Transactional, Transformational and Situational Leadership - Literature review Example

The paper "Transactional, Transformational and Situational Leadership" is an outstanding example of management literature review. There are many definitions and qualities that are given to leadership due to its complexity (Grimm 2010). According to the definition given by Porter-O’Grady(2003) leadership is defined as a multifaceted process where goals are identified, and motivating people towards action and support and motivation being given towards achievement of mutually negotiated goals. In clinical practice, the definition of leadership is given as direct involvement in clinical care while having a constant influence on others in ensuring there is an improvement in the care they are giving (Cook 1999). A leader has a role of eliciting effective performance from the people they are leading. The leaders are supposed to lead and influence the development of shared values, vision as well as expectation so as to have an improvement on the goals of the organization and the overall effectiveness (Feather 2009). Winkler (2010) points out that, leaders have always been seen to possess unique personality traits from those of the people they are leading. The personalities associated with good leaders have been given by Grimm (2010) as comprising confidence, ethical fitness, purpose, courage and having the ability to prioritize. The proposition of Whitehead et al (2009) was that even though leadership may be natural in some people everyone has the capability of leading if they are imparted with relevant knowledge and skills. Leadership skills may be improved through the acquisition of education (Mahoney,2001). Enhancement of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness as well as social skills is an approach that is taken by many organizations which have seen to be successful (Feather 2009).

The definition of emotional intelligence is given as one’s ability to control the effect of emotions impacting on a relationship with others (Walton 2012). The belief of Goleman(1998) is that emotional intelligence is very important in effective leadership and his observation was that having training of high quality, good ideas, as well as an analytical mind, was not enough when emotional intelligence was lacking. There has been a huge development in research towards emotional intelligence, but the concept has remained controversial and studies for testing its effectiveness have not been satisfactory (Cavazotte et al 2012).