Transformational Leadership: Why is it so important these days?

Have you ever met a team leader who has the ability to clearly communicate the group's goals and heavily inspire all team members? This style of leadership is known as "transformational leadership."

A transformational leader possesses the ability to bring about positive changes in other people. Generally, they are always full of energy, enthusiasm, and passion. Aside from the team's business, they also focus on helping every member to achieve success.

Transformational leadership is key to inspiring employees to embrace changes, as well as creating a sense of responsibility, ownership, and autonomy at work.

WHAT IS TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP?

The transformation leadership style is characterized by leaders encouraging and inspiring people to innovate themselves - which is critical to the organization's development and success. They focus on establishing a strong sense of corporate culture, ownership, and autonomy at work.

Transformational leaders do not micro-manage - instead, they believe in the employee's ability to handle their jobs themselves. This leadership style gives employees the opportunity to be creative, think bigger, and come up with new solutions. Through coaching and mentoring, your employees will be equipped with the necessary skills to become the next generation of transformational leaders.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP MODEL

The transformational leadership theory was introduced by James V. Dftimeon in 1973, and developed by James Burns in 1978. In 1985, Bernard M. Bass proposed methods to measure the success of transformational leadership. This model encourages leaders to demonstrate strong management skills, knowing that your people will be able to follow suit.

"Transformational leaders...are those who stimulate and inspire followers to both achieve extraordinary outcomes and, in the process, develop their own leadership capacity. Transformational leaders help followers grow and develop into leaders by responding to individual followers' needs by empowering them and by aligning the objectives and goals of the individual followers, the leader, the group, and the larger organization."

Bass and Rigio

After more than 30 years, Bass's model is still now considered a standard for leadership. This model is applicable to all industries - especially fast-growing tech ones that require the ability to innovate and adapt quickly.

CHARACTERISTICS OF TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP

According to Bass, transformational leaders are characterized by the following things:

• They prove themselves as an example of morality, fairness, and integrity.
• They define clear goals and set reasonable expectations.
• They inspire the positive development of their fellows.
• They are willing to spirit co-operate, and recognize the achievements of their people.
• They allow their employees the ability to self-control and make decisions themselves.
• They establish a culture of work, in which everyone pursues common goals instead of personal interests.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP EXAMPLES

History has witnessed many famous transformational leaders, whose influence still stays on until today. Some outstanding examples include Nelson Mandela. Mahatma Gandhi, Abraham Lincoln, Richard Branson, Martin Luther King Jr., Franklin D. Roosevelt, etc.

These days, the strong growth of companies such as Apple, IBM, Microsoft ... is credited to the management's transformational leadership style. An analysis of the Harvard Business Review - based on the S&P and Fortune Global 500 list has come up with the following names:

• Jeff Bezos - CEO of Amazon
• Reed Hastings - Netflix
• Steve Jobs and Tim Cook - Apple
• Satya Nadella - Microsoft

(Source: HRBP.org)

BENEFITS OF TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP

According to Riggio, transformational leaders have complete faith in the competence of their subordinates. It is this belief that inspires their fellows to give away their best.

"Research evidence clearly shows that groups led by transformational leaders have higher levels of performance and satisfaction than groups led by other types of leaders"

Ronald E. Riggio, Psychology Today

On the other hand, this leadership style has also been shown to have a great impact on one's well-being. In one study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, workers at many German IT companies were asked to answer a few questions about their managers' leadership style. Specifically, they were asked to score their leaders based on the ability to intellectually stimulate, provide positive feedback, and recognize employees' contributions to the team. According to the results, those who leaders displayed a strong sense of transformational leadership were reported to have a higher level of well-being.

WHAT CONSTITUTES TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP?

According to Bass, there are four key elements that constitute the transformational leadership style.

• Intellectual Stimulation: Transformational leaders are capable of inspiring creativity in others. They encourage their fellows to propose new methods and constantly look for self-development opportunities.
• Individualized Consideration: Transformational leaders are always open to new ideas. In addition, they are ready to directly recognize the contributions of their employees.
• Inspirational Motivation: Transformational leaders are the ones who define clear visions. They possess the unique ability to empower people to accomplish their goals.
• Idealized influence: Transformational leaders prove themselves as role models for everyone to follow. People trust and respect them; hence, they try their best to emulate their style and materialize their visions.

(Source: Verywellmind)

TRANSACTIONAL vs TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP

The opposite of transformational leadership is transactional leadership - characterized by motivating employees through strict supervision, rewards, and penalties. This leadership style does not focus on innovation; rather, its aim is to establish common working processes - in which every mistake is strictly controlled.

Transactional leadership has the advantage of forming a consistent development process. On the other hand, transformation leaders aim to come up with new ideas - for the sake of the organization's future development.

THE ADVANTAGES & DISADVANTAGES OF TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP

The transformational leadership style is recommended when change is necessary. It is not suitable for newly established organizations that have not yet finalized their structure and workflow.

Pros

• Facilitate the development of new ideas
• Ensure a balance between short-term visions and long-term goals
• Build mutual trust between team members.
• Promote integrity and the ability to empathize with others (high emotional intelligence - EQ)

Cons

• Not suitable for new organizations.
• Require the organization to have a clear structure
• Does not work well for bureaucratic models

Overall, the best leaders are the ones who display both transactional and transformational leadership styles - so as to serve their organizations at the right time.

HOW TO BECOME A TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADER

Below are the 4 steps that you can use to improve your transformational leadership skills.

1. Create an Inspiring Vision

It is critical that you communicate a clear and compelling mission statement to your people. That vision is the reason why you - and the team - get up every morning. This is achievable only if you understand the core values of your people, their capabilities, as well as the resources available.

2. Motivate People

This is where your business storytelling skills come in handy. You need to tell your employees powerful stories - so that they realize the benefits that they will get by pursuing your vision. Not only once - you need to frequently engage with them, link the company's vision to their interests, and show them what they can do to make it come true.

3. Monitor the Delivery of the Vision

It is a norm for leaders to come up with a vision, yet fail to put in the necessary efforts to deliver it. To resolve this issue, communication within the team is critical. Every member needs to be fully aware of their roles, and how their achievements are measured.

On the other hand, clear and SMART goals are necessary. These include short-term ones that can help the organization achieve quick wins and inspire all members.

4. Establish Trust-based Relationships

Transformational leadership is all about your people - you need to assist them in achieving their own goals. Take a good look at Dunham and Pierce's Leadership Process Model - so that you may understand the importance of your people to the whole team's success.

As a transformational leader, you are expected to frequently communicate with each team member in person. The purpose is to realize their developmental needs and goals - as well as what you can do to help them attain these things. The Johari Window should prove to be useful in setting the conversation in the right path.

Last but not least, do not forget to coach your people. Coaching is critical to scaling up your team's skills, self-confidence, and mutual trust.

TAKEAWAY

Transformational leadership may not be the correct leadership style in certain situations; yet, it has the potential to unleash your team's potential for exponential growth. Among the current VUCA world, what got you here won't get you there - constant changes are critical to the survival of businesses. Therefore, it is never a bad idea to SWOT up on your leadership skills - so as to empower your people and direct your organization in the right way.

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Reference

A Closer Look at the Effects of Transformational Leadership. https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-transformational-leadership-2795313. Accessed on August 5, 2020.

Transformational Leadership - Becoming an Inspirational Leader. https://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/transformational-leadership.htm. Accessed on August 5, 2020.

What the Best Transformational Leaders Do. https://hbr.org/2017/05/what-the-best-transformational-leaders-do. Accessed on August 5, 2020.