Transactional vs Transformational Leadership

This week we will be covering transformational leadership theory. In post #1 for this week, I will talk about the differences between transformational leadership and transactional leadership. In transactional leadership, the role of supervision, organization, structure and group performance is crucial. The term “transactional” refers to the notion that these type of leaders rely on rewards and punishment to motivate followers. There is also a very clear chain of command for everyone to follow. Transactional leaders generally are more focused on making sure everything runs smoothly day-to-day as opposed to the future.

Transformational leadership goes beyond the day-to-day operations and is focused on creating strategies for taking the company, department, or team to the next level and ensuring their success. Transformational leaders set goals to push their followers to perform better. These leaders want their followers to contribute to the success of the team, while also growing personally and professionally as individuals. Transformational leaders build confidence and earn the trust of their leaders to give their followers the freedom to solve problems on their own and showcase their innovation and creativity.

It is fairly easy for us to recognize these types of leaders in our own lives. I actually have an example of each. First, there is one of my old bosses. She was very much a transactional leader. Instead of focusing on the big picture of the department, she was more concerned with the day-to-day operations. She also would offer employees small rewards for getting their tasks completed (though it didn’t really do much to motivate the employees), and she made sure that if anyone wasn’t doing their job properly, they got written up for it. The punishments tended to be more motivating than the rewards. For me, it was a little difficult to be a follower. She was actually my boss’ boss, so as one of the heads of the department, I thought that she should be focused more on making sure the programs we were running were successful as opposed to what borders were on the bulletin board. Being so high up in the chain of command, I think she was less successful because she didn’t wasn’t looking at the big picture. It was almost like she had tunnel vision when it came to what was important and she would focus on the smaller, less meaningful tasks and made sure those got accomplished before anything else. She was also much more focused on punishing people for not doing a good job than she was rewarding those who had done a good job.

My experience with a transformational leader was much more satisfying for me as a follower. My direct supervisor at that same job was much more transformational in her leadership style. She is very “big picture” in how she views things. If something isn’t necessary to the success of the program or will help the department in the future, then it isn’t worth spending time on. She makes sure to give us the tools we need to succeed, but then lets us solve the problem or complete the task on our own. She is a huge part of how I developed as a leader. I was promoted as a manager with very little experience leading a group of employees. She would help me whenever and as much as I needed, but she wouldn’t “baby” me through tough situations, she let me ultimately handle it in the best way I saw fit. Not only did this show that she trusted me and helped to boost my confidence in my leading abilities, but it also helped me develop my critical thinking skills so that the next time there was a problem that came my way, I didn’t have to ask her for as much guidance. I could handle it more on my own. She also showed her trust for me by giving me a list of tasks at the beginning of each week and sitting down with me to discuss the most important and/or time sensitive ones. After that, she would give me the freedom to get them done on my own without looking over my shoulder or nagging me for things. I really enjoyed being able to have the freedom to make decisions on my own, and I felt confident to do so because my supervisor proved that she trusted me and would back me in whatever decision I made.

Transactional and transformational leaders can be easy to recognize, though they have a different focus. In my experience, the transactional leader hasn’t been as effective. I was much more receptive to the transformational style of leadership. However, these are just my experiences and what worked better with my own personal work style. Think about the leaders you’ve had and decide for yourself. Everyone is different.