So much attention gets given to the role of the project manager and the project team itself, that the role of the project sponsor and the project governance board often gets overlooked.  The skills of a project sponsor are absolutely critical, because the sponsor represents the contact of the project within the organization, the supply of resources to the project and the ownership of the project. The project sponsor needs to be accessible and be prepared to continually explain the organizational imperative to the project, and to defend the project within the organization.