Leadership Theory: Transformational Leadership and Personal Experience

This essay provides an in-depth analysis of transformational leadership theory, exploring its main aspects such as self-management, risk calculation, and adaptability. It discusses how transformational leadership can mitigate challenges faced by project leaders, including misalignment of business ...Read More

Running head: TRANFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP
Transformational Leadership
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note:

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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
1. Leadership Theory.................................................................................................................2
Definition of Transformational Leadership...........................................................................2
Main Aspects of Transformational Leadership......................................................................3
Challenges faced by Project Leaders.....................................................................................4
Mitigation of Challenges through Transformational Leadership...........................................5
2. Personal Reflection................................................................................................................6
a) Experience about Project Leadership.................................................................................6
b) Incident about the Situational Leadership Theory.............................................................7
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................9
References................................................................................................................................10
Bibliography.............................................................................................................................12

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Introduction
Leadership can be defined as the practical skill that is present within an individual to
lead as well as guide the other team members in any specific project. The person, who fulfils
the duty of leadership, is known as a leader (Van Wart, 2013). The study of leadership has
several important theories that solely involve traits, attitude, functions, behaviour, values,
situational interaction, vision, intelligence, charisma and many more. These leadership
theories help to know about the various types of leaderships and how well a situation can be
handled in a project or any organization. The most popular significant theories include Great
Man Theory, Trait Theory, Behavioural Theories, Role Theory, Charismatic Theory,
Transactional Theory, Transformational Theory and many others (Antonakis & House,
2014). The following report outlines a brief description on the leadership theory of
Transformational theory and its aspects. Moreover, personal experiences are also shared for
this particular leadership theory.
1. Leadership Theory
Definition of Transformational Leadership
Transformational leadership can be defined as the specific leadership style, where any
worker works with his subordinates for the successful identification of required changes and
thus creating a vision for the guidance of that change (Avolio & Yammarino, 2013). This
eventually helps to execute those changes within the project group or team. This
transformational leadership is responsible for serving to enhance the overall morale,
performance and motivation of the project members.
Transformational leadership even inspires the people in achieving the remarkable or
unexpected results. This type of leadership provides autonomy to the people and thus they

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can take decisions once the training is over. The other name of transformational leadership is
quiet leadership (Price & Weiss, 2013). Moreover, this type of leadership eventually
mobilizes the people for getting the work done perfectly. It even helps in the conflict
resolution in any project team.
Main Aspects of Transformational Leadership
Transformational leadership comprises of several significant characteristics or
aspects. These main aspects are given below:
i) Self Management: This is the first and the foremost aspect of transformational
leadership. It helps to the project management as well as themselves (Kark & Shamir, 2013).
This particular aspect helps in motivating to direct the organization in right path.
ii) Ability in Calculating Risks: The second aspect is the ability in calculating the
correct risks. These risks are the most significant threats of any project and they help to
understand the difficult situations of that typical project.
iii) Taking Tough Decisions: This is the third important aspect of the
transformational leadership (Effelsberg, Solga & Gurt, 2014). Various tough and difficult
decisions could be taken with the help of this leadership.
iv) Sharing Collective Organizational Consciousness: Transformational leadership
helps in sharing as well as understanding the collective consciousness of the project. it
eventually helps to know about the perspectives of the team members and thus a clear idea is
given about the actions that are to be taken for the betterment of the project.
v) Entertain New Ideas: Another important aspect of the transformational leadership
is that it helps to entertain new and innovative ideas (Odumeru & Ogbonna, 2013). It helps in

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understanding the truth that success of any project is completely dependent on the team
effort.
vi) Provides Autonomy to the Members: The next important and significant aspect of
the transformational leadership is that it is responsible for providing autonomy to the
members. Since, it provides autonomy to the project members; it helps the group members to
take their own decisions.
vii) Leading with Vision: Transformational leadership helps in the setting of an
achievable and realistic visionary for the project (Braun et al., 2013). Thus, communication
with the vision is done effectively with the followers.
viii) Adaptability: The next important aspect of the transformational leadership is the
adaptability. This type of leadership helps to adapt with the changing market constantly for
keeping in moving forward.
Challenges faced by Project Leaders
There are several challenges that are faced by the project leaders while executing any
particular project (Avolio & Yammarino, 2013). The most significant challenges faced by the
project managers in a project are as follows:
i) Misalignment between Business Objectives: This is the most basic challenge that is
faced by the project executives or project leaders in any specific project. When there are
drifts in the objectives of a project, it is evident that the project would face significant losses
as there would be lack of team work.
ii) Project Delays: This is the next challenge in any specific project. Any type of
delay in the project would incur more expenses and thus the project would be in losses.

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iii) Conflicts: This is again another important challenge in any project (Antonakis &
House, 2014). The conflicts between the project members often turn out to risky for the
project members to execute their business operations.
iv) Difficulty in Execution: The fourth important and significant challenge within a
project is the difficulty in executing that project. The most problematic situations are the
wastage of resources, opportunities and time and thus divert the attention of the management
for hindering the project delivery.
v) Redundant and Overlapping Projects: Due to the waste resources, the redundant
and the overlapping projects occur (Price & Weiss, 2013). These projects are extremely
unprofitable and they incur huge expenses, hence, reducing the potential benefits of the
project.
vi) Unrealistic Business Values: The deliverables of any project determine the
business values of that project. If those deliverables are late or does not arrive on time, the
business is supposed to lose the opportunities and thus this is a major challenge for the
project managers.
Mitigation of Challenges through Transformational Leadership
The challenges faced by the project managers in any particular project could be easily
mitigated by the help of transformational leadership (Van Wart, 2013). The most interesting
mitigation techniques of the transformational leadership are given below:
i) Conflict Resolution: This is the first and the foremost mitigation technique of
transformational leadership. This particular leadership helps to reduce the conflicts of the
project and thus the projects does not incur much losses.

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ii) Encouraging New Ideology: This is the next technique to mitigate the challenges
of any project (Braun et al., 2013). New ideas and ideologies are always welcomed in the
transformational leadership and thus this type of leadership is extremely popular in all
projects.
iii) Exceptional People Skills: The third significant technique for mitigating the
challenges of any project is the identification of the exceptional people skills or exceptional
skills in the project members.
iv) Providing Mitigation in Redundant Projects: The next important technique that is
present in the transformational leadership is the mitigation of redundant and overlapped
projects (Van Wart, 2013).
All these mitigation techniques help in the mitigation of all the challenges faced in the
project by the project manager.
2. Personal Reflection
a) Experience about Project Leadership
Transformational leadership can be defined as the leadership theory that helps to work
to change the system and thus maximizes the capacity and capability of the team and also
solves the challenges by searching for experiences, which are absolutely obsolete for the
project. The most popular examples of transformational leaders mainly include William
Edwards Deming, Peter Drucker, Ross Perot, John D. Rockeffer and many more.
I have my personal experience with this popular leadership theory. I completed and
executed my first project, when I was in school. We were a group of six and we had to
complete our science project. Since, I had better knowledge with the subject, I was appointed
as the project leader of that project. My other class mates did not take this incident sportingly

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and they opposed me in my every action. I was extremely taken back with the incident,
however with my teacher’s support, I continued with my duties.
I understood that since, I was their class mate; they were not ready to accept my
decision or leadership. My best friend was also in that project team and he supported me.
Thus, conflicts were raised in the team and our science project was getting delayed. Finally, I
came up with the idea of transformational leadership. I researched about this leadership
theory and was finally able to learn about the aspects and characteristics of this typical
leadership theory. The most significant characteristic of transformational leadership is that
the leader himself takes up the first step in the project. He leads or rather guides the rest of
the team members and even encourages the ideas and actions of the team members. I did the
same thing. I took the main responsibility of the project and gave my team members options
to choose their own duties. They were thus happy with the decision and took their own
decisions. They were successful in completing their project duties even before me and hence
our science project was completed on time. The conflicts were also solved with this
transformational leadership as conflict resolution is one of the major characteristic of
transformational leadership. I was well appreciated by my teacher for my excellent leadership
skills and knowledge.
b) Incident about the Situational Leadership Theory
Apart from the transformational leadership, I also have experience with the
Situational Leadership theory. This specific type of leadership theory defines the fact that
there is no best style of leadership. It all depends on the situation of a project. The most
effective leadership is completely based on tasks and how well those tasks are being
executed. Situational Leadership eventually is made of two typical and fundamental concepts.
They are the leadership style and the Performance Readiness level of the group or individual.
There are four behaviour types in the situational leadership. They are as follows:

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i) SI: Directing: It is the one way communication where the leader instructs
everything to his subordinates.
ii) S2: Coaching: It is the two way communication, where after getting the
instructions, the team member is supporting the project leader.
iii) S3: Supporting: This is the shared decision making features of the project team. It
helps to maintain the relation of the leader and the team member.
iv) S4: Delegating: The team member takes up the responsibility of taking the
decision and the team leader monitors him.
I had a past experience with the Situational Leadership theory. Few years back, a
building was being constructed in our locality, right beside the only children’s park. The
problem occurred, when the owner of the building decided to buy the park and utilize that
plot as his parking lot. I raised my voice in against of this and with my whistle blowing; few
more people were involved in this protest. Since, I was the first to protest, I was the leader in
his situation. However, I knew that I cannot be claimed as the situational effective leader
since I have not fulfilled all the duties of S1 to S4.
In the first behaviour of S1, I directed my team members to write to the local police
and file a written complaint against the owner of the building. For S2, I was supported by my
entire locating and all of them wet to the local police station for filing a complaint. For S3, all
of us took the decision to file a case against the builder for S4, my project members decided
to talk to the builder for one final time before filing a case against him. I completely,
supported the team members and they went to the builder. They were successful in making
him understand that he was taking a wrong decision.

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Since, I took the first step and was with the team till the end, I was termed as the
leader of the group. Thus, I was an effective leader as I was successful in completing all the
four situations. I learnt the lesson that an effective leader should always support their team
members and should take their ideas and decisions.
Conclusion
Therefore, from the above discussion, it can be concluded that leadership is the
practical skill that helps any individual or person to guide or lead the rest of the team
members or employees in any particular project or organization. Leader is the person, who is
responsible for fulfilling the duties of leadership. Leader helps in the creation of an aspiring
vision of the future and motivation as well as inspiring people in engaging with that vision.
Furthermore, a leader even manages or controls the delivery of the vision. Study of leadership
helps to identify and recognize situations in terms of various attributes. There are various
leadership theories that are utilized for knowing regarding the several leadership kinds and
how well a leader can handle any difficult situation. The most famous and significant
leadership theories are the Great Man Theory, Situational theory, Servant Leadership theory,
Transactional Theory, Authentic Leadership theory, Charismatic Theory, Transformational
Theory and many more. The above report has properly outlined a detailed explanation on the
popular theory of leadership, namely, Transformational theory with relevant details.
Furthermore, personal experiences are also shared for this particular leadership theory and
Situational Leadership theory in the report.

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References
Antonakis, J., & House, R. J. (2014). Instrumental leadership: Measurement and extension of
transformational–transactional leadership theory. The Leadership Quarterly, 25(4),
746-771.
Avolio, B. J., & Yammarino, F. J. (Eds.). (2013). Introduction to, and overview of,
transformational and charismatic leadership. In Transformational and Charismatic
Leadership: The Road Ahead 10th Anniversary Edition (pp. xxvii-xxxiii). Emerald
Group Publishing Limited.
Braun, S., Peus, C., Weisweiler, S., & Frey, D. (2013). Transformational leadership, job
satisfaction, and team performance: A multilevel mediation model of trust. The
Leadership Quarterly, 24(1), 270-283.
Effelsberg, D., Solga, M., & Gurt, J. (2014). Getting followers to transcend their self-interest
for the benefit of their company: Testing a core assumption of transformational
leadership theory. Journal of Business and Psychology, 29(1), 131-143.
Kark, R., & Shamir, B. (2013). The dual effect of transformational leadership: Priming
relational and collective selves and further effects on followers. In Transformational
and Charismatic Leadership: The Road Ahead 10th Anniversary Edition (pp. 77-101).
Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
Odumeru, J. A., & Ogbonna, I. G. (2013). Transformational vs. transactional leadership
theories: Evidence in literature. International Review of Management and Business
Research, 2(2), 355.

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Price, M. S., & Weiss, M. R. (2013). Relationships among coach leadership, peer leadership,
and adolescent athletes’ psychosocial and team outcomes: A test of transformational
leadership theory. Journal of Applied Sport Psychology, 25(2), 265-279.
Van Wart, M. (2013). Lessons from leadership theory and the contemporary challenges of
leaders. Public Administration Review, 73(4), 553-565.

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Bibliography
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