Based on research by J. Lee Whittington, PhD, McKee, Victoria, Vickie Goodwin, PhD, and Greg Bell, PhD
Research and the popular press have long championed transformational leadership as being critical to achieving high levels of engagement and performance in employees. Transformational leadership (TFL) has consistently been linked to high levels of in-role performance, organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs), and employees’ affective commitment to the organization. However, what can organizations do if they don’t have a transformational leader? This study investigates whether there are ‘substitutes’ for transformational leadership.
Key Points
Transformational leadership does contribute to high levels of performance, positive citizenship behaviors, and commitment among employees. This study demonstrates that organizations can achieve high levels of performance from their employees in the absence of a transformational leader. In fact, performance tends to be higher when managers focus on developing a high quality relationship with their employees in combination with setting challenging goals for their employees. Also, employee commitment is higher when managers focus on setting challenging goals in combination with heightening the job enrichment of their employees.Why This Matters
Transformational leadership does contribute to high levels of performance, positive citizenship behaviors, and commitment among employees. This study demonstrates that organizations can achieve high levels of performance from their employees in the absence of a transformational leader. In fact, performance tends to be higher when managers focus on developing a high quality relationship with their employees in combination with setting challenging goals for their employees. Also, employee commitment is higher when managers focus on setting challenging goals in combination with heightening the job enrichment of their employees.Based upon the following peer-reviewed manuscript: Whittington, J.Lee, McKee, Victoria, Goodwin, Vicki & Bell, Greg, 2013. “Applying Fuzzy Set Methodology to Evaluate Substitutes for Leadership” in Fiss, P., Cambre, B., & Marx, A. (Eds.), Research in Sociology of Organizations (RSO): Configurational Theory and Methods in Organizational Research, 279-302.
