As you may know, I’ve been investigating different educational programs in the area of engineering leadership. I was reading some papers that professors at a local university business school had published, and I happened upon the idea of transformational leadership. I had never heard of that before, so I dug into it a bit, and I think many of you will agree that it’s a model of leadership to aspire to, no matter what position you hold in an organization.

Transformational Leadership

Transformational leadership is distinguished by four factors:

1. Individualized Consideration: Transformational leaders give a high degree of time, attention, and emotional energy to the individuals in their team. They act as coaches and mentors for the people in their team.
2. Intellectual Stimulation: This describes the leader’s willingness to challenge assumptions and inspire their followers to do the same. Transformational leaders think outside the box, and thus set a precedent for having their followers do the same. This can really bring out the creativity in a group.
3. Inspirational Motivation: A leader who can provide inspirational motivation to a group gives the group purpose and meaning. Both of these things are critical to having a team act – there has to be and end-game for any undertaking, and a reason why an undertaking is important.
4. Idealized Influence: Simply put, idealized influence captures the idea that transformational leaders are good role models for their followers.

What I Love About This Model of Leadership

I think this is brilliant. First of all,  I agree with all of the above. The most influential and motivating leaders in my experience exercised all four of the points above. They cared about me – not just the team, but the individuals within it as well. They challenged me. They made sure I understood the bigger picture and why we were doing what we were doing. They were excellent role models in terms of their actions and their approach to work and life. I had never really thought to frame their abilities in the terminology of “transformational leadership” but now that I see it, it makes perfect sense.

What I like best about this model of leadership is that anyone can adopt these traits. Anyone. It doesn’t matter whether your office is  in a cubicle or on a private jet with gold-plated toilet paper roll holders, you can care about other people and give them individual attention. You can challenge yourself and others to aspire to be great at what you do. You can be a role model.

Of course, if you’re in a cube farm like I am, you probably don’t have employees that you’re guiding, but you do have yourself and the people you work closely with. If you start holding yourself to a higher standard, and treat people with individual care, you can bet your bottom dollar that you’ll start turning heads.

My Challenge

I challenge you, dearest reader, to take one of the 4 qualities mentioned above, and turn it into action. it doesn’t matter what so much as that you take some kind of physical action. When you do, please let the community know in the comment box below. We’d love to hear the results.