Burns and Bass on Transformational Leadership

Transformational versus Transactional Leadership

In the 1970’s, researcher James McGregor Burns wrote a significant book entitled, Leadership. He wrote about the processes or behaviors used by leaders to motivate or influence their followers. Burns described leadership as transformational, which is the behavior founded on the belief that leaders and followers can raise each other to higher levels of motivation and morality, or transactional, which is the behavior founded on the belieft that leaders and followers make transactions for wanted behaviors.

The heart of transformational leadership is the leader’s desire and ability to raise the consciousness of others by appealing to powerful moral values and ideals. The leader is able to transform followers beyond jealously, greed and fear toward liberty, justice and humanitarianism. As Burns would say, the followers are raised from their “everyday selves” to become “better selves.” Transformational leaders influence followers by serving as mentors or coaches. They seek to elevate and empower others to a higher level. Transformational leaders are found in many churches and organizations.

Bernard Bass expanded upon the earlier ideas of Burns with his own theory of transformational leadership. He defined this supervision in terms of the leader’s motivational effect on followers. They feel loyalty, trust, admiration and respect toward the transformational leader. The followers are motivated to serve and achieve more than they originally thought possible. They are inspired to achieve higher-order needs and are made more aware of the organization’s needs for their unique skills and talents. Bass wrote about four various types of transformational leadership behavior. They are…

1. Idealized Influence – This is the behavior that arouses followers to feel powerful identification and strong emotions toward the leader.

2. Inspirational Motivation – This behavior models high values as an example, and includes communication of an inspiring vision. It also promotes powerful symbols to arouse greater effort and a feeling of belonging.

3. Individualized Consideration – This behavior provides coaching, support and encouragement of specific followers.

4. Intellectual Stimulation – This behavior influences followers to view problems from a fresh perspective and with a new increased awareness.

The end result of transformational leadership is empowering others to take more initiative in their work, inspiring them to be more committed and building their self-confidence. Of course, these activities can’t take place in a vacuum. Transformational leaders nurture an organizational culture by giving attention to priorities and concerns, maturely reacting to crisis situations, role modeling, wise allocation of rewards, and by defining the criteria for success.