Leadership Theories Comparison Chart
Leadership Theories Comparison Chart
(Leadership Theories Comparison Chart)
| Leadership Theory | How Theory Supports Organizational Change |
| Transformational Leadership Theory:
The transformational leadership theory was established in the 1970s by James McGregor Burns. According to the transformational leadership theory, a leader’s vision can inspire a whole team to achieve feats they never imagined possible (Steinmann et al., 2018). As a result, the group members are more inclined to have faith in this visionary who so greatly motivates them. It is frequently applied to staff motivation and general leadership style assessment. Because these leaders are skilled at resolving conflicts, they encourage and drive their teams to find better ways to accomplish a goal (Steinmann et al., 2018). They can organize people into productive groups, improving the group’s well-being, morale, and motivation using strong rapport. Key elements of transformational leadership include individualized consideration, intellectual stimulation, inspirational motivation, and idealized influence. (Leadership Theories Comparison Chart)
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More people must act as transformational leaders for organizations to adapt successfully to change. Successful transformational leaders can alter a company’s culture and create a system-wide synchronization of its strategy to respond to external pressures. Transformational leadership affects both social systems and individual behavior during organizational change (Steinmann et al., 2018). In its optimal state, it brings about significant and constructive change in the employees with the ultimate objective of transforming them into leaders. When practiced in its purest form, transformational leadership improves people’s motivation, morale, and output via several processes like encouraging employees to take increased responsibility for their work, challenging them to do so, and recognizing and understanding the strengths and weaknesses of employees so the leader can assign them to tasks that maximize their performance, and linking an individual’s sense of identity and self to the organization’s mission and shared identity (Steinmann et al., 2018). Conclusively, transformational leaders allow employees to own and identify with the change and actually be leaders in the change process. (Leadership Theories Comparison Chart) |
| Transactional Leadership Theory:
This leadership theory examines how leaders deal with their staff members. Transactional leaders want their subordinates to abide by their rules. In contrast, the expectations of transformational leaders are higher than those of ordinary leaders. As a result, this concept is frequently applied to people who have little expertise in leadership and who require step-by-step guidance on how to carry out responsibilities efficiently (Richards, 2020). The premise of the transactional leadership theory is that managers should provide people with what they desire in exchange for cooperation. It asserts that employees need structure, guidance, and supervision to execute jobs correctly and on time because they lack self-motivation (Richards, 2020). After World War II, the transactional leadership style became quite popular in the US. A high level of organization was needed to sustain national stability during this period of government focus on reconstruction. Contingent reward, which entails the establishment of expectations and rewarding employees for achieving them; passive management by exception, in which a leader does not intrude with workflow until a problem occurs; and active management by exception, where leaders foresee issues, track progress, and provide remedial action, are some of the facets of transactional leadership (Richards, 2020). (Leadership Theories Comparison Chart) |
Transactional leaders operate in line with specified operating procedures. They are more focused on maintaining continuity in day-to-day operations, ensuring everything runs smoothly by putting systems and processes in place and concentrating on achieving goals (Richards, 2020). Such leaders can impose punitive measures, create a systematic framework, specify a course of action, develop and carry out policies, and encourage exceptional performance through rewards and incentives. A transactional leader is more interested in ensuring that the planned activities are accomplished on time and to the highest standard than. However, transactional leaders lack a futuristic vision or tactics for gaining market leadership. With this understanding, transactional leaders are more suited to developing and influencing short-term changes or changes in the daily procedures and processes to make task completion more efficient and successful (Richards, 2020). (Leadership Theories Comparison Chart) |
| Servant Leadership Theory:
According to the philosophy of servant leadership, a leader should set their own needs aside to support others’ development and growth (Allen et al., 2018). It is what they meant when they said, “It is not about me; it is about the patient,” at any time. Putting patients first is the key goal in this theory in healthcare, which is a commendable trait for any leader. Servant leadership suggests that a leader genuinely cares about giving each team member the support and resources they require to be successful. Servant leadership can be incredibly helpful when managing a diversified, varied team. Regardless of the positions, skills, or resource needs of any team member, servant leaders are exceptional at satisfying individual team members’ needs. Servant leadership adopts a holistic approach and wider emphasis on affecting other people and team-level performance like change ownership behavior, job performance, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment and loyalty compared to other theories, which makes it the most promising and explored concept recently (Allen et al., 2018). (Leadership Theories Comparison Chart) |
Servant leaders are considered change agents in organizations, empowering employees to take more responsibility toward organizational change. Servant leaders share visions with employees and lead from behind, supporting individual development in the organization to take more ownership in the change implementation. Servant leaders are also more effective in influencing people and convincing people of the need for change because they instill trust in employees, who, in turn, invest more commitment and energy toward organizational change and achieving desired goals and results (Zhou et al., 2022).
According to Warren Bennis, organization development is a sophisticated approach designed to alter organizations’ attitudes, values, and organizational structure to improve their capacity to respond to emerging markets, technologies, and problems. The leader must therefore be aware of the pulse of their workforce in light of the rapidly and always changing environment and aid in transforming their organizations into vital and successful entities through change initiation and adoption (Allen et al., 2018). A leader who genuinely wants to comprehend others will only be able to determine what direction the organization and individual employees have to move to accomplish desired goals. The demand for servant leaders whose decision-making is comprehensive and who support organizations in thriving has never been greater than it is today. (Leadership Theories Comparison Chart) |
References
Allen, G. P., Moore, W. M., Moser, L. R., Neill, K. K., Sambamoorthi, U., & Bell, H. S. (2018). The Role of Servant Leadership and Transformational Leadership in Academic Pharmacy. American journal of pharmaceutical education, 80(7), 113. https://doi.org/10.5688/ajpe807113
Richards A. (2020). Exploring the benefits and limitations of transactional leadership in healthcare. Nursing standard (Royal College of Nursing (Great Britain) : 1987), 35(12), 46–50. https://doi.org/10.7748/ns.2020.e11593
Steinmann, B., Klug, H. J. P., & Maier, G. W. (2018). The Path Is the Goal: How Transformational Leaders Enhance Followers’ Job Attitudes and Proactive Behavior. Frontiers in psychology, 9, 2338. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.02338
Zhou, G., Gul, R., & Tufail, M. (2022). Does Servant Leadership Stimulate Work Engagement? The Moderating Role of Trust in the Leader. Frontiers in psychology, 13, 925732. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.925732
