The future project environment is expected to remain increasingly complex and ambiguous. This requires project delivery leaders to develop and grow their cognitive proficiency and expertise persistently. For majority of the involved project delivery leaders, the project complexity is a lived experience. In this conceptual study, we used phenomenological examination of project leaders’ coping mechanisms on the challenges of complex project delivery to produce cognitive model and guiding principles for the navigation of project complexity in practice. To navigate the analysis and interpretation of the data, the study used the Understanding, Perception and Action Taken (UPA) model, a three-fold knowledge structure, developed with a rationale that if complexities in projects are better understood by project participants, it often creates the foundations for other actions to be taken. The results provide understanding of project delivery leaders’ perceptions of project complexity and ability to assess it for a given project. The full outcome are principles suitable for navigating and managing complexity. The results of this study can assist complex project delivery leaders to develop greater insight into optimal management of in-creasingly complex projects.
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