Transformational Leadership

Describe about the role of leadership in organization?

Leadership is the important component in the success of an organization, yet there exist academic debate about the effective leadership style (Hoy and Miskel 2001). The main aim of this essay is to critically evaluate the various leadership styles that are deployed by the business leaders by demonstrating the transformational leadership principles, which are more conductive for improving the staff motivation, by impacting positively on the culture of organization and delivering overall success for long term (Hoy and Miskel 2001).

The first style, which is analyzed, is the leadership of transformation and its examples includes about the Smith, who is the International Coffee CEO, and is leading coffee supplier of fair trade (Skogstad, Einarsen, Torsheim, Aasland and Hetland 2007). Transformational leadership includes four dimensions and these include the congruent along with actions and practices that were implemented by Smith (Skogstad, Einarsen, Torsheim, Aasland and Hetland 2007). For example, Smith tries to characterize the first dimension that create influence by his optimism, ambition, as well as attitude oriented towards innovation along with the willingness to do sacrifice for short period gains for the purpose to offer ethical services that are mainly built over the principles of fair trade, and the same is presented through the axiom that align with Einstein and Humphreys (2001) perception over the transformational leaders that also elevate the followers towards high morality level (Einstein and Humphreys 2001).

Smith fulfills the dimension of inspirational motivation through creating the environment that values the originality and employees could feel the freedom to expand and fail (Einstein and Humphreys 2001). This could be viewed by the practices of company for celebrating the attempt towards the techniques of new harvesting, which also tries to amply and demonstrate their appreciation of taking risk element, which inherent in proceeding with the new assignments and inspire the team to go with new ideas through removing the risk of failure (Leatherman  and Leatherman 2008).

He also offers the third component that is termed as intellectual stimulation through motivating the staff to work in collaboration in small group of teams in order to come up with new ideas and project within the safe environment without any kind of fear (Leatherman  and Leatherman 2008). Lastly, Smith also satisfies the dimension of individualized consideration through offering the employees that work in International Coffee with the free perks like assistance for travel, and healthcare through the support of benefits menu, in which every employee could pick the three advantages, which suit those most (Leatherman  and Leatherman 2008). He also offered personal feedback to all members of team on daily basis that also corresponds with the view of Bass (1985), who states that the transformational leaders offer help as well as encouragement to other members (Bass 1985). There are some critics like Morgeson, Derue and Karam (2010), who has argued that the transformational style of leadership assumes about the high ambition level and employees motivation where else the situational approach also suggest that leaders could easily modify the behavior of employees as per the employees level of maturity (Morgeson, Derue and Karam 2010).

Transactional Leadership

Notable, Morgeson, Derue and Karam (2010) also draws various important differences among the transactional as well as transformational styles of leadership that could be easily observed in the International coffee last CEO, who was Jones (Morgeson, Derue and Karam 2010). For example, oppositional to the Smith that inspires the staff to focus towards innovation, Jung (2001) also reports that Jones main focus is over maintaining the company’s success that aligns with Benne and Sheats (1948) who explores that the transactional leaders are passive and tries to preserve the status quo (Benne and Sheats 1948). In long term this leads the Jones to fail in anticipating the shift in the market of fair trade that also results into opting market of company in the leadership along with effects on market share and profits (Benne and Sheats 1948).

Moreover, its noted that transformational style of Smith also tries to acknowledge the mistakes as part of process success, and in this case Jones tried to implement the rigid ranking system of performance between 1-5, in which top performers will be given reward along with bonus, while the one coming at the bottom, that is 5 will result into the disciplinary action (Skogstad, Einarsen, Torsheim, Aasland and Hetland 2007). This kind of practices corresponds into the style of transaction, in which employees tries to achieve the objective through reward and punishment system that is also determined through the leader (Skogstad, Einarsen, Torsheim, Aasland and Hetland 2007).

Significantly, a contextual view point is considered as the key in depicting the transactional style effectiveness (Purcell, Kinnie, Swart, Rayton and Hutchinson 2009). When international coffee operated in the increasing market along with low competition, the leadership of Jones also proved effective in maintaining the profitability acceptance level and also clarified the employee’s role (Purcell, Kinnie, Swart, Rayton and Hutchinson 2009). The highest leadership form is considered as the autocratic leadership style that is exhibited through the Johnson, who is assumed to be Solar Drink CEO (Purcell, Kinnie, Swart, Rayton and Hutchinson 2009).

In comparison with the Smith, who is referred as the role model and considers empowerment of employees, Johnson tries to evident the autocratic principles that include the entire authority, which help in determining the procedures, objectives and policies in context of employees (Purcell, Kinnie, Swart, Rayton and Hutchinson 2009). This also signifies the typology of power culture through Morgeson, Derue and Karam (2010) with control that emanate through the center (Morgeson, Derue and Karam 2010). Radical strategies of Johnson also includes the extreme layoffs, shutting down factories, renegotiating of contracts, as well as revoking perks of employees that proceed effective for short period in the success of finance and lead towards enhancement in revenue (Purcell, Kinnie, Swart, Rayton and Hutchinson 2009).

The faire style of laissez on the other side is considered as antithetical towards the autocratic Johnson style and this could be viewed by the analysis of Fast Food chairman, Dean, this company includes the outlets of fast food eating in the UK (Purcell, Kinnie, Swart, Rayton and Hutchinson 2009). Where else, Johnson holds the entire authority; the style of laissez faire is predicated over the leader that provides managers with freedom to make any decision. As per Benne and Sheats (1948) Dean tries to achieve this through permitting the individual managers to run independent restaurant without any intervening of assistance (Benne and Sheats 1948). Success of Dean claim that style of laissex faire could attain success, but Jung (2001) has argued that this style subscribe with the theory of McGregor, in which employees assume to have autonomy and gets ineffective, when managers fail to possess with the ability to make important decision of business (Jung 2001). It’s noted that leadership of laissez faire could destructively create influence on culture of company through lack of guidance, and therefore style of transformational leadership is effective for the leaders as it offers better direction for long term with Smith.

Autocratic Leadership

In order to recapitulate by conducting analysis of different business leaders and the style of leadership, it is viewed that the leadership transformational style is arguably the most effective one, as it tries to articulate the strategic vision for long term, and help in creating the performance culture and at the same time motivates the employees towards attaining maximum capability and results that are basic for attaining the sustained business success. Conversely there are other leadership styles like transactional which encompass more and lead towards passivity and might stifle the creativity of the employees. In the similar way, the autocratic leadership style is effective in emergency situations, and requires fast decisions, which often lead towards the dysfunctional culture and also tries to de-motivate the employees for long period. Likewise, other leadership style of laissez faire might also impact negatively on organizational culture through creating the confusion and create role conflicts due to lack in direction from the leader.

According to Burns (1978) delegation is considered as the important component in the entire set of skills of leader and when its utilized successfully can lead to improvement in motivation, performance and level of commitment of the team members and employees (Burns 1978). During my study time at University of Singapore, I was able to gain the first hand experience in context of significance of having effective delegation. This includes the working as part of the team to come up with the video marketing campaign for the website of e-commerce company, in which I was selected as the team leader.

The key issues through which I encountered was the initial reluctance towards disseminating the workload with other members of the team, as I believed that I need to clear understanding about the specific methods of marketing that could be more effective. This lead some team members to get de-motivate as I failed in setting up the objectives for them as well as assigning roles and responsibilities and rather than doing so, I proceed with my own ideas without giving any kind of input (Skogstad, Einarsen, Torsheim, Aasland and Hetland 2007). Eventually due to these facts that I have become more overwhelmed with the workload and even gained experience about the video editing, as I delegated the tasks to other team members (Aldefer 1972).

Denning (2005) explains that the teams are usually more productive and even efficient, whenever the team leader delegate the responsibilities and tasks, which correspond with the strength of an individual of team members (Denning 2005). Therefore, at this specific stage I started appreciating the talents and ability of the team members and explored that assigned responsibilities dramatically got enhanced efficiently and even productivity was increased, along with the motivation and morale of the employees. This also got align with the work of Kuhnert and Lewis (1987) who explored the various team roles and suggested about the ways in which it could be integrated successfully and harmonized the improvement of entire performance (Kuhnert and Lewis 1987).

Moreover, whilst the working in the team instead of working independently by pursing the own ideas and I should have tried to sought to set up the communication related to what is required to be done along with encouraged insight, feedback, and opinions taken from the members of the team. This is Congruent with the thoughts of Locke and Latham (2002) who has explained how the strong leader in the team establish the appropriate objectives for each person and tries to encourage as well as facilitate them towards communication between the members of the team (Locke and Latham 2002).

Laissez-faire Leadership

Simultaneously, I also believed in enhancing the planning as well as organizational ability about how communication could be made effective, so that strong interpersonal relations could be built up with other members in the company that could add as the benefit in supporting to delegate successfully in the coming period (Locke and Latham 2002). Therefore, if I was to undertake the managerial and leadership role in the future of my career, I would like to explore the strength and weakness of my staff members and consequently I would like to delegate the task that could enhance the efficiency (Skogstad, Einarsen, Torsheim, Aasland and Hetland 2007).

I would also like to employ the systematic approach through establishing the expectations and goals and try to motivate the staff to undertake responsibilities for own personal development that brings good results (Locke and Latham 2002). This could also be substantiated through the research conducted by Northouse (2012) that demonstrate the empowerment of employees in becoming important in the present environment of business in context of motivating the employees to attain maximum capability and high output performance (Northouse 2012). Finally, this could also be aligned with my own experience by the organization and leadership module, from where I could learn about how the most successful style of leadership for long period that could help me in cultivating supportive relations with my team mates and empower them through offering autonomy and high control on their work (Bratton 2010).

References

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Denning, S. 2005. ‘Transformational innovation: a journey by narrative’. Strategy & Leadership, 33(3), pp. 11â€Â16

Jung, D.I. 2001. Transactional and transformational leadership and their effects on creativity in groups. Creativity Research Journal, 13(2), pp. 185-1

Kuhnert, K.W. and Lewis, P. 1987. Transactional and transformational leadership: A constructive/developmental analysis. Academy of Management Review, 12(4), pp. 648–657.

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Bratton, J. 2010. Work and Organizational Behaviour: Understanding the workplace. 2^nd ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

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Leatherman, W.R.  and Leatherman, D. 2008. Quality Leadership Skills: Standards of Leadership Behaviour. Amhest: HRD Press

Morgeson, P. F., Derue, D. and Karam, P. E. 2010. ‘Leadership in Teams: A Functional Approach to Understanding Leadership Structures and Processes’. Journal of Management, 36(1), pp. 5-39

Purcell, J.,Kinnie, N.,Swart, J.,Rayton, B. and Hutchinson, S. 2009. People Management and Performance. Abingdon: Routledge