Transformational leadership and shared leadership

I have written about transformational leadership before (here), and shared leadership (here), but I have not talked before about how these two concepts relate to each other. Transformational leadership and shared leadership are both key leadership theories, each springing from a slightly differing philosophical base - regarding power and control - on a continuum of command and control (leader-centred leadership) at one end, and autonomy (follower-centred leadership) at the other. As we can see by the Leadership Continuum diagram accompanying this post (Tannenbaum & Schmidt, 1973, p. 164, amended Young, 2009), leadership styles have tended to focus on who has control: one leader, or many followers. They have not overtly focused on who holds the power. Power is implied, through who has control.

Transformational leadership proposes that 'effective' leaders inspire their followers to achieve through fostering a clear vision; building enthusiasm; creating an environment of intellectual curiosity; encouraging creativity; and taking a developmental approach with all followers. Collectively, this generates more commitment to the task, higher levels of performance, and leads to greater satisfaction (Gomes, 2013; Lowe et al., 1996). The focus is on the leader, although followers participate. Perhaps this is in the "Leader presents problems" position at 71% of the way across the continuum; or perhaps at 86%, "Leader defines limits" (Tannenbaum & Schmidt, 1973). The leader still holds the power.

Shared leadership is less hierarchical, proposing that leadership can be a collective, distributed and dynamic process among team members, allowing multiple individuals within a team to lead (Pearce & Conger, 2003; Allen et al., 2003). For this model to flourish, all participants must trust each other. They must also be willing to collaborate, communicate, and share power (Moxley, 2000). I think this is at the 100% mark (Tannenbaum & Schmidt, 1973), and there is shared power. This is "power with", not "power through" (Marshall, 1984).

Transformational and shared leadership can be complementary. Transformational leaders can create shared leadership by inspiring, developing and empowering followers to become collaborative, autonomous teams (Gomes, 2013; Lowe et al., 1996; Pearce & Conger, 2003; Allen, Morton & Li, 2003; Moxley, 2000). Both theories highlight the importance of collaboration, vision, and motivation in the leadership process, albeit from different perspectives, ultimately contributing to competitive advantage. 

Sam

References:

Allen, B. L., Morton, L. W., & Li, T. (2003). Shared Leadership. Rural Development Initiative/Iowa State University. https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=37b4f29746fa9e3fedb2afd62a97d5523512fb2f

Gomes, A. R. (2013). Chapter 4: Transformational Leadership: Theory, research and application to sports. In C. Mohiyeddini (Ed.), Contemporary Topics and Trends in the Psychology of Sports (pp. 53-114). Nova Science Publishers, Inc.

Lowe, K. B., Kroeck, K. G., & Sivasubramaniam, N. (1996). Effectiveness correlates of transformational and transactional leadership: A meta-analytic review of the MLQ literature. The Leadership Quarterly, 7(3), 385-42. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1048-9843(96)90027-2

Marshall, J. (1984). Women Managers: Travellers in a Male World. Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Moxley, R. S. (2000). Leadership and Spirit. Jossey-Bass.

Pearce, C. L., & Conger, J. A. (Eds.). (2003). All those years ago: The historical underpinnings of shared leadership. In Shared Leadership: Reframing the hows and whys of leadership (pp. 1−18). SAGE Publications, Inc.

Tannenbaum, R., & Schmidt, W. (1973). How to Choose a Leadership Pattern. Harvard Business Review, 51(3), 162-180.