Transactional and Transformational leadership styles - Essay Example

es of these two emerging leadership approaches, the discussion attempts to explore and differentiate leadership roles and significances in change management analysing the case of IBM’s turnaround strategy to growth. In order to assess the diverse functions and competencies of leaders in the modern era, the paper also explores an in-depth understanding of these leadership approaches in terms of decision making and change management processes. The paper also demonstrates the other major functions of both transactional and transformational leadership with respect to the selected case to evaluate aspects of the firm’s while building relationship with the major group of stakeholders.

Finally, the paper also suggests an effective set of recommendations from a critical point of view to the importance of transactional and transformational leadership styles in organisational turnaround. Overall, the report will present an argumentative thesis concentrating on the statement as to whether transformational and transactional leaderships are the only leadership styles that can be used in an organisational turnaround process. Transactional leadership approach can be defined as a particular style, which is primarily based upon setting the predetermined business targets for the followers.

This approach uses both punishments (as a negative motivation prospect) as well as rewards (as a positive motivation strategy) in order to enhance the performance level of the individuals or groups (Gardiner, 2006). In the case example of IBM, the transactional traits, as emulsified in the leadership practices, are significantly highlighted during the period of the organisational turnaround. Throughout the tenure of one of the key leaders of IBM from the year 1985 to 1993, the decision of breaking up the organisational structure into different operational units not only fetched the company to experience dramatic changes but also led the firm to incur massive losses.

In order to deal with the