How Transformational Leadership Influence Change Initiation and Implementation - Research Proposal Example

Abstract The focus of this research is to explore how leadership has a role in influencing change initiation and acceptance in an organisation. The main focus of this study is Kawader Al Watan, a company whose success has defied industry competition by accepting imminent changes in various industries of business interests including transportation, petroleum, IT solutions, and security systems. Therefore, the study explores how leadership styles provide the organisation culture that motivates employees thus boosting their morale to work towards achieving both personal and organisational goal and these conditions are necessary for increasing their overall productivity. The main focus of leadership style is the transformational leadership and the research seeks to find out from Kawader Al Watan case how the style is effective during change since it encourages high levels of engagement as a perquisite for employee motivation. Introduction The success of organisations has been linked to the influence that their leaders have on the existing culture and employee commitment. Underpinning the increased focus on leadership in organisations is the dynamism of the modern business environment and the complexity of operations (Harms, Han & Chen, 2012). The complexity of business environment requires leaders to act like change agents and ensure that they embrace transformation so that their organisations can gain and sustain competitive advantage. Nonetheless, the increased focus on leadership and change is because organisations are trying to stay relevant with their business operations. Since leaders are the change agents, they are always in the best positions to bring about the transformations and this explains why success of an organisation like Kawader Al Watan has been strongly attributed to transformational leadership approach (Kawader Al Watan, 2015). Leadership and change as a contemporary issue in managing organisations is the reason as to why theorists recommend some of the management approaches that have the potential for employee commitment (Zhang, Li, Ulrich & Van Dick, 2013). Therefore, the famous approaches to leadership like transformational, charismatic, and transactional styles are the most commonly used in organizations because they have been found to influence good performance by improving motivation and morals of the employers (Jackson, Meyer & Wang, 2013). Therefore, it becomes evident that leadership style has a profound effect on the overall motivation of the employees. Thus, it is imperative to propose a research on how transformational leadership style influences the motivation employees by paying close attention to how the style encourages or discourages change initiation. Rationale for the study/reason for choosing the study Leadership in organizations assumes various approaches and can take many forms. Existing research tries to find out, through theories and models, most effect leadership styles that have the potentials for employee commitment and involvement. The basic forms of leadership of transactional, transformational, charismatic and laissez-faire all contribute to a certain degree of employee motivation (Harms, Han & Chen, 2012). However, few of the existing studies emphasize on describing how the leadership styles are useful in influencing good performance among the organizations without focusing their attention on issues like employee commitment, engagement, moral and motivation. Therefore, underpinning this study is the need to embrace leadership styles that result in high motivation among the employees. Transformational leadership in Kawader Al Watan Company Transformational leadership has been lauded as the most effective approach to organising, directing, and coordinating workforce thus Kawader Al Watan Company has used it to its advantage in becoming an industry leader in transportation, petroleum, IT solutions, and security systems within the Middle East region (Kawader Al Watan, 2015). Therefore, the leadership style has played a crucial role in improving the success of the organisation and this forms the basis of the research to seek and find out how transformational leadership is responsible for the company’s performance in the oil and transportation business. Purpose of the research The research aims at finding out the effect of transformational leadership on employee motivated (Jackson, Meyer & Wang, 2013). On the other hand, the research aims at filling the possible gaps pertaining to research on leadership and organizational performance by identifying elements of leadership that are crucial for the improved and increased performance for the employees through motivation. Besides, the research aims at opening the door for future research to focus on how organizations can use leadership to motivate employees by creating the organisational culture that focuses on employee motivation. Research question The direction of a research always depends on the approach of executing the study or the methodology in general. In this case, the study assumes a qualitative approach thus it will use research question as opposed to hypothesis that is used on quantitative research because it must be tested and proven. In respect to this study, the possible research question is: Does leadership transformational leadership influence motivation of the employees in respect to change initiation and implementation? Objectives of the research a). To explore the role of transformational leadership on organisations b). To examine how the extent to which transformational leadership motivates employees c). To highlight some of the conditions or organizational environment that leaders must create to implement transformational leadership. Sources of information The research will be first step will be to engage in searching both the primary and secondary data sources (Östlund, Kidd, Wengström & Rowa-Dewar, 2011). Secondary data sources include the existing literature and what they cover about the research topic. In this case, the focus will be on the current books, journals articles, periodicals, as well as other relevant sources concerning how leadership affect change in an organization by looking referring to other factors or elements of leadership like employee motivation. In the form of literature, the background information will be collected and organised in topical coverage where the study will identify what the existing literature recommend as the most commonly used leadership styles, effects of leadership styles on motivation and conditions necessary for effectiveness of the leadership styles. Sampling Since a research cannot have the necessary resources and energy to measure every single aspect or item within the population, it is quite vital to use a part of the population to represent it. In this regard, the focus of this research will be to use a large sample size because it has the potential to accurately represent the whole population. Therefore, the research will engage in random sampling of the population where the participants will be chosen haphazardly. The reason for choosing this sampling method is that it is the least biased sampling technique because it does not result in subjectivity. The implication is that each member of the population has equal chances of selection. The research method The study appreciates and takes into consideration different approaches that are used to undertake studies (Plonsky & Gass, 2011). The term research methods as used in this study refer to the tools and processes that are useful in carrying out studies. Therefore, has a variety of tools to choose from including surveys, questionnaires, case studies, and observation where possible and applicable. On the other hand, the term research methodology used in the context of this study refers to how the research will be done (Östlund, Kidd, Wengström & Rowa-Dewar, 2011). In this case, the study considers that a research methodology concerns principles that guide the entire study. Therefore, the study appreciates the qualitative approach of undertaking research. There are two approaches to undertaking research namely quantitative and qualitative methods. Therefore, to measure qualities, beliefs and attributes, research needs to adopt the qualitative approach (Plonsky & Gass, 2011). In most cases, qualitative research entails seeking attributes of participants about the research topics where the common methods of collecting data include direct observation, interviews, case studies, and participatory observation. Another important philosophical underpinning of the study is to determine whether the research assumes a deductive or an inductive approach. Inductive approach concerns using data to build new theories unlike the deductive approach that uses data to validate the theoretical underpinnings of the study (Plonsky & Gass, 2011). In this case, the deductive approach focuses on developing hypotheses or research questions based on the existing theories and tested using the appropriate research design or strategy. In simple terms, the research adopts the deductive approach because it focuses on deducting conclusions from the propositions. Wiles, Crow and Pain (2011) confirm that deductive approach begins by looking at the expected patterns that are tested using observations unlike the inductive approach that begins with the observations then finds the pattern that explain the observable results. In this study, the research seeks to substantiate how transformational leadership styles affect employee motivation and this inferences is embedded on theories concerning leadership and change, motivation or hygiene factors and employee needs Therefore, the research entirely seeks to verify the theoretical underpinnings of effectiveness of transformational leadership style and thus a deductive approach is applied throughout the study. Reasons for choosing A Qualitative Approach Qualitative research approach has been criticized for emphasizing on focus group despite the availability of other approaches to collecting data like observation, case studies and documentary analysis, the approach has some advantages that make it suitable for this study (Plonsky & Gass, 2011). Firstly, qualitative methods involve observation of the relationship between variables thus makes it possible to carry out a detailed analysis of the study question (Plonsky & Gass, 2011). On the other hand, there is room to revise the entire research approach in any case new information comes up during the study process. On the contrary, one of the limitations of using qualitative approach in this study is because of the overdependence on the individual skills and this requires the researcher to have the competence in interpreting and analyzing qualitative data. In this context, he study uses a case study that can be easily analyzed thus such limitations will be properly taken care of. Ethical considerations There are ethical codes of conduct governing researches, and some institutions have standardized the moral codes governing research. One of the ethical considerations with research is upholding the confidentiality of the information collected from the individual or the organisation (Halse & Honey, 2014). In this research, efforts will be made to keep any information obtained from the participants with much confidentiality as possible. The implication is that research ethics compels individuals to uphold information collected during the field study with much confidentiality. Another ethical consideration is that the researcher must make sure that the participants engage in the study upon their consent. Therefore, the interviews and questionnaires will only be carried if the target participants have given their consent or the go ahead. On the other hand, personal consent as an ethical consideration means that the research offers the participants with the chance to withdraw from study if they feel uncomfortable (Halse & Honey, 2014). In this case, the research gives the participants the opportunity to withdraw from the study if they feel it is going against their personal values and morals. Problems and difficulties One of the problems that the research will encounter is incurring of costs, in monetary form that will be used to buy the materials for the study including materials for questionnaires, interviews and transportation costs. On the other hand, the study anticipates a lot of problems with transportation because moving around interviewing people and convincing them to feel in the questionnaires is not an easy task. Besides, time is a limited resource that must be utilise during the study thus the study will require a lot of dedication in terms of time and commitment. Nonetheless, interpretation of qualitative data is not that easy thus the research requires some skills on how to code qualitative data so that it can be transformed into a form that can make it easy to be interpreted by the computer mediated analysis tools like the SPSS. Bibliography Halse, C, & Honey, A 2014, ‘Unraveling ethics: Illuminating the moral dilemmas of research ethics’, Signs, vol. 40, no. 1, pp. 23-45. Harms, P.D, Han, G & Chen, H 2012, ‘Recognising Leadership at a Distance: A study of Leader Effectiveness Across Cultures’, Journal of Leadership & Organisational Studies, vol. 20, no. 10, pp. 1-9. Jackson, TA, Meyer, JP, Wang, HF 2013, ‘Leadership, Commitment, and Culture: A Meta-Analysis’, Journal of Leadership & Organisational Studies, vol. 20, no. 1, pp. 84-106. Kawader Al Watan, 2015, Viewed from http://www.kwaddr.com/ Östlund, U, Kidd, L, Wengström, Y, & Rowa-Dewar, N 2011, ‘Combining qualitative and quantitative research within mixed method research designs: a methodological review. International journal of nursing studies, vol. 48, no. 3, pp. 369-383. Plonsky, L & Gass, S 2011, ‘Quantitative research methods, study quality, and outcomes: The case of interaction research’, Language Learning, vol. 61, no. 2, pp. 325-366. Wiles, R, Crow, G, & Pain, H 2011, ‘Innovation in qualitative research methods: A narrative review. Qualitative Research, vol. 11, no. 5, pp. 587-604. Zhang, X, Li, N, Ulrich, J & Van Dick, R 2013, ‘Getting Everyone on Board: The Effect of Differentiated Transformational Leadership by CEOs on Top Management Team Effectiveness and Leader-Rated Firm Performance’, Journal of Management, vol. XX, no. X, pp. xx-xx. Read More