Situational Leadership Theory, Transformational, And Transactional Theory

As Northouse (2015) explained, transformational leadership is a process that can change and transform the emotions, values, ethics, standard, and long term goals of the people. It also involves transforming followers to accomplish more than what is expected of them. The four factors that are closely associated with transformational leadership includes being an idealized influence or charisma leaders who act as strong role models, have a high standard of moral and ethical conduct, and deeply respected by his or her followers. A leader who can inspire and motivate their followers to be part of a shared vision of the organization. A leader who can also stimulate followers to become more creative and innovative, and provide the necessary coaches and advice to the followers (p.167).

Leadership has been an important topic in the social sciences for many years. Recently, renewed interest in the concept of leadership has been aroused. “The resurgence of interest in studying the topic of leadership appears to be accompanied by an acceptance of the distinction between transactional and transformational leadership.” (Den Hartog, Van Muijen and Koopman, 1997, P.41)

Fifth is the insufficient specification of situational variables in Transformational leadership. A fundamental assumption of transformational leadership theory is that the underlying leadership processes and outcomes are essentially the same in all situations. Bass (1998) had suggested that transformational leadership is beneficial to both followers and organizations regardless of the situation. Studies have shown that situational factors can influence the effects of transformational leadership on followers and work outcomes.

There are many models of leadership that exist across a range of fields (e.g. social work, education, psychology, business, etc.). The ability to transform an organization successfully requires a different set of attitudes and skills. Transformational leadership is an approach where a leader utilizes inspiration, charisma, individualized attention, and intellectual stimulation with their employees (Iachini, Cross, & Freedman, 2015, p. 651). Transformational leadership helps to clarify organizational vision, inspires employees to attain objectives, empowers employees, encourages employees to take risks, and advocates the seeking of alternative solutions to challenges in the workplace (Transformational Leadership, 2015). It allows the leader to engage and motivate each follower identify with the organization’s values and goals.

Devine and Winter (2012, p. 25) state, “there is nothing magical about leadership, and there is nothing magical about teaching it or learning it.” They go on to define leadership as the ability to influence those who work for you to want to accomplish and strive to reach organizational goals and objectives. Those who influence others must understand the theories of motivation so that these theories can be applied, communicated and taught in order to motivate followers (Devine and Winter, 2012). Different from supervision, leadership implores the desires of those around you to want to succeed in meeting a goal through you the leader’s motivational abilities.

To ensure leadership effective, several leadership theories are put forward and are adopted by different organizations. Some widely accepted theories include Trait Approach, Style Approach, Situational Approach, New Leadership Approach and Post-charismatic & Post-transformational (Western, 2013). Beyond doubt, they have their pros and cons, and they could play their role to guarantee the effectiveness of leadership as long as they are applied in an appropriate condition.

Johnson and Dipboye (2008) proclaimed, “Transformational leadership style mainly focuses on transformation of values and beliefs of followers by inspiring them” (As cite by Zareen, Razzaq, & Mujtaba, 2015). Connectedness, mutual respect, and collaboration on goals and responsibilities are what I see as the hallmarks that transformational leadership affords

The transformational leader, according to Burns (1978), is one who” raises the followers level of consciousness about the importance and value of designated outcomes and ways of reaching them; gets the followers to transcend their own self-interests for the sake of the team, organization, or larger polity; and raises the follower’s level of need on Maslow’s (1954) hierarchy from lower-end concerns for safety and security to higher-level needs for achievement and self-actualization.” The transactional leader use rights a reward/punishment paradigm to entice meeting the agreements and standards. Transactional leaders emphasize the exchange between leader and follower (Bass) where reaching objectives are rewarded and failing to reach objectives are punished, which is then reinforced by the leaders. The two factors which emerged reflecting the punishment/reward is contingent reward and management by exception. This type of leadership was the core of leadership theory up until 1970’s when transformational leadership theory was introduced as different from transactional (Downton, 1973). In 1978, James MacGregor Burns wrote Leadership which contrasted these styles which was followed by Bass’s work in 1985 in which he empirically demonstrated the positively correlated dimensions which represented a shift in the study of Leadership. (Bass).

Foundational theories are the backbone of today’s application of leadership in all aspects of a global society. Understanding the characteristics that define successful leadership is not feasible due to application of leadership principles in different circumstances. This does not defray the premise that effective leadership cannot be learned. In fact, learning and understanding the many approaches to leadership allows an individual to internalize and effectively develop a leader’s mentality (Derecskei, 2016). In this section the four core theories on leadership and the tools used under each will be discussed.

Transformational leadership. Burns (1978) is recognized as one of the earliest theorist on transformational leadership, who introduced transformational leadership over 30 years ago. Transformational leaders are perceived as leaders who uplift their employee morale, subsequently uplifting the entire organizational. Transformational leaders are known by their capacity to inspire followers to forgo self-interests in achieving superior results for the organization (Clawson, 2006). Avolio and Yammarino (2002) shared Bass’s explanation of transformational leadership as leaders who act as agents of change that stimulate, and transform followers’ attitudes, beliefs, and motivate from lower to higher level of arousal.

Out of all the different leadership theories I learned about this semester I really feel that I best relate to transformational leadership and authentic leadership theories. During the development of my personal theory I found that these theories tended to list many similar traits, and values that aligned with my own. Additionally, both authentic and transformative theories place a significant amount of emphasis on the relationship between the leader and her/his followers. The success and influence of a leader comes not from herself but from her ability to create and invoke strong relationships with their followers. Given my character strengths of sociability, integrity, assertiveness, and my drive to connect to others on a deeper level, I value both the authentic and the transformative leadership theories.

Transformational theory: As it discusses how transformational leadership discuss and focusses on others, their needs and assists employees to reach their goals as a team.

This theory states that situational factors, rather than skills of leader, determine the effectiveness of leadership. Situational theories propose that leaders choose the best course of action based upon situational variables. Different styles of leadership are needed

If I were the new director of an art gallery in New York City, I would utilize a mixture of transformational leadership and situational leadership styles. Transformational leadership is "based on mutually beneficial relationships between leaders and followers whereby the leader is seeking to promote growth and real charge" (Shriberg & Shriberg, 2011, p. 78). Since the twenty employees have opinions of the former leader and how the gallery should be run and the stockholders also have input about what art to display and events to hold, the past managerial style did not sufficiently unify all stakeholders in the business. Utilizing the transformational style of leadership, I would strive to get everyone invested in a shared vision of what the gallery could be. I would listen to everyone 's input because ideas can come from unlikely places and everyone needs to feel that they are a valued part of the whole company. Studies conducted on transformational leadership show organizations led by transformational leaders perform at higher levels and have a higher satisfaction rating, by workers, than organizations led by other types of leaders (Riggio, 2009, March 24). There are four aspects of transformational leadership. They provide intellectual stimulation by encouraging employees to think outside of the box. They give individualized consideration by acknowledging each employee as an individual. They offer inspirational motivation to help employees have a passion for the shared

Transformational leadership are classified into four components which are pointed out by Bass (1990, p. 28), ‘charisma, idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration’. Apart from these basic roles, charisma leadership, a collection of personal characteristics, has its own role of literature since it has similarity with transformational leadership and they are contribution to each other (Bertocci, 2009, p. 43; Judge & Piccolo, 2004, p. 755). Leaders’ behaviour reflects them being role models for their followers. Followers respect, admire and trust their leaders who have charismatic effect on their followers to an extremely high grade are willing to take risks