Transformational and transactional leadership style preference and its influence on turnover intention

Abstract

Organisations today must implement the creation of a more conducive and favourable working environment for their employees which will in return be a guarantee for their competitive advantages. The positive orientation held by employees towards their job and the organisation to which they belong is often evident through the increase in productivity and services offered, behaviour of the employee and their loyalty towards the organisation. Thus, it is critical to keep them motivated and engaged at all times. One of the most common approach to achieve all the above mentioned is an effective practice of leadership. However, several studies conducted in the past by numerous researches across various fields reported an inconsistent and inconclusive finding about the association between leadership styles and turnover intention especially when transformational and transactional leadership is concerned. Therefore, this study investigates transformational and transactional leadership style preferences and its influence on turnover intention within a military setting. About 160 servicemen were drawn out of the population of 271 servicemen through a stratified random sampling method. Descriptive analysis were conducted using Statistical Package for Social Sciences software version 21 to discover the preferred leadership style and level of turnover intention while series of multiple analysis were carried out to investigate the influence of leadership style preference on turnover intention. The finding of the study revealed high preference towards transformational leadership style generally and inspirational motivation dimension of transformational leadership specifically while turnover intention was found to be at a moderate level. However no significant influence discovered to be held by the preference of leadership style towards turnover intention held by servicemen serving Malaysian Army. In conclusion, this study is believed to nurture better leadership practice within the army as well as to prevent servicemen from leaving the force.