Transformational leadership and service delivery in organizations

Transformational Leadership

Challenges facing Transformational Leaders with reference to Service Delivery and Leveraging of New Technologies

Transformational leadership has gained a significant amount of popularity in the literature over the years. Transformational leadership has been called one of the most effective among the various theories of leadership (Judge & Bono, 2000). As a result of the model's popularity, it has been applied in a range of different circumstances and various organizational functions. The model has even been used to look for different personality dispositions that can contribute to the predictions of transformational leadership; for example it was found that traits, linked with extraversion and agreeableness were more consistent and stronger predictors of transformational leadership (Judge & Bono, 2000).

The seminal work in the study of the transformational leadership model seems to stem from the insights that are gained by contrasting the model to a more transactional management or leadership. The transactional management role is viewed as the role of monitoring, controlling, and motivating employees through economic incentives and other exchange incentives (Bass, 1985). This type of leadership arrangement typically focus on extrinsic factors of motivation such as contractual agreements and financial rewards. In some cases, a transactional leaders will use a laissez-faire approach in which they participate infrequently in any attempt to achieve organizational objectives.

The transactional model allows the transformational leadership model to be defined in these early works. Where the transactional model is largely devoid of inspirational or intrinsic motivation, the transformational model is defined by these characteristics. This is contrasted with a transformational leader that can stimulate the moral values of the employees beyond the transactional or contractual agreements. A transformational leader is said to be able transform the self-interested personal goals of the organizational members into the collective organizational goals (Bass, 1985).

The transformational model makes sense to people intuitively. Employees who are inspired by a transformational leader are likely to devote a greater level of energy into their work and work harder to achieve team or organizational goals. Much of the dialogue regarding transformational leadership consists of intrinsic motivators such as building a moral commitment and challenging employees to do their best, sets challenging expectations, and thus achieves higher performances. Models were then further refined and the definition of transformational leadership was condensed to the leader's ability to inspire organizational members to move beyond their immediate self-interests (Bass, 1985).