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Transformational Leadership 2
Posted by creativedifference on July 18, 2009
I previously wrote about transformational leadership on 6th February this year. However, two things I read recently made me reflect again on leadership style.
One was an article, “Transactional to Transformational Leadership” by Bernard M. Bass. Bass contrasted “transactional” leaders, who relied on contingent reward (do the job or don’t get paid at its most crude) and management by exception, with “transformational” leaders. Bass believed that transformational leaders achieved great results through charisma, showing individualised consideration to staff, and stimulating those staff intellectually. I have no beef with the latter two as good things for a leader to do, but I do mistrust charisma (which Bass believed could be learnt).
The second thing I read was an article about Mike Wake wasting millions and his dubious involvement with and promotion of women employees in his organisation Novas. I has the pleasure of working for Novas many years ago, and for myself and others who knew the organisation, the main surprise is that the allegations mentioned in the article took so long to come out. Mike was not a charismatic leader in the conventional understanding of this, and Bass recognises that quiet but visionary people with a lot of determination are charismatic. He did intellectually stimulate and show individual consideration to employees, but as this included promoting women he had relationships with, it was a parody of the ethical transformational leader. Over a period of less than twenty years Mike Wake led his organisation from nothing to a large organisation and now, possibly, back to nothing again.
The picture at the head of this article displays the very picture of the leader that worries me. The leader is at the centre, communication is to spokes of the wheel, and the followers are not connected. Maybe this works well if the leader is a great and selfless one (met lots of those) but even then it neglects emergent potential from employees.
Bass himself recognised the potential problems of transformational leadership that is selfish or antisocial (“The Two Faces of Charismatic Leadership”, Leaders Magazine).
If there is a remedy to this, it lies in more distributed leadership. The UK government has invested much money in leadership training and development, and its big money for consultancy firms. The case of Mike Wake suggests that unless this concentrates on leaders giving away power and pushing responsibility downwards, then the Novas scenario is all too likely. My own view is that if we replace “charisma” with the redistribution of leadership throughout an organisation, then we may get better ethics and longer term success.
Edward Brown said
The interplay between charismatic leadership, transformational leadership, transactional leadership as well as other traditional leadership models is always fascinating. Are pundits trying to determine the ideal leadership model or merely playing each model off each other as a form of brinkmanship? Once more, is a person’s personality geared towards one leadership model over another? Certainly, a life-long introvert wouldn’t necessarily adopt the Charismatic Leadership Model to follow. While the Charismatic Leadership Model may have ideal traits the introvert may emulate, invariably, the core genotype for charisma may not be present. Consequently, hybrid approaches in leadership development may be necessary based on current social conditions. There has been an ongoing “Intellectual Donnybrook” where pundits square off one leadership style versus another. In the end, the winner is the style most favored personally by the pundit (based on his own temperament).
At the core, each leadership model is attempting to persuade or assuage the natural narcissism within each individual for the greater good of the organization. At the macro level, charismatic leadership may resonate with one group of individuals more viscerally than a traditional form of leadership. At the micro level, a leader may have to use various leadership styles for individuals in a smaller group as a means of group cohesion. It’s the leader who is malleable and mutable to the context of the situation as well as the personalities involved who will triumph. While there may be core traits within each leadership model, the would-be leader could and should use leadership models as mere tools for achieving an objective. To suggest a leadership model exists that is purely altruistic is naïve. Whether it’s a mission, crusade or profitability, leadership is created to feed the hungry need of the overarching objective.
Edward Brown
Core Edge Image & Charisma Institute
http://www.charismatoday.blogspot.com