Transformational Leadership - Research Proposal Example

Transformational Leadership of the al Affiliation Transformational Leadership The Chinese saying, “May you live in interesting time” seem to describe what the world is going through today. Conflict, turbulent, surprise, change, possibility and challenges are all daily events in every sphere of life and evoke myriads of emotions ranging from excitement, hope, enthusiasm, fear and anxiety. Clearly, the challenges the world is facing today such as ethnic and religious conflict, inequality of wealth and opportunity distribution, increased ineffectiveness of institutions and governments require new kind of leadership style (Judge & Piccolo, 2004). In order to cope effectively with these emerging issues, the leaders will not only be required to possess skills and knowledge but also a high level of wisdom, spiritual and emotional intelligence. Higher education plays an important role in shaping many facets of society. The staff and colleagues at higher institutions are not only responsible for training leaders in various fields such as business, science and clergy but they are also responsible for setting the educational standards for the society at large. As such there role is greatly felt both at institutional level and at societal level. Nevertheless, the failing leadership at faculty levels has led to job dissatisfaction and hence the need to introduce a transformational leadership within these organizations for the betterment of the staff and all stakeholders involved. Transformational leadership is an integral part of business. The success of the business highly depends on the leaders’ ability to transform human capital to tangible ends results. As a leader, one should take control of the situation and motivate the people towards achievement of certain goals. There are pre-defined characteristics of such leaders such as having the energy, enthusiasm and the passion to work on the deliverables at hand. For a transformational leader, it is not just about completing the task but also helping others overcame any difficulty they might be having in achieving their goals by enhancing their morale. Within the organization, the leaders are role model. There personality, enthusiasm and strength of vision they influence others significantly. Transformational leadership calls upon the leaders to use their characters, ethics, morality and personal integrity and to bring about change amongst their subjects and social systems, optimizing group’s overall performance (Judge & Piccolo, 2004). There are pillars to this form of leadership which include intellectual stimulation. The leader not only challenges the status quo and the traditional way of doing things but also inspires creativity within the team by constant encouraging on creative methods on working of the projects. Individualized consideration whereby the leaders encourages the team by keeping the line of communication open and any team member feels open to share new ideas they may have that can help in accomplishment of the project. A leader is also visionary in own sense and can share the vision with the team members about the project to help accomplishment of such project. Through their personality, characters and enthusiasm, a leader inspires the team emulate and internalize these ideals transforming them into positive energy towards achieving the goals. To assess the viability of transformational leadership, a research on transformational leadership at a higher institution of learning will be conducted by focusing on transformational leadership on job satisfaction at faculty level in institutions of higher learning. Annotated Literature Review This review focuses on of recently published articles on transformational leaders on employee welfare particularly in the institutions of higher learning. The major areas of discussion include:- the need to for new leadership structures; training the employees on institutional management changes and sharing a vision on part of the leaders to the employees. New leadership structures The global systems have been occasioned by change in almost every sector. The world faces new challenges consistently and hence the need to change the way things are done. Astin (2000), reports that with the increased demand in institutions of higher learning, there is certainly immediate need to change on how the institutions of higher learning are managed. They author notes that, the staff within these institutions have bigger role at the societal by setting the educational standards besides molding talents. In this respect, it is important for them to be satisfied in their job. Astin (2008) acknowledges the existence of a problem in managing the employees at higher institution of learning. In his book, the author challenges the management to institute new form of leadership. “Transformational management engages the employee’s welfare by giving room for discussion on the necessary change. It also ensures the leader are equal to the task assigned (Astin, 2008)”. Training of employees on institutional changes Many authors agree on the need to train the employees in order to integrate successfully transformational leadership. With the growing demand to change the management style, the employees need to be trained on the new concepts of transformational leadership for the overall effectiveness of the program (Gong & Farh, 2009). Often the method to bring these new ideas to the staff can reduce or increase effectiveness and sometimes can cause conflicts. In their book, Gong & Farh (2009) advise the management to use the most effective system depending on the organizational structures. For instance, some organization will need a prior report about the need for management change but other can do without the prior information. It is important that the employee feel as part of the project that is going to be instituted. In this regard, whenever such change is going to be implemented or a training is going to be done as part of the management structures, the employees should be involved for instance through the internal memos within the various faculty. Sharing a vision One of the things that differentiate a leader and a transformational leader is the ability to share the vision and inspire the team towards achieving a particular goal. According to Bass (2001), leaders’ effectiveness is felt if they can manage to transfer the ideas they have in the mind to the employees in a way that is easy to understand and implement. Transformation leader are people who have vision. They have a clear view of the organization goal and can combine the current performance with the future expectations to decide the right path to follow. Since the employees are the people are the people who implement these ideas, it becomes necessary to communicate these goals for sustained growth. The author of the article concurs with the fact that, in the current modern of learning institutions, there are many areas that have changed and hence the need to move with these changes. The need to have an open management in administration cannot be undermined. Majority of the study conducted pays particular attention to change in management. There is little mention on the change towards job satisfaction. Therefore, the current study is important tin bringing the gap between changes in leadership style and how it relates with job satisfaction in higher institution of learning. The success of the overall institutions objectives is ingrained in adopting a transformational leadership within the institutions of higher learning to improve on job satisfaction. Methodology To gather the information of this research, a cross-sectional survey design will be conducted within the various institutions of higher learning. A survey design will be appropriate as the respondents can be able to describe and report the variables. Additionally, it allows generalizations to mad made from the data analyzed. The population where the study will be conducted will be in major institutions of higher learning. The researcher will target the staff of these institutions whereby per every faculty, the researcher will sample two participants who will make the sample size. To collect the data successfully, the researcher is going to administer research instruments namely questionnaire and interview questions to the respondents. The data collected will be analyzed by using Excel to indicate similarity in the response and hence make generalizations about the study topic. The information given by the respondents will be safeguarded from to ensure privacy. Similarly, the respondents will be informed prior before participating in the study. Informing the respondents and safeguarding their data will be part of the ethical considerations. References Astin, A. W., & Astin, H. S. (2000). Leadership Reconsidered: Engaging Higher Education in Social Change. Bass, B. M. (2001). From transactional to transformational leadership: Learning to share the vision. Organizational dynamics, 18(3), 19-31. Gong, Y., Huang, J. C., & Farh, J. L. (2009). Employee learning orientation, transformational leadership, and employee creativity: The mediating role of employee creative self- efficacy. Academy of Management Journal, 52(4), 765-778. Judge, T. A., & Piccolo, R. F. (2004). Transformational and transactional leadership: a meta- analytic test of their relative validity. Journal of applied psychology, 89(5), 755. Read More