As a leader, you are always looking for ways to motivate your followers. Typically, the desire is to motivate your followers to accomplish their job roles and responsibilities effectively. However, what does it take to motivate your followers to go above and beyond? How can a leader foster an environment that supports their followers to engage in acts that are outside of their prescribed roles? Identifying and implementing the appropriate leadership style may be key to facilitating organizational citizenship behaviors within the organizational culture.
Organizational citizenship behaviors (OCB) are non-mandatory and voluntary acts based on individual initiative where they go above and beyond their prescribed roles (Kim & Park, 2019). Followers who assist their co-workers in problem solving or help with other member’s tasks when it is not formally required of them are prime examples of organizational citizenship behavior (Kim & Park, 2019). OCB has been proven to be positively associated with organizational effectiveness and job satisfaction (Kumari & Thapliyal, 2017). Additionally, these behaviors are not recognized under the organization’s formal reward or punishment system (Kumari & Thapliyal, 2017). This would suggest that employing a transactional leadership style would not be suitable for fostering OCBs among followers.
On the other hand, transformational leadership may be more suited to promoting organizational citizenship behaviors. Transformational leaders maintain a strong moral compass and are perceived as role models (idealized influence); they motivate their followers to commit themselves to the overall vision of the organization through emotional appeals (inspirational motivation); transformational leaders challenge their followers to be innovative when combating issues (intellectual stimulation); finally, they cultivate an environment of active listening and take each follower’s needs into consideration (individualized consideration) (Northouse, 2021). At its core, transformational leadership promotes trust among their followers (Kim & Park, 2019). Engaging in transformational leadership will result in an increase in interpersonal trust among employee’s which has been proven to also increase the number of OCBs (Kim & Park, 2019).
Leaders are seen as direct representatives of their organization. When followers have positive perceptions of their leaders and trust is developed then, by extension, they have a positive perception of their organization which can promote organizational citizenship behaviors because they reciprocate those positive feelings (Kim & Park, 2019). Transformational leadership works to motivate followers to accomplish tasks that are in the interest of the organization rather than simply for themselves (Northouse, 2021). This promotes organizational citizenship behaviors which can have a significant impact on the organization such as an increase in performance quality (Kumari & Thapliyal, 2017). Additionally, because of the extra roles’ followers take on due to OCB leaders are able to allocate more time to securing resources and focusing on strategic goals which ultimately causes the organization to run smoothly (Kumari & Thapliyal, 2017).
References
Kim, E. J., & Park, S. (2019). The role of transformational leadership in citizenship behavior: Organizational learning and interpersonal trust as mediators. International Journal of Manpower, 40(7), 1347-1360.
Kumari, P., & Thapliyal, S. (2017). Studying the impact of organizational citizenship behavior on organizational effectiveness. Human Resource Management, 4(1), 9-21.
Northouse, P. G. (2021). Leadership: Practice and Theory (9th ed.). SAGE Publications.
Hello Mckenzie,
First off, I really enjoyed the tie-in of organizational citizenship behaviors and transformational leadership. While reading your post I couldn’t help but think about the times I have seen this at work in the military. You, being a fellow Air Force member, are probably no stranger to dealing with individuals who want nothing to do with their assigned job. I work in aircraft maintenance, and it is very common for us to get people who were “advised” by their recruiter to pick aircraft maintenance even though they had a degree in Biology. I think our branch and the military in general latches on to the idea of transformational leadership because we inherently deal with individuals that aren’t committed or at least unmotivated right from the start. It’s our ability to articulate their role in the mission and future benefits that are important. Our ability to transform them into being committed to the job even if for just long enough to exit the military and pursue other goals.
Interestingly enough though, I have seen many Airmen whom I did not think would make it in aircraft maintenance excel because of the people around them. One thing I, and many of the leaders that trained me, try to champion is having heart. By having heart, we mean volunteering for unfavorable jobs so someone else doesn’t have to or picking up a shift so someone else can take the day to be with their parents. This quickly evolves into people taking on extra task loads at work so everyone can get off on time or making sure their subordinate understands a task because they want them to succeed. These are all, by my understanding, organizational citizenship behaviors and they play an important role in transformational leadership. At the heart of transformational leadership is the ability of leaders to elevate individuals to new heights whether in task proficiency or morality (Northouse, 2022). If you can transform the individuals to engage in OCBs then it can only further their commitment to the organization.
Reference:
Northouse, P. G. (2022). Leadership: Theory and practice (9th ed.). SAGE.
Hi McKenzie,
Great write-up. I agree that it is our everyday business as leaders to find ways to motivate our followers however, I would like to add that we motivate them in a way that not only do they do their responsibilities but they are also aligned with our goals and culture as a unit or team. As Northouse (2021) states, the goal of transformational leadership is to inspire subordinates to act in the organization’s best interests rather than their own.
I observed in the conclusion how you co-related OCB and transformational leadership. Maybe that’s why I’ve found this notion so fascinating to study. This philosophy does not prescribe action but rather alters our perspective on what it means to be a leader. This form of leadership enlightens us to the fact that our actions as leaders have the power to alter the cultural norms of the organizations we serve.
References:
Northouse, P. G. (2021). Leadership: Practice and Theory (9th ed.). SAGE Publications.