Leadership and Innovation Characteristics - Transforming Your STEM Career Through Leadership and Innovation - page 86

THE TRANSFORMATIONAL INNOVATION LEADER
A recent study evaluated the relationship between extraordinary leaders, or trans-
formational leaders, and innovation. A study by Gumusluoğlu and Ilsev [27]
investigated the impact of transformational leadership on organizational innova-
tion to determine whether internal and external support for innovation as con-
textual conditions influence the level of organizational innovation. In this study,
transformational leadership was hypothesized to have a positive influence on
organizational innovation. In order to test these hypotheses, data were collected
from 163 Research and Development employees and managers of 43 micro- and
small-sized Turkish entrepreneurial software development companies. Hierarchi-
cal regression analysis was used to test the hypothesized effects. The results of the
analysis provided support for the positive influence of transformational leader-
ship on organizational innovation. This finding is significant because this positive
effect was identified in micro- and small-sized companies while previous research
focused mainly on large companies. In addition, external support for innovation
was found to significantly moderate this effect. Specifically, the relationship
between transformational leadership and organizational innovation was stronger
when external support was at high levels than when there was no external support.
The key points made by the research suggest the following with respect to
the impact of individual transformational leadership on innovation within an
organization:

Transformational leaders enhance innovation within the organizational con-
text; in other words, the tendency of organizations to innovate.

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Transformational leaders have been suggested to have an impact on innova-
tion as the individuals enhance the culture of innovation within the organiza-
tional context.

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The tendency of organizations to innovate is enhanced with transformational
leadership [28] that has innovation as a priority.

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Transformational leaders promote creative ideas within their organiza-
tions and their behaviors are suggested to act as “creativity-enhancing
forces”; individualized consideration “serves as a reward” for the follow-
ers, intellectual stimulation “enhances exploratory thinking,” and inspi-
rational motivation “provides encouragement into the idea generation
process.” [29]

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Howell and Higgins [30] state that this behavior reflects the “championing
role” of the transformational leaders.

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This leader develops his or her followers' self-confidence, self-efficacy, and
self-esteem.

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This leader motivates his or her followers by his or her vision, increases their
willingness to perform beyond expectations, and challenges them to adopt
innovative approaches in their work.

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The heightened levels of motivation and self-esteem in the followers are likely
to enhance organizational innovation [31] .

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