Grand Canyon University: RSD-851 Organizational Leadership Report

This report synthesizes ten key studies examining the influence of transactional leadership on the professional competence of Direct Support Professionals (DSPs) in community home services for individuals with intellectual disabilities. The analysis encompasses articles published within the last five years, highlighting common findings such as the importance of leadership in enhancing DSPs' skills, knowledge, and overall competence in providing quality care. The studies emphasize the need for training, rewards, and professional development programs to improve DSPs' performance and address gaps in service quality. The report also draws conclusions about the positive impact of leadership behaviors on employee motivation and strategic relationships. Furthermore, it identifies gaps in the research, including the need for more extensive investigation into leadership roles, geographic diversity, and the impact of professional development programs. The primary focus is to improve the skills and competence of DSPs to provide the best quality care and support for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Running head: ORGANIZATIONAL STRATEGY AND LEADERSHIP
Organizational Strategy and Leadership
Name of student
Name of University
Author note

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Statement of common findings..................................................................................................3
Conclusions drawn from the articles..........................................................................................5
Gaps in research.........................................................................................................................6
References..................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction
Considering the assignment, it is clear that there is need to summarise the ten main
studies associated with the research. The ten studies are associated with the assessment and
determining of influence of transactional leadership traits on the professional competence and
skills of the Direct support professionals involved in the Community home services. The
community home services’ professionals are associated with the management of delivery of
car services for treating the individuals with intellectual disabilities or weaknesses from the
perspectives of the leader (Astala et al., 2017). The leadership aspect is of profound
importance as it can not only influence the skills and competence management of Direct
Support Professionals, but will also help them to acquire the desired knowledge in serving the
individuals who may have been diagnosed with intellectual disability.
Statement of common findings
The ten articles have been assessed to determine the knowledge and information
regarding the assignment, thereby, gain insight about how the successful delivery of care
services will be possible for the people with intellectual disability. Based on the assessment
of different types of articles, it has been found that the focus has been on the improvement of
skills, knowledge, competence and experiences so as to manage the institutional care of
people suffering from some intellectual and developmental disabilities (Beadle‐Brown, Bigby
& Bould, 2015). The primary research method seemed to be common and well-illustrated in
some of the major points discussed in this assignment. Moreover, the most of articles have
something in common related to the use of Direct Support Professionals and how the
leadership has influenced this care service workers to provide the desired services to the
individuals in need. Another common findings from the articles could be the selection of

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descriptive study, which has helped in gaining relevant research related data and information
required to facilitate the research (de Kuijper & van der Putten, 2017).
Based on the statement of Morlino (2019) as per the third article, it has also been
found that the employees have been provided with training and developmental programs with
the influence of leadership aspects so as to support the individuals with intellectual and
developmental disabilities. Thus, all these articles are generally focused on the improvement
of skills and competence among the workers, i.e., the DSP employees in order to make them
qualified, skilled and competent enough to deliver the best quality care services (Morlino,
2019).
It has also been argued by many scholars that the performance of organisation
deteriorates when the DSPs or the employees of the organisation lacked the desired skills and
qualities that are required to excel. There also should be core competencies and skills present
in the individuals so as to benefit the individuals who need support and help for overcoming
their intellectual disability (Friedman, 2018). Also to be noted that the DSPs lacked
conceptual knowledge and information about those, which could be fostered with the help of
training and development sessions provided to them. The leadership plays an integral part in
influencing the management of personal and professional development of employees,
thereby, make sure that the employees gain the required skills and expertise to enhance the
quality of services and overall organisational performance (Friedman, 2019).
Another major common findings based on the studies could be the procedure of data
collection, which mainly represented the collection of primary data. The survey processes
were conducted and also at few cases, the secondary data and qualitative data were acquired
from the secondary sources of data including journals, articles, newspapers, etc. and also with
the help of conducting interviews with the managers of the organisations.

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Conclusions drawn from the articles
The conclusions drawn from the articles represented the fact that there has been need
to enhance the skills, knowledge and competency level among the DSPs. It has been aimed at
improving their skills while at the same time, facilitate their experience by providing them
enough scopes and opportunities to take care of the people with intellectual disabilities. The
conclusions drawn also illustrate about how the Professional development competency
framework, also known as the PD framework could help in targeting the individuals as well
as improve their group behaviours and skills for building a learning culture (Gormly, Gormly
& Johnson, 1971). Notably, also stated by Hoge et al. (2016), that the leadership played a
very important role in managing the professional development of employees and thus the
transactional leadership could be a favourable way to keep the employees motivated and
encouraged at work. This had been possible with the help of providing rewards and benefits,
both monetary as well as non-monetary along with other compensation structure and increase
in pay structure, which should also ensure that the employees understand their job roles and
responsibilities properly (Hoge et al., 2016). Also understood from the analysis of these
studies that the leadership behaviours among the managers helped in forming strategic
relationships with the employees, thereby, influenced their sustainable skills and competence
to level up their task performance as a whole.
The exploratory research design has been followed, which denotes the definition of
initial research, based on which, the outcomes could be present in the form of theoretical data
and information. The observations could be made much more easily, which also assist in
considering the existing theories, concepts, ideas and frameworks too. Thus, the initial
framework would be developed, which should be helpful for identifying the cause of research
as well as its effects, furthermore, ensure that the research aspects are communicated properly
too (Morlino, 2019). From the assessment of various articles and studies made previously, it

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could be understood that the data collection instruments include the survey instrument and
also the use of secondary sources for collecting secondary data and information. Based on the
assessment of articles, the sample sizes have been chosen as different for different cases and
thus the collection of data and information has been both quantitative and qualitative (Qian,
Tichá & Stancliffe, 2017). While the quantitative data has been acquired with the help of
survey process where survey questionnaires were provided to the respondents and their
responses were considered as quantitative data. The qualitative data was gathered in the form
of responses provided by the managers and leaders of the organisation who were interviewed
(Tyler et al., 2019).
Gaps in research
Few of the gaps were experienced while assessing the studies done in the previous
sections where it was found that the leadership aspect was ignored in few areas. There were
gaps experienced in terms of the location and sample size too, which required additional and
extensive research for exploring the various areas that might not have been explored at the
earlier stages (de Kuijper & van der Putten, 2017). It was also understood that the employees
or DSPs could not only be considered as ineffective and responsible for the lower rate of
retention, but also there were other factors that contributed to the same such as the lack of
proper professional development programs, due to lack of training programs and even poor
rewards and benefits management system, which lowered down the morale of staffs (Hoge et
al., 2016).
There were few gaps in the research in terms of delivery and supply of skills and
knowledge for the DSPs. At times, due to the absence of leadership roles as a phenomena for
the researchers, practical leadership was not possible, which also created some difficulty in
finding out how the transactional leadership proved to be beneficial for guiding the DSPs in
the right direction. Though there were enough data and information regarding the leadership

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impact on the DSPs roles within the organisations, still the patients suffering from intellectual
disabilities could be treated only when the staffs possess the desired skills and knowledge to
do so (Qian, Tichá & Stancliffe, 2017). Often the service quality was considered as poor and
ineffective while the lack of professionalism due to ignorance of personal and professional
developments programs and curriculum were not implemented properly in the report, which
could be a major gap as well.

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References
Astala, L., Roos, M., Harmoinen, M., & Suominen, T. (2017). Staff experiences of
appreciative management in the institutional care of people with intellectual and
developmental disabilities–a cross‐sectional study. Scandinavian journal of caring
sciences, 31(4), 930-938.
Beadle‐Brown, J., Bigby, C., & Bould, E. (2015). Observing practice leadership in
intellectual and developmental disability services. Journal of Intellectual Disability
Research, 59(12), 1081-1093.
de Kuijper, G., & van der Putten, A. A. (2017). Knowledge and expectations of direct support
professionals towards effects of psychotropic drug use in people with intellectual
disabilities. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 30, 1-9.
Friedman, C. (2018). Direct support professionals and quality of life of people with
intellectual and developmental disabilities. Intellectual and developmental
disabilities, 56(4), 234-250.
Friedman, C. (2019). State utilization of direct support professionals in Medicaid HCBS
waivers. Intellectual and developmental disabilities, 57(1), 1-13.
Gormly, J., Gormly, A., & Johnson, C. (1971). Interpersonal attraction: Competence
motivation and reinforcement theory. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,
19(3), 375.
Hoge, M. A., McFaul, M., Cauble, L. L., Craft, K. L., Paris Jr, M., & Calcote, R. M. (2016).
Building the skills of direct care workers: The Alaskan core competencies initiative.
Journal of Rural Mental Health, 40(1), 31.
Morlino, R. M. (2019). Developing Qualified Workers to Support Individuals with
Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities in Home and Community Settings: An
Evaluation Study (Doctoral dissertation, University of Southern California).

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Qian, X., Tichá, R., & Stancliffe, R. (2017). Contextual factors associated with implementing
active support in community group homes in the United States: A qualitative
investigation. Journal of Policy and Practice in Intellectual Disabilities, 14(4), 332-
340.
Tyler, C. V., Wells, M. D., & Developmental Disabilities–Practice-Based Research Network.
(2019). Direct Support Professionals' Perspectives on Ambulatory Health Care
Processes and Quality. Intellectual and developmental disabilities, 57(3), 188-197.