Merits & Shortcomings of transformational leadership

Leader is a person who motivates & inspires a team. (Northouse, 2013) Leaders have various skills & those skills can be categorized as Technical, Human & Conceptual skills. (Katz, 1955)

Leaders are not appointed in formal way most of the time, a leader have the ability to guide a crew & also to align them to achieve a common goal. (Goffee & Jones, 2006)

Northouse (2013) has discussed several leadership traits based on intelligence, insight, self-confidence, alertness, responsibility, persistence, sociability & initiatives of the leader.

Transformational leadership also one of such leadership trait discussed by Northouse.

Transformational leadership is one of the most popular leadership style which is more oriented to charismatics & effective elements of the leadership. Transformational leadership changes the behavior of the team by motivating them through fulfilling their needs & also treating them in very good manner. (Northouse, 2013) These type leaders support their subordinates to work up to their maximum potential by making them to think critically, adopt change, achieve higher goals & also making them to commit towards the goals of the organization. (Bass & Avolio, 1990)

Merits of transformational leadership

Transformational leadership can be used very commonly in most of the situations. It provides greater motivation & more oriented on followers’ development. (Bass & Riggio, 2006)

Since the present business environment is rapidly changing organizations may have to face huge competition to run their businesses smoothly with such situation transformational leadership can be the most valuable leadership style. (Yukl, 2002)

Transformational leadership has a positive effect towards subordinates & it increase overall performance, efficiency & it motivates the group as well. (Cohen, Chang, & Ledford, 1997)

Shortcomings of transformational leadership

Despite most of the researchers have discussed about the positive side of the transformational leadership, there is a darker side of it as well. As an example a transformational leader has the ability to motivate followers in negative way in order to achieve an unethical goal as well. (Bass, 1999) The best example for such situation is Adolf Hitler who was a transformational leader used his leadership skills to motivate followers to achieve an unethical, harmful goal.

Bass (1999) define unethical transformational leaders as ““pseudo-transformational” leaders.

Another negative side of transformational leadership is, these leaders may influence exceptionally on the behavior of subordinates to achieve goals (Bass, 1999) & it may cause unidirectional influence on followers (Yukl, 1999). This unidirectional influence may drives subordinates to be susceptible to the leader. (Mullins, 2007)

By looking at above merits & negatives of transformational leadership we can understand that, to become a successful & ethical leader having leadership skills only is not sufficient. Leadership is a more complicated & complex role more than just motivating the followers.

References

• Bass BM & Avolio BJ (1990) Manual for the multifactor leadership questionnaire, Consulting Psychologists Press, Palo Alto Canada.

• Bass, B. M., & Riggio, R. E. (2006). Transformational leadership (2nd ed.). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

• Bass, B. M. (1999), “Two Decades of Research and Development in Transformational Leadership”, European Journal of Work and Organisational Psychology, Vol. 8, No. 1, pp. 9–32.

• Cohen SG, Chang L & Ledford GE (1997) A hierarchical construct of self-management leadership and its relationship to quality of work life and perceived group effectiveness, Personnel Psychology 50: 275-308

• Goffee, R. and Jones, G. (2000), “Why Should Anyone Be Led by You?”, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 78, No. 5, pp. 62-70.

• Katz, R. L.  (1955) "Skills of an effective administrator", Harvard Business Review, 33 (1), pp.33 - 42.

• Mullins, L. J. (2007), Management and organisational behaviour. 8th ed. Harlow: Financial Times Prentice Hall. 

• Northouse, P. G. (2013) Leadership: Theory & Practice. 6th Edition, Thousand Oaks, Canada: Sage.

• Yukl GA (2002) Leadership in organizations (5th ed.), Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs NJ.

• Yukl, G. (1999), “An evaluation of conceptual weaknesses in transformational and charismatic leadership theories”, Leadership Quarterly, 10, No. 2, pp. 285–305.