Transformational leadership

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Transformational leadership is a leadership style that is defined as leadership that creates valuable and positive change in the followers. A transformational leader focuses on "transforming" others to help each other, to look out for each other, to be encouraging and harmonious, and to look out for the organization as a whole. In this leadership, the leader enhances the motivation, morale and performance of his follower group.

Contents 1 Background 2 Development of concept 3 Components of concept 4 Leadership Through Emotion 5 Research in the area 6 Implications for managers 7 References 8 External links

[edit] Background

James MacGregor Burns (1978)^[1] first introduced the concepts of transformational leadership in his descriptive research on political leaders, but this term is now used in organizational psychology as well. According to Burns, transformational leadership is a process in which "leaders and followers help each other to advance to a higher level of morale and motivation". Burns related to the difficulty in differentiation between management and leadership and claimed that the differences are in characteristics and behaviors. He established two concepts: "transformational leadership" and "transactional leadership". According to Burns, the transformational style creates significant change in the life of people and organizations.It redesigns perceptions and values, changes expectations and aspirations of employees. Unlike in the transactional style, it is not based on a "give and take" relationship, but on the leader's personality, traits and ability to make a change through vision and goals.

[edit] Development of concept

Another researcher, Bernard M. Bass (1985), suggested a transformational leadership theory that adds to the initial concepts of Burn's (1978).^[2] The extent to which leader is transformational, is measured first, in terms of his influence on the followers. The followers of such leader feels trust, admiration, loyalty and respect to the leader and they will do more than they expected in the beginning. The leader transforms and motivates followers by charisma, intellectual arousal and individual consideration. In addition, this leader seeks for new working ways, while he tries to identify new opportunities versus threats and tries to get out of the status quo and alter the environment.

The researchers, Bass & Avolio (1993), made an empirical study which mapped the frequent leadership styles of managers and commanders. They located the two categories (transformational and transactional leadership) on a continuum and created more stages at the passage between those two leadership styles. This model is called "The full range of leadership"^[3].

[edit] Components of concept

The full range of leadership introduces four elements of a transformational leader:

1. Individualized consideration- the degree to which the leader attends to each follower's needs, acts as a mentor or coach to the follower and listens to the follower's concerns and needs. The leader gives empathy and support, keeps communication open and places challenges before the followers. This also encompasses the need for respect and celebrates the individual contribution that each follower can make to the team. The followers have a will and aspirations for self development and have intrinsic motivation for their tasks.

2. Intellectual stimulation-The degree to which the leader challenges assumptions, takes risks and solicits followers' ideas. Leaders with this trait stimulate and encourage creativity in their followers. they nurture and develop people who think independently. For such a leader, learning is a value and unexpected situations are seen as opportunities to learn. The followers ask questions, think deeply about things and figure out better ways to execute their tasks.

3. Inspirational motivation- the degree to which the leader articulates a vision that is appealing and inspiring to followers. Leaders with inspirational motivation challenge followers with high standards, communicate optimism about future goals, and provide meaning for the task at hand. Followers need to have a strong sense of purpose if they are to be motivated to act. Purpose and meaning provide the energy that drives a group forward.

The visionary aspect of leadership are supported by communication skills that makes it precises and powerful. The followers are willing to invest more effort in their tasks, they are encouraged and optimistic about the future and believe in their abilities.

4. Idealized Influence: Provides vision and sense of mission, instills pride, gains respect and trust.

[edit] Leadership Through Emotion

Leadership is much more than managing tasks and barking orders at employees. In order to be a true leader, one must be able to bring out the best of their subordinates. A key aspect in achieving this is to be able to manage subordinates' emotions. James Kouzes and Barry Posner, both of whom are best-selling authors in the area of leadership, believe there are seven essential elements to leading through emotions. Those seven elements are to set clear goals, expect the best, pay attention, personalize recognition, tell the story, celebrate together, and set the example. ^[4]

[edit] Research in the area

When researching this construct, the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) is used. This is a questionnaire that measures deferent factors of transformatial and transactional leadership (Bass, 1985). The scales in the questionnaire are based on a initial factor analysis and earlier versions.

Earlier research on transformatial leadership was limited, because the knowledge in this area was too primitive for finding good examples for the items in the questionnaire.

Another weakness in the first versions of the MLQ relates to the wording of items. Most items in the scale of charismatic and intellectual arousals described the result of leadership, instead of specific actions of the leader that can be observed and that, in turn, lead to the results.

In response to the critics, Bass and his colleagues(1990) included in the revised version many more items that describe leadership actions that are observed directly.

[edit] Implications for managers

Yukl (1994) draws some tips for transformational leadership^[5]:

1. Develop a challenging and attractive vision, together with the employees.

2. Tie the vision to a strategy for its achievement.

3. Develop the vision, specify and translate it to actions.

4. Express confidence, decisiveness and optimism about the vision and its implementation.

5. Realize the vision through small planned steps and small successes in the path for its full implementation.

[edit] References

• Roesner, J. (1990). Ways women lead. Harvard Business Review. November - December.
• Kotlyar, I. & Karakowsky, L. (2006). Leading Conflict? Linkages Between Leader Behaviors and Group Conflict. Small Group Research, Vol. 37, No. 4, 377-403
• Kotlyar, I., & Karakowsky, L. (2007). Falling Over Ourselves to Follow the Leader. Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, Vol. 14, No. 1, 38-49
• Albritton, R. L. (1998). A new paradigm of leader effectiveness for academic libraries: An empirical study of the Bass (1985) model of transformational leadership. In T.F. Mech & G.B. McCabe (Eds.), Leadership and academic librarians (pp. 66–82) . Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1998.
• Bass, B. M. (1998). Transformational leadership: Industrial, military, and educational impact. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
• Bass, B.M. & Avolio, B.J. (Eds.). (1994). Improving organizational effectiveness through transformational leadership. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
• Burns, J.M. (1978) Leadership. New York. Harper & Row.
• Pielstick, C.D. (1998). The transforming leader: A meta-ethnographic analysis. Community College Review, 26(3), 15-34.
• Alimo-Metcalfe, B. & Alban-Metcalfe, J. (2001). ‘The development of a new Transformational Leadership Questionnaire’. The Journal of Occupational & Organisational Psychology, 74, 1-27
• Kouzes, J.,Posner, B. (1999). "Encouraging the Heart." San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass Inc., Publishers

[edit] External links

• [1] Kotlyar, I., & Karakowsky, L. (2007). Falling Over Ourselves to Follow the Leader. Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, Vol. 14, No. 1, 38-49
• [2] Tips for transformatial leader