Transformational leadership is passionate about achieving excellent results through extraordinary actions taken by others in the organization. Transformational leadership also acts to alter the organizational context and culture in order to sustain the remarkable accomplishments. Transformational leadership is crucial to creating breakthroughs in financial performance, revenue growth, innovation, and other forms of organizational transformation.
Transformational leadership begins with intense commitment to achieving the results needed to create value for the organization. This intense focus on value creation is a core commitment of the transformational leaders. Transformational leaders know that a key element in creating value begins with predictably delivering results with their organization. Further value is created when results are achieved far beyond what is expected and what competitors are achieving. When extraordinary results are being achieved, leaders have excellent opportunities to speak with their various stakeholders regarding the exciting future of the organization.
Observing the Consequences of Transformational Leadership
The popular comedy Seinfeld was described as the “show about nothing”. It may sound like transformational leadership is similar when answering the question “What to Look for in Observing Transformational Leaders”? There is no single right answer since there is not necessarily any one personal attribute or characteristic that identifies the person as a transformational leader. However, if the question is reframed as “What is probably going on around a transformational leader”, then we have something to talk about. When I look to see the consequences of transformational leadership, I consider the following:
- People are inspiring and in action.
- The organizational context is changing.
- People are working to expand the quality of communications, both personally and organizationally.
- Things are happening and there is a high energy among the people.
- The intense commitment to improving performance of the organization is readily apparent.
- Leadership development is happening on a large scale.
- Employees and other stakeholders are enrolled in the changes and are organized and active.
- Innovation is happening.
- A solid foundation for the future is being built.