Transformational Leadership Paper Essay Example for Free

Transformational Leadership Paper Essay Abstract The purpose of this paper is to identify the the role a transformational leader can play in order to minimize the volatility that a change or transformation brings about in an organization. The paper discusses the two most common leadership styles, transactional and transformational leadership, and their differences. The qualities and traits of a transformational leader have been discussed. Most importantly this paper tries to associate the qualities of emotional intelligence to a transformational leadership style, and how the two feed into one another. Introduction Today the world has become a global village and markets have expanded to the extent that now firms are competing on a global level. This on one has provided firms with a massive opportunity and on the other hand it also demands more hard-work and effort from the workers. The challenge therefore is how to tackle the ever-changing work-environment. When one speaks of the dynamic work environment one has to realize the importance of Good Leadership in such a scenario. So, the leaders of todays companies have a lot to care about and a lot of responsibilities to take care of. Therefore, it is totally up to the leadership to make most of the human skills at hand and motivate them in order to make sure that they adapt quickly and easily to the work environment and thus maximize efficiency. Leaders broadly may be categorized into two groups, transactional leaders and transformational leaders. Transactional leaders are the kind of leaders whoguide or motivate their followers in the direction of established goals by clarifying role and task requirements (Robbins and Judge, 2005). The other type of leaders inspire followers to transcend their own self interest for the good of the organization. They are able to have a profound and extra-ordinary effect on their followers, these are transformational leaders (Robbins and Judge, 2005). Transformational leaders are are charismatic in nature and have the ability to provide individualized consideration and intellectual simulation (Robbins and Judge, 2005). Transformational leaders pay attention to the concerns and development needs of individualized followers; they change followers’ awareness of issues by helping them to look at old problems in new ways, and are therefore able to excite, arouse and inspire followers to put in extra effort to achieve group goals (Robbins and Judge, 2005). Analysis Leadership at the top is never easy for even the most experienced people. For someone taking on the job of CEO for the first time, mastering the new skills and sorting out the uncertainties that go with the position can be an overwhelming challenge. The fact is that for most of the CEOs especially the freshly appointed ones it is exceedingly difficult to familiarize themselves with the responsibilities and the risks that are associated with the job, and usually it requires some time and experience before they can deliver. The Centre for Creative Leadership has estimated that 40% of new CEOs fail in their first 18 months (Dan Ciampa 2005). What’s more, the churn rate is on the rise: In a 2002 study, the centre found that the number of CEOs leaving their jobs had increased 10% since 2001 (Dan Ciampa 2005). As a recent report from the outplacement firm Challenger, Gray Christmas points out, â€Å"The biggest challenge looming over corporate America [is] finding replacement CEOs.†(Dan Ciampa 2005) Take Coca Cola for an example, when the company lost its CEO Robert Goizueta in 1997, the two subsequent CEOs suffered in his shadow, as people expected them to perform the same way Goizueta did, however, leading as suggested earlier is the toughest job amongst all. Goizueta had guided Coke through its glorious years of the 1980s and the most of 1990s, leading it to perennially unrealistic expectations by shareholders. This is why change management is regarded as a tough job, because changes can occur in the external macro-environment and at the same time in the internal environment, as incase of Coke, whose CEO Robert Goizeuta died of cancer. And since then Coke has never been able to make up for the loss, and Pepsi has gained a significant market share since then. Jack Welch is probably the first name that comes to mind when we speak of transformational leaders. Richard Branson of the Virgin group is another very famous transformational leader (Robbins and Judge, 2005). When we speak of transactional and transformational leaders, they shouldn’t be considered or viewed as opposing approaches to getting things done. Transformational leadership is built on top of transactional leadership, as it produces levels of follower effort and performance that go beyond what would   with a transactional approach alone (Kotter, 1995). A transcational leader believes in exchange of rewards for effort as a major source of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. He rewards good performance, and recognizes accomplishments. He tries to identify deviations from rules and standards, and subsequently reverts to corrective measures, and intervenes only if he believes that the standards have not been met. Transactional leaders usually abdicate responsibilties to others empowering them but also avoiding to go throw the challenging phase of decision-making. Trasformational leaders, on the other hand, are charismatic by nature, i.e. they provide vision and sense of mission, instills pride, gains respect and trust of his followers (Kotter, 1995). But, transformational leadership is more than just charisma. Because all charismatic leaders would want is to make sure their followers share the same viewpoint on things as they do, whereas transformational leaders will try to instill in followers the ability to question views, views established by the leaders themselves. Transformational leaders act as a source of inspiration to their followers, communicating high expectations, using symbols to focus efforts, expressing important purposes in simple ways. Transformational leaders also promote intelligence, rationality and careful problem solving skills (Robbins and Judge, 2005). But the most obvious and impotant trait of a transformational leader is that they offer individualized considerations to their followers, giving them personal attention, treating them all individually, coaching and advising them on a one to one basis. The evidence supporting the superiority of transformational leadership over the transactional variety is overwhelmingly impressive. For instance, a number of studies were conducted with American, German and Canadian military officers, belonging to different ranks, and the eventual verdict was that transformational leaders were evaluated as more effective than their transactional counterparts. Similarly, managers at Federal Express who were rated by their followers as exhibiting more transformational leadership were evaluated by their immediate supervisors as higher performers and more promotable. Much has been written about leadership and the qualities that fuel leadership such as intelligence, passion, toughness, determination, ethics, credibility, integrity, vision, etc. Often left off are the lists softer and more personal qualities, but recent studies have proven that they are equally important. Researchers have proposed a new term called Emotional Intelligence, and it may well help differentiate the outstanding leaders from the merely adequate ones. Emotional intelligence is one of the major aspects of transformational leadership. This may be because, effective transformational leaders rely on the expression of feelings to help convey a message; therefore, they possess a higher level of emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence helps leaders manage the mood of their organizations which is an integral part of the transformation process (Satterlee, 2007). Emotional intelligence is what makes transformational leaders self-aware and empathetic to a greater extent. They can read and regulate their own emotions while intuitively grasping how others feel and gauging their organization’s emotional state. According to Daniel Goleman, who conducted a lot of research on Emotional Intelligence, there are five main components to emotional intelligence. Self-awareness is the trait where emotional intelligence actually begins (Goleman, 1998). Transformational leaders with a greater degree of self-awareness are never hesitant to talk about and discuss their weaknesses and it is this attitude that later brings upon a positive change in them as they are able to improve upon such weaknesses with time. This helps a leader in bringing about a transformation as he is someone who knows his limitations and he knows when and where he can actually stand-up and deliver for the rest of the workforce and be a motivator for them, i.e. when can he lead by example. Thus he knows which tasks and changes can actually be brought about in an organization and which ones cannot. The second trait is self-regulation, and that leaders with this trait can control their emotions and impulses better and channel them for good purposes (Goleman, 1998). This brings about an openness to change and transformation in their attitude and behavior, and increases their trustworthiness and integrity, and also helps them remain comfortable in ambiguous situations and scenario. And this is what subordinates try to see in their leaders, especially in times of change and transformation. Motivation is perhaps the most important trait and the most obvious one that a leader is judged upon. It’s the motivational abilities of a leader that gives the sub-ordinates the notion that the leader has a strong drive to achieve. It portrays the optimism of the leader towards the followers, such that they know their leader would still be optimistic when facing failure, so it has to do more with the mind than anything else. It is the positivity of the mind, it emanates from the mind of the leader and leads its way to the minds of the followers (Michael Roberto and David Garvin 2005). Empathy is the ability to understand the emotional makeup of other people. Empathy is the trait that enables a leader to be an expert in building and maintaining talent, something that is critical to the process of transformation. It enables him to treat people according to their emotional reactions. This is why he can be successful in getting the most out of the talented people that work under him, making him a better man manager. He is able to manage and lead people from various different backgrounds and cultures, belonging to various social and economic classes, i.e. it increases the cross-cultural sensitivity of the leader himself. With the businesses and economies globalizing, leaders have to lead and manage people belonging to different cultures which is the major reason why change management in such a scenario is very difficult, however, if only a leader can empathize with his followers, it makes the job half as difficult as before. The last trait that comes under emotional intelligence is the social skills of the leader. Transformational leaders need to be proficient in managing relationships and constructing networks that lead to effectiveness in change management ans transformation. Such a leader is able to find common ground between individuals and situations and scenarios and is able to build rapport. It also improves his persuasiveness and the ability to build and lead teams. A transformational leader combines emotional intelligence with the courage to raise the tough questions, challenge people’s assumptions about strategy and operations and risk losing their goodwill, i.e. he does not care about pleasing individuals but rather believes in the greater good of the company. A leader gets into trouble when there’s dissonance between the inside and outside what today we’d call a â€Å"disconnect.† (Mayer 2004) If a single theme runs through this issue, it’s the importance of keeping the two aligned. Every leader ought to want a more supple emotional intelligence, and â€Å"Leading by Feel† is a great place to begin (Mayer 2004). Another important tool in ensuring effective transformation is collaboration and good communication, which is essential and plays a vital role in process. All processes, practices and functionalities give more values to customer, goals and performance for achievement of goals. There should be internal solutions. Horizontal, Vertical and multi directional interaction must be carried out before change in organization. For a transformational leader, it is important to study the present culture of the organization and to know where one is. It is also necessary for a him to identify employees who want change and those who are not happy with the process of transformation. Take examples from existing model that has effectively implemented change and also communicate with them regarding their experience with transformation. The process has to be subtle and gradual, and a transformational approach would not demand immediate and complete change in the existing culture. Transformational approach to leadership also encourages one to seek advice from people about ways to implement change and methods to solve the problems while transformation. A clear vision definitely accelerates the transformation process. References Ciampa, Dan (2005). Almost Ready: How Leaders Move Up. Harvard Business Review. Goleman, Daniel (1998).What makes a Leader?. Harvard Business Review. Mayer, John (2004). Leading by Feel. Harvard Business Review. Kotter, John P. (1995). Leading Change: Why Transformation Efforts Fail. Harvard Business Review Leadership As A Boss In The Workplace. Retrieved July 29, 2008, from Manager Newz Web site: http://www.managernewz.com/managernewz-21-20070125LeadershipasaBossintheWorkplace.html Roberto, Michael and Garvin, David (2005). Change through Persuasion. Harvard Business Review. Robbins, Stephen P.   and Judge, Timothy A. (2005). Organizational Behavior, Twelfth edition: Pearsons Publishers Satterlee, Anita (2007). Essential of Management: Core principles, concepts, and strategies. Synergistics Inc.