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Leadership
Leadership is used to describe the ability of an individual or group of people to direct, guide, and positively influence the behaviour of other individuals, teams, or an entire organization Transformational leadership styles are the most commonly used styles of leadership, especially in contemporary organizations. Transformational leaders lead their followers through inspiration and motivation. These types of leaders are big picture thinkers, and they work by inspiring group members to see the importance and higher value of tasks. Personality traits of these types of leaders are usually characterized by enthusiasm, energetic appeal, and passion for what they do. Transformational leaders aim to help individual employees realize and actualize their more significant potentials besides the set team goals. This type of leadership style results in high levels of performance and satisfaction of team members compared to other leadership styles. Besides, this type of leadership works well in diverse work environments.
Organizations that employ the use of transformational leadership have satisfied teams focused on producing the highest form of quality work and continuously improving their skills and capabilities. From my professional experience, working under transformational leaders was really motivating, mainly since the leader engaged us on individual levels, primarily to address ways we can improve our job performance. The experience developed my confidence while performing tasks, especially since consultation, was encouraged. Team assigned tasks also became more comfortable to perform due to the insights of the transformational leader. Compared to the influence of other leaders, transformational leadership has been the best approach in my experience primarily since it focuses on individual employees at the firm.
Job satisfaction improved due to the use of this style; employees were now more satisfied with their job positions, especially since the leader inspired each of us positively to work towards a particular common goal despite the differences in our positions. Moreover, during evaluations of job performance, most employees recorded significant improvement when compared to previous assessment under different leaders, particularly those using autocratic leadership style. Transformational leadership equally impacted on employee turnover, with individuals feeling more comfortable in their work environments. Absenteeism was proportionately reduced significantly, primarily because the approach of transformational leadership encouraged employee engagement; thus, individuals felt free to suggest new innovative ideas that could improve on the success of the organization. What’s more, transformational leaders gave employees mentorship and inspiration, which positively affected them by boosting their morale, improving their enthusiasm at work and building their passions.
Organizations should invest more on leadership than management because, clearly, good leadership impacts on employees and the firm at large. Observing the needs of employees promotes employee job satisfaction, which later influences job performance. Thus it is vital to consider the right leadership style depending on the work environment, organizational short term and long term goals, and the wants of employees. Besides, managers need to be taught critical leadership skills besides managerial skills because running a successful organization is dependent on the two skills. Personality traits are the main factors considered when selecting people for leadership roles; however, characteristics of a situation can also be used to determine the most appropriate leader. While there are many leadership theories, relationship and management based approaches such as the transformational theory discussed above are more appropriate in serving the independent needs of employees and actualizing the long term goals of an organization.