Qualitative and quantitative approaches to studying transformational leadership

¶ … Versus Quantitative Methods: Challenges Facing Transformational Leaders

Phenomenological studies in the tradition of qualitative research attempt to understand the different sides of a particular phenomenon without an overriding hypothesis or even a desire to construct a particular theory grounded in inductive research. In the case of Savage- Austen & Shorter (2011), regarding the phenomenon of servant leadership: "Literature suggests that the servant leader is distinguishable through the care that is taken to ensure that other people's highest priority needs are being served ... instead of followers serving the needs of the leader, the leader ensures that the needs of the subordinates are met" (Savage-Austen & Honeycutt, 2011, 50). Of course, what constitutes something as ambiguous as a servant-leader is difficult to quantify, hence the usefulness of a qualitative study to provide guidance. In the study, servant-leadership is specifically compared with transformational leadership, which the authors distinguish from servant leadership as still focusing upon the leader him or herself and his or her own ability to establish a vision which transforms both the organization and its followers. Although transformational leadership is not ego-focused, it still places the orientation of the leadership theory squarely upon the leader, not upon his or her followers. With servant-leadership, changes in the organization in regards to new technologies are not imposed but rather evolve organically.

Savage- Austen & Shorter (2011) focused upon the "lived experiences of 15 business leaders who practice the servant leadership philosophy" through unstructured qualitative interviews (Savage-Austen & Honeycutt, 2011, 52). The leaders described their perceptions of how increased employee involvement in leadership decisions led to corresponding increases in productivity. The most common barriers identified were organizational -- i.e., a lack of organizational support and fear of change, as well as a lack of self-confidence. Open communication was deemed to be key to fostering sharing of ideas between leaders and followers to promote an effective service-based orientation (Savage-Austen & Honeycutt, 2011, 53). In servant leadership, the leader does not set the agenda as in transformational leadership; rather goals are established as part of a dialogue. This increases buy-in for organizational changes in regards to technological innovations.

However, while some researchers believe that transformational leadership is unable to be quantitatively assessed, some studies have attempted to define this attribute according to a measurable numerical scale of achievement. In a study by Boehm, Dwertmann, Bruch, Shamir (2015) it was hypothesized that "CEO charisma is related to firm performance" when CEOs foster a climate conducive to "raise the transformational leadership climate" and both CEO charisma and a transformational leadership climate are proposed to "increase a firm's organizational identity strength (OIDS), which in turn, relates positively to firm performance." The results suggested that charisma alone was not positively associated with firm performance but a strong Transformational Leadership (TFL) climate and Organizational Identity Strength (OIDS) was associated with improved results. A lack of unified purpose, even with a charismatic CEO thus did not yield the same quantitative benefits.