30 May 2026 at 11:30AM
Stop Just Assigning Sponsors, And Start Preparing Them
We've all been there. The project kickoff went well, everyone on the team was excited, stakeholders seemed to be on board, and the executive sponsor said all the right things.
Fast-forward three to six months. Now the project team is having trouble obtaining the necessary resources, a senior manager in another department is obstructing progress, and the project sponsor suddenly sends an email demanding an explanation for why the project is falling behind.
The problem is this is the first time since kickoff that you have heard from the sponsor in any meaningful way.
Many of us in this situation have complained about disengaged or struggling sponsors. But how many of us have stopped to ask whether they were ever trained to be sponsors in the first place?
Sure, it is part of our job as project managers to coach our sponsors. However, a brief coaching session at the beginning of a project is not enough to build an effective, high-performing sponsor.
That is the real gap.
When most people hear the word "sponsorship," they think of a role assigned to a senior leader. I believe we need to start looking at it more as a skill. A skill that can be learned, practiced, and reinforced.
Project managers receive training, certifications, templates, tools, and delivery systems. Sponsors are often given a calendar invite, a project charter to sign, and the expectation that they will support the work and the project team.
That setup is not fair to anyone. Not the sponsor, not the project manager, and not the organization.
Most project sponsors are capable leaders with years of experience. So this is not about blaming them. This is about the greater problem that many organizations treat project sponsorship as intuitive simply because the person holds a senior role.
PMI emphasizes this point well: We do not expect project managers to understand project management simply because they received the title. So why do we expect senior managers to automatically understand what it means to sponsor a project? (Schibi & Lee, 2015)
Sponsorship Is a Partnership
Too many sponsors view project managers as people who simply report up to them and take direction from them. While that is not completely wrong, there is a better way to view the relationship: project partners.
Project managers lead delivery, but they rarely have all the authority required to deliver successfully.
A project manager can manage the work, identify risks, document decisions, influence stakeholders, and keep the project moving. But in every meaningful project, the project manager eventually hits an authority ceiling.
That ceiling usually shows up when the obstacle involves another senior manager, an executive-level decision, a resource conflict across departments, or a function with competing priorities.
This is precisely where the sponsor matters most.
The sponsor exercises the authority and applies the organizational force the project manager does not possess. They:
- Establish and clarify overall project priorities
- Secure critical resources for the project team
- Remove senior and executive-level obstacles
- Reinforce the importance of the project when competing demands start pulling attention elsewhere
Sponsorship is active leadership. It is not passive oversight that only shows up during a crisis.
The Cost of Unprepared Sponsors
The consequences of unprepared sponsors usually do not show up immediately.
Projects typically begin positively. The sponsor attends the kickoff, enthusiastically promotes the benefits of the project, speaks to the project team, and may even socialize key points with their peers. Everything seems good.
As a result, it is easy for the project manager to believe things will continue that way throughout the entire project life cycle.
Green status updates can also create a false sense of security. The sponsor assumes the project manager has everything needed for success. The project manager assumes the sponsor understands the expected level of engagement and has committed to it.
Then the honeymoon phase ends. Small gaps begin to appear. Over time, those gaps compound.
Everyone may be acting in good faith, based on their best knowledge and intentions, and still be misaligned.
This is why ineffective sponsorship is not simply a project management problem. It is an organizational performance problem.
MIT Sloan Management Review notes that executive sponsors line up resources, help manage activities while work is underway, and ultimately help deliver results. At the same time, sponsors rely heavily on project managers because they rarely have time to manage projects personally (Kloppenborg & Tesch, 2015).
The sponsor and project manager must agree on shared expectations before the project needs rescuing.
Every Project Requires Change Management
It is almost too obvious, but it is worth stating clearly: every meaningful project is also a change management effort.
When sponsors green-light a project, they are not only sponsoring the budget, schedule, or deliverable. They are also sponsoring the change that the project is meant to create within the organization.
The project manager manages delivery, but the sponsor helps create the conditions for adoption. Sponsors must make the change visible, build support among other leaders, and consistently communicate why the project matters to impacted stakeholders.
Prosci identifies active and visible participation, building a coalition of sponsorship, and communicating support to impacted groups as core behaviors of effective sponsors (Prosci, n.d.).
That is not extra work. That is the core work.
What Sponsors Need to Learn
- Sponsors need to understand value ownership. The sponsor should be clear on the value the project is supposed to generate, not only the deliverable the project is supposed to produce.
- Sponsors need decision discipline. They must understand which decisions belong solely to them, which decisions can be delegated, and when they need to make a timely call with limited information.
- Sponsors need to establish and protect priorities. Projects do not fail only because people oppose them. Often, they fail because the right people become busy with something else.
- Sponsors need to build coalitions. Project managers must influence stakeholders across the organization, but only the sponsor has the senior or executive-level peer credibility needed to align other leaders.
- Sponsors need life cycle engagement. A sponsor who appears at kickoff and then disappears until there is a crisis is not truly sponsoring. They are attending events and firefighting.
Bonus: All five capabilities depend on clear, effective communication.
That means confirming understanding, clarifying decisions, reinforcing priorities, and making sure the project team knows where the sponsor stands.
Prepare Sponsors Before the Project Starts
Sponsor training should be executive owned.
Just as organizations depend on projects to deliver strategy, sponsorship should have its own development path. Sponsor preparation should be championed by the CEO, COO, or equivalent senior leader, with support from the PMO where one exists.
Anyone who green-lights projects should learn the basics of effective sponsorship.
The training does not need to be complicated. It should be light, practical, and useful. This can include:
- A short executive sponsor training
- A one-page sponsor guide
- A simple sponsor checklist
- A decision matrix
- A clear escalation process
These tools create clarity.
Before a project begins, the sponsor and project manager should also have an alignment meeting. This is not just a kickoff or charter review. It is a real working conversation.
They should answer the following questions:
- What is the project trying to accomplish?
- What does success look like?
- What does the sponsor need from the project manager?
- What does the project manager need from the sponsor?
- Which decisions belong solely to the sponsor?
- What is the best way for the project manager to communicate critical information?
- How should escalations happen?
- What are the report-back expectations?
- What is needed before work begins?
That conversation turns sponsorship from an assumption into an agreement.
PMOs can support this system through templates, coaching, governance practices, and retrospectives, but they cannot replace executive ownership. Project managers can create structure, surface risks, and keep communication moving. What they cannot do is fix executive sponsorship on their own.
That responsibility has to sit with executives. They have to hold themselves, and one another, accountable for the quality of sponsorship they provide.
When sponsors struggle, the easy answer is to label them disengaged. In some cases, that may be true. But the better question is whether the organization ever prepared them to sponsor well in the first place.
Project managers need training to lead projects effectively. Sponsors need preparation to understand their role, make timely decisions, remove barriers, and stay visibly connected to the work.
Projects need both roles operating as partners, with shared understanding, clear communication, and visible accountability.
If a project matters enough to approve, it matters enough to sponsor well.
Works Cited
Kloppenborg, T. J., & Tesch, D. (2015, March 16). How executive sponsors influence project success. MIT Sloan Management Review. https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/how-executive-sponsors-influence-project-success/
Prosci. (n.d.). Change management success. Prosci. https://www.prosci.com/change-management-success
Schibi, O., & Lee, C. (2015). Project sponsorship: Senior management’s role in the successful outcome of projects. Paper presented at PMI Global Congress 2015, EMEA, London, England. Project Management Institute. https://www.pmi.org/learning/library/importance-of-project-sponsorship-9946/
