Omar,Ismi Arif Ismail,Siti Noormi Alias |
| Subject Matter | Strategy,International business |
Understanding leadership roles
and competencies for public-private
partnership
Rafedzah Mohd Som, Zoharah Omar, Ismi Arif Ismail and Siti Noormi Alias
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this study is to explore the rolesof public–private partnership (PPP) leaders
and the vital skills and competencies that PPP leaders should possess to ensure the success of PPP
projectsin Malaysia.
Design/methodology/approach –This study adopted an exploratoryqualitative research design using
an in-depth interview technique. Ten informants who were involved in the PPP projects from the public
and the private sectors participated in this study. Data gathered from the in-depth interview were
analysedusing the constant comparative method.
Findings –The findings of this study show that among the main roles of PPP leaders are building a
collaborative culture, leading and influencing the partnership process by developing trust and
encouraging commitment and fairness. Key competencies were sensitivity of the cross-cultural issues
betweenthe public and the private sector, communication and PPP technicalskills.
Practical implications –This paper outlines key competencies for the training and selection of PPP
leadersand team members.
Originality/value –This paperenriches the existing body of knowledge on Malaysia’sPPP with regard to
PPP leadershiproles and their competencies.
Keywords Roles, Leadership, Competency, Public–private partnership, Successful PPP
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
While many other factors have been researched and found to be critical in ensuring
public–private partnership (PPP) success (Cheung et al.,2012;Ismail, 2013;Ma et al.,
2019), the roles of PPP leaders and the leadership competencies required to manage the
said roles effectively have been poorly considered (Petkovi
cet al., 2015;Ma et al.,2019).
This indicates a lacuna in PPP literature where the general project management literature
has consistently indicated that leaders play an important role in managing and ensuring
project success (Mu
¨ller and Turner, 2010;Clarke, 2012a;Ahmed and Anantatmula, 2017).
As such, this paper examined the various roles of PPP leaders and the essential
competencies required to lead an effective partnership to ensure the success of PPP
project implementation.
2. Background
PPPs have been practised worldwide with multiple objectives, including promoting
infrastructure development, generating quality and funds, reducing costs, increasing
construction and operational efficiencies, improving service delivery and, most importantly,
sharing risk between the public and private sectors (Yuan et al.,2008;Roumboutsos and
Rafedzah Mohd Som is a
PhD candidate at Faculty of
Educational Studies,
University Putra Malaysia,
Serdang, Malaysia.
Zoharah Omar,
Ismi Arif Ismail and
Siti Noormi Alias are all
based at the Faculty of
Educational Studies,
University Putra Malaysia,
Serdang, Malaysia.
Received 27 January 2019
Revised 7 November 2019
26 November 2019
26 December 2019
16 January 2020
Accepted 19 January 2020
DOI 10.1108/JABS-01-2019-0027 VOL. 14 NO. 4 2020, pp. 541-560, ©Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 1558-7894 jJOURNAL OF ASIA BUSINESS STUDIES jPAGE 541
Saussier, 2014;Wibowo and Alfen, 2015). The popularity of PPPs is derived from their high
success rate in solving government problems by providing high-quality goods and services
in a shorter amount of time without burdening the fiscal side(Roumboutsos and Saussier,
2014;Sapri et al., 2016).
In Malaysia, PPP projects have been implemented since the mid-1980s, when privatisation
was first introduced with the main objective of increasing efficiency and effectiveness in the
delivery of public facilities while at the same time reducing government expenditure in
providing those facilities (Ismail and Haris, 2014;Lop et al., 2016;Rashid et al., 2016;Sapri
et al.,2016
;Mohamad et al.,2018). Throughout the 1990s, Malaysia aggressively pursued
privatisation with the objective of fully developing and industrialising the country by 2020
(Rashid et al.,2016). In 2006, the public finance initiative (PFI) was introduced under the
Ninth Malaysia Plan as an “engine of growth” for the development of Malaysian
infrastructure and the strengthening of the privatisation policy (Lop et al.,2016;Rashid
et al.,2016
;Mohamad et al., 2018). Finally, the concept of PPP was introduced under the
Tenth Malaysia Plan, which incorporated privatisation and PFI (Rashid et al., 2016). As the
PPP initiative is an extension of privatisation, the objectives of PPP adoption are similar to
those of privatisation: to encourage participation by the private sector and to reduce
government expenditure in providingpublic facilities (Mohamad et al.,2018).
This evolution and implementation of PPPs in Malaysian infrastructure development signify
the transformation of the relationship between the public and private sectors from a short-
term contractor–principal relationship to a longer partnership. Through partnership modes
of procurement, both public and private sector leaders have responsibilities to integrate
human, financial and technicalresources, organise their respective teams, maintain positive
relationships with their partners and uphold PPP’s basic rule, which is that risks should be
allocated according to those who are best at managing them. However, this is no easy task
for either public or private sector leaders, as they must manage the differences between
work cultures and their own objectives (Zou et al., 2014), especially when their teams are
sceptical and reluctant about collaboration (Wuichet, 2000;Backer, 2003). This is because
while PPP is formed with the objectives that partners work together for the success of the
same project, their underlying organisational objectives of existence are contradicted with
one another; the achievement of maximisation of profit for a private entity is conflicted with
the maximisation of value for moneyof the public sector (Yuan et al.,2011).
Furthermore, at least in Malaysian context, PPP is generally associated with the
implementation, development and management of infrastructure projects rather than other
kinds of social collaboration between the public and the private sectors. Managing PPP
projects require the combined expertise of a variety of personnel from various teams of two
different sectors, and, therefore, the success of it depends on the cross-functional
cooperation within these teams (Petkovi
cet al.,2015). For this reason, PPPs provide an
interesting organisational context for organisational researchers as leaders from both
parties must go beyond effectively managing their own teams but must be able to facilitate
differences and minimise conflicts between both the public and the private teams while at
the same time focussing on the performance objective of PPP projects and their respective
organisation at the same time. Also, at the individual level, while regular teams might have
similar ultimate personal objectives, e.g. similar rewards scheme, PPP teams’ members
which consist of the public and the private sector employees are rewarded differently
according to their employment scheme. Therefore, unlike other work teams which are
ongoing and operational in nature, leadership in Malaysia’s PPP setting might be more
difficult to be effectively delivered due to the temporary and different composition of project
team members from different sectorsand expertise.
Intriguingly, despite the increasingly important roles of PPPs in Malaysian development
(Ahmad et al.,2018), the roles of leaders and the leadership competencies required to
manage the said roles effectively have been poorly considered. In this regard, besides a
PAGE 542 jJOURNAL OF ASIA BUSINESS STUDIES jVOL. 14 NO. 4 2020
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