The Impact Of Transformational Leadership On Organizational Performance: A Study On The One Retailer In UAE

Aims/objectives of the research followed by research questions:

In present time, almost all organizations are dealing with dynamic environment characterization, globalization, technological changes and shortening of product life cycles. It is apparent that organizations dealing within the dynamic and competitive environment needs to be innovative and creative to maintain growth for sustainable timeframe (Avolio and Yammarino 2013). Now, innovation and creation of creative ideas within the deadline require proper guidance and support for the management. For that reason, leaders are expected to play major role in fulfilling all the business objectives of the organization. In this study, the focus would be on the kind of impact transformational leadership can have on a UAE based retail organization namely The One. The organization was established on 1996 with the objective of providing superior quality furniture products. The one has total 18 stores across Middle East that consists of around 700 employees (theone.com 2017). With time, The One has to face massive challenges in sustaining its revenue level with the increasing competition in the UAE market. For that reason, it has become essential for the organization to focus on transformational leadership style for implementing different changes in the business process.

The study aims to assess the kind of impact transformational leadership can have on the performance level of ‘The One’ retailer

Factors of transformational leadership:

Transformational leadership reflects a committed relationship between the followers and leaders. It includes four basic elements including idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration (Kark and Shamir 2013). Now, idealized influence emphasized on that fact that transformational leaders need to act like a role model with charismatic personality so that it can influence subordinates to become like the leader. Idealized influence can be described through the willingness of transformational leaders to take risks, maintain conviction and ethical principles and follow core set of values. Secondly, inspirational motivation focuses on the ability of the leaders to motivate others to perform all the organizational responsibilities in an effective manner (García-Morales, Jiménez-Barrionuevo and Gutiérrez-Gutiérrez 2012). For that, it is necessary to articulate clear vision and communication network for the future. Inspirational motivation requires superb communicational skills from the leaders to impose a sense of authority among the subordinates.

Thirdly, intellectual simulation focuses on the process where leaders involve others in the decision-making process and stimulating their entire efforts to identify possible solutions for operational challenges. Intellectual simulation also describes the fact that leader’s vision can help others to have an idea about the bigger picture (Grant 2012).  Fourthly, individualized consideration focuses on specific needs and desires of each group member. For that reason, the individualized consideration allows leader to recognize all the needs of the employees in order to motivate them towards fulfilling all the provided organizational responsibilities (Tourish 2013). It also allows organizations the opportunity to implement customize training session for maximizing the impact on the operational performances.  

Brief introduction/Context of the topic:

As described by Van Knippenberg and Sitkin (2013) organizational innovation can be referred to the creation of useful and valuable products and services. In the present competitive business environment, organizations utilize innovative activities as the weapon of achieving business aims and objectives. Therefore, it can be mentioned that innovation is extremely important for enhancing the performance level of the organization. Now, transformational leaders are expected to have major impact on the organizational innovation aspect. Transformational leaders focus on utilizing intellectual stimulation and inspirational motivation that can have major impact on the innovation aspect. Braun et al. (2013) have mentioned that transformational leaders promote creative and unique ideas within the workplace, as they regarded as the ‘creativity enhancing forces’. Moreover, intellectual stimulation enhances exploratory thinking whereas individualizes consideration serves as a reward for the followers. It has been assessed that transformational leaders play a crucial role in enhancing the self-confidence, self-esteem and self-efficacy of the employees. As a result, it encourages employees to focus on several innovative approaches and ideas that can have major impact on the overall organizational performances (Roueche, Baker III and Rose 2014). Transformational leadership also creates major impact on the motivational level of the employees, which can induce them to go beyond the organizational expectation, which is also likely to increase the efficiency level of the organizational performances.

Transformational leaders are confident and optimistic about assessing what needs to accomplished for fulfilling future needs. As a result, it allows employees to see the mission and vision statement of the organization meaningfully. In addition, it also allows leaders to provide necessary supports in developing employee’s strengths and abilities. Now, a major attribute of transformational leadership has been the empowerment of employees. It has been assessed that empowered employees are likely to take greater responsibilities compared to traditional workplace situation. Wright, Moynihan and Pandey (2012) have elaborated empowerment as the motivational concept of self-efficacy. In the present competitive business environment, empowerment has emerged as “increased intrinsic task motivation manifested in a set of four cognitions reflecting an individual’s orientation to his or her work role: meaning, competence, self-determination, and impact”. Therefore, it will eventually allow employees to create greater understanding among each other, which is likely to create major impact on the organizational performances. Psychological empowerment would also allow employees to understand strengths and weaknesses about each other (Gumusluoglu and Ilsev 2012). Therefore, it will eliminate any possibility of confusion within the workplace. In fact, psychological empowerment would encourage employees to take additional responsibilities of developing team bonding that will increase the commitment level towards the organizational roles and responsibilities. 

Brief literature review:

From the above discussion, it can be assessed that transformational leadership style can have major impact on enhancing the performance level of the organization. However, retail organizations like ‘The One’ is facing huge amount of competition in maintaining the sales volume at the desired level. It has been also assessed that technological advancement has completely altered the way business activities of retail sector are conducted in the UAE market. Therefore, it is very difficult to assess the exact amount of impact transformational leadership style can have on the effectiveness of the operational performance. Moreover, retail sector organizations have to deal with different rules and restrictions that can also have impact on the innovation aspect of the transformational leadership. For that reason, the study would look to analyze the exact amount of impact transformational leadership can have on the effectiveness of the organizational performances.

According to Taylor, Bogdan and DeVault (2015) research philosophy allows to include in-depth information about the topic. As a result, it allows covering all aspect of the research study in an appropriate manner. Research philosophy has three parts including positivism, interpretivism and realism that studies consider for fulfilling all the business objectives. In order to understand the kind of impact transformational leadership can have on ‘The One’ performances, the study would consider positivism research philosophy. It allows the study to utilize factual knowledge through the observation for fulfilling all the research objectives. It would also allow the research study to formulate hypothesis about the topic. Positivism philosophy also eliminates any type of human interest from the research topic, which is essential to minimize the possibility of gaining biased results. On the other hand, the study will not consider other research philosophies, as it can increase the required time for the successful completion of the research project. 

Research approach reflects another crucial aspect of research methodology that directs the study towards a particular direction. As per the article by Flick (2015) research approach can be divided into three prime categories including deductive, inductive and abductive. For understanding the impact of transformational leadership on organizational performances, the study would consider deductive research approach. The selection of deductive approach would help the study to evaluate the developed hypothesis in the research philosophy section. In addition, deductive approach would also help the study to include different concepts, models and theories about the research topic, which is likely to add value to the overall outcome. Selection of deductive approach would also help study to utilize the collected information in a positive way for fulfilling all the research objectives. On the other hand, the study will not use inductive approach, as it does not require inclusion of any new concept.  

Impact of Transformational leadership on organizational innovation:

Research design describes the general plan about the way entire research activities will be conducted for achieving desired outcome. As mentioned by Panneerselvam (2014) research design have prime two parts including exploratory and conclusive research design. Now, in order to indentify the impact of transformational leadership on the performance level of ‘The One’, the study would focus on conclusive research design. It will help the study to collect appropriate information about the research topic. It also helps to develop a clear structure through which all the activities associated with the research process can be performed in an effective manner. In fact, conclusive research design is the best way to establish the relationship between two factors. As a result, it will help the study to identify the exact amount of impact transformational leadership can have on the performance level of the organization. Furthermore, conclusive research design would help to include large sample size, which will decrease the probability of sampling error largely.

Data collection is arguably the most important part of any research study, as the entire outcome heavily depends on the selected procedure. For identifying the impact of transformational leadership, the study would focus on primary data collection technique. It will help the study to include current benefits and challenges in an effective way. In order to collect comprehensive data about the research topic, the study would focus on the effective utilization of both qualitative and quantitative data collection approach for covering all aspect of the topic. The study would select quantitative data collection process, as it will help to identify the trend regarding the responses of the respondents (Neuman and Robson 2012). On the contrary, the study would focus on capturing qualitative approach to gain in-depth information about the study.

The study would develop two separate set of questionnaires for gathering qualitative and quantitative information effectively. Qualitative questionnaire would only include open-end questions whereas quantitative questionnaire would focus on including closed-end questions. The study would select 50 executive levels of employees working in ‘The One’ for capturing qualitative information. On the other hand, 5 managers from different retail organizations will be selected for gathering qualitative information. Thus, the study would focus on utilizing non-probability sampling technique for the identification of the respondents. The study would select online survey method for capturing changes quantitative data whereas face-to-face interview method would be selected for qualitative data collection technique. 

References:

Avolio, B.J. and 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. and Frey, D., 2013. Transformational leadership, job satisfaction, and team performance: A multilevel mediation model of trust. The Leadership Quarterly, 24(1), pp.270-283.

Flick, U., 2015. Introducing research methodology: A beginner’s guide to doing a research project. Sage.

García-Morales, V.J., Jiménez-Barrionuevo, M.M. and Gutiérrez-Gutiérrez, L., 2012. Transformational leadership influence on organizational performance through organizational learning and innovation. Journal of business research, 65(7), pp.1040-1050.

Grant, A.M., 2012. Leading with meaning: Beneficiary contact, prosocial impact, and the performance effects of transformational leadership. Academy of Management Journal, 55(2), pp.458-476.

Gumusluog? lu, L. and Ilsev, A., 2012. Transformational Leadership and Organizational Innovation: The Roles of Internal and External Support for Innovation.

Kark, R. and 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.

Neuman, W.L. and Robson, K., 2012. Basics of social research: Qualitative and quantitative approaches.

Panneerselvam, R., 2014. Research methodology. PHI Learning Pvt. Ltd..

Rao, A.S. and Kareem Abdul, W., 2015. Impact of transformational leadership on team performance: an empirical study in UAE. Measuring Business Excellence, 19(4), pp.30-56.

Roueche, P.E., Baker III, G.A. and Rose, R.R., 2014. Shared vision: Transformational leadership in American community colleges. Rowman & Littlefield.

Taylor, S.J., Bogdan, R. and DeVault, M., 2015. Introduction to qualitative research methods: A guidebook and resource. John Wiley & Sons.

theone.com, 2017. THE One. [online] Theone.com. Available at: <https://www.theone.com> [Accessed 30 Mar. 2017].

Tourish, D., 2013. The dark side of transformational leadership: A critical perspective. Development and Learning in Organizations, 28(1).

Van Knippenberg, D. and Sitkin, S.B., 2013. A critical assessment of charismatic—Transformational leadership research: Back to the drawing board?. The Academy of Management Annals, 7(1), pp.1-60.

Wright, B.E., Moynihan, D.P. and Pandey, S.K., 2012. Pulling the levers: Transformational leadership, public service motivation, and mission valence. Public Administration Review, 72(2), pp.206-215.

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