Research Article - (2014) Volume 4, Issue 1
1Yazd Branch, Farhangian University, Yazd, Iran
2Kerman Branch, Shahid Bahonar Pardis Farhangian University, Kerman, Iran
3Department of Educational, Roudehen Branch, Islamic Azad University, Roudehen, Iran
This study is conducted in the field of Islamic Azad University employees organizational learning according to the utilization of transformational leadership components. The statistical population in this study contains the faculty members and administrative staff in all departments of university and capital cities; and the statistical sample consisted of 200 individuals. With this aim, 200 expert staff from Islamic Azad University was randomly selected Research data was collected using questionnaire and SPSS Software was utilized for data analysis. Obtained results showed that a positive and meaningful relationship exists between the components of transformational leadership and organizational learning. Moreover, idealized influence (behavior), a dimension of transformational leadership, was known to be the most important predictor in organizational learning.
Organizational learning, Transformational leadership, learning organization
In today's competitive business environment, the organizations are more concerned with the survival and development and their overall progress. To obtain this aim, the managers are seeking to optimally identify and utilize the resources and capital which are hard and expensive to be obtained. Therefore, the managers, who utilize the mentioned capital through the most effective and efficient way, will be successful in this regard. The major sources of each organization include the human, financial and technical resources, of which the human capital determines the direction and way of other capitals because it is the labor who can apply other resources through this abilities and planning [35]. The major changes in the business environment are among the main characteristics of this century [26].
The rapid changes in the environment, industry, customers, clients, competitors, partners, products and services are all the forces which affect the organization and lead to the need for the priority [25] .Meanwhile, understanding of the environment, variations, and being aware of the opportunities, threats, constraints and possibilities, which are considered as the requirements of new organizations [28] are not possible through the traditional management approaches [18] .The extensive changes and globalization in today world require the transformational leadership style which is among the newest leadership styles that are recently taken into account [20] this leadership style has numerous advantages such as improving the organizational learning. The organizational learning is a conscious, purposeful, interactive, dynamic, continuous, and ongoing process which leads to the continuous, fast and effective feedback at the individual, group, and organizational level and acts under the influence of perceptual processes and the applied cultural resources by the individuals and has the aim at making the individual and organization successful [4]. The transformational leadership improves the organizational learning by supporting the grouping and changing processes [9] and leading to the intellectual excitement, creativity, innovation, and enhanced selfconfidence [17].
Theoretical Principles and Research Background
The transformational leaders stimulate their followers to take efforts in line with the organizational objectives and interests and accomplish them. Furthermore, these leaders are able to stimulate the employees to do their works with performance beyond their expectations. Thus, the employees will have the commitment to the job and its outcomes and they lead to the enhanced job satisfaction and more effort [24]. Bass's transformational leadership model is taken into account by the scientists as the process through which the employees are stimulated to have performance beyond the expectations. Despite the great interest to Bass's model, it has several problems. Its main problem is its uncertainty in separating the transformational leadership sub-criteria. This problem is reflected in the lack of support for the factor structure of transformational leadership model and the discriminant validity of components of this model compared to each other in the empirical studies [12].According to the recent development in the leadership theory, the charismatic leadership theories (under which the leader is considered as an unusual individual and the followers as the leadership-dependent ones) are changed to the neo-charismatic theories and the transformational leadership (which pay attention to the followers' development and empowerment for the independent performance) [1].Bass argued that real transformational leaders stimulate their followers for achieving the major objectives in order to go beyond the personal immediate-achievable interest and be developed in line with the desired group, organization or country [5].
The Bass's transformational leadership model is achieved based on four dimensions including the Idealized Influence (behavior and attitude), Intellectual Stimulation, Inspirational Motivation, and Individual Consideration as follows [6].Idealized Influence: It covers the charismatic factor of transformational leadership, so that the leaders become the strong behavioral models for their followers [20] ,thus their followers trust on their behavior and decisions [10].Intellectual Stimulation: The transformational leaders utilize the Intellectual Stimulation in order to challenge their followers' ideas, imagination and creativity [14] .They stimulate their followers to be creative and innovative through questioning the assumptions, reformulating the issues and ignoring the previous problems by the new ways [10].Inspirational Motivation: It describes the leaders who enhance their followers' motivation through involving them in drawing the future perspective (Antonakis). The Inspirational Motivation draws a clear picture of optimistic and accessible future [10]. Individual Consideration: The consideration of followers' individual differences, the relationship with each of them, stimulating them and transferring the responsibility to them are among the main features of transformational leaders' behavioral dimensions. These leaders consider each follower's needs, abilities and objectives [14], listen to them and make their potential talents developed [10].In general, these characteristics have a profound effect on the organizational learning and lead the members' commitment and the sense of ownership towards the results of organizational learning process [13].Marquardt has argued that 8 factors change the business world and made the extensive organizational learning inevitable and essential in the 21st century. These eight factors include: The globalization and global economy, technology, severe change of business world, the customer's increasing influence, considered knowledge and learning as the major organizational asset, the employees' changing roles and expectations, the diversity and mobility of labor, and rapidly expanding changes and development [15].The research results indicate that the organizational learning affects the competitive advantage financial and non-financial performance the tangible and non-tangible participatory interests and the innovation [17]. Robey and Rose raised five features in order to define the organizational learning: a) The organizational learning occurs at the organizational level, b) The organizational learning is a process, not the structure, c) The organizational learning is both intentional and unintentional, d) The organizational learning needs the organizational memory storage and intellectual models and finally the organizational learning leads the organizational behavior [27]. Huber (1991) defined the organizational learning as the information processing with the aim at storing the knowledge in the organizational memory and argued that has four structures including the information acquisition, distribution, and interpretation and the organizational memory. After him the researchers like Kim (1993), Dimovski (1994), Crossan (1995), and Sanchez (2005) expanded the information processing perspective and added the behavioral- cognitive dimensions to it and argued that the organizational learning had a profound impact on the organizational performance [34].
Furthermore, Castiglione emphasized that the organizational learning process is based on the work environment in which the organizational members are encouraged to share their ideas and insights at all levels [7].The organizational learning in this paper covers the following components: commitment and responsibility, risk-taking, organizational improvement, interpersonal interaction, utilization of experience, customer-orientation, and finding the reasons for the mistake and the efficiency of organizational structure [11].Ultimately, the organizational learning is possible when the leaders act beyond the control and leadership techniques and welcome the systematic approach of organizational learning [17].
Transformational Leadership and Organizational Learning
The emergence of transformational leadership theory is a new approach to the theory of leadership characteristics according to the contingent requirements and includes the features such as: The vision, attraction, ability to inspire, better relationship with senior managers, referral power, intellectual stimulation, paying attention to the individual differences and the tendency towards making the fundamental changes [35].Therefore, the objective of transformational leadership is to develop the dialogue and cooperation among the team members and improve the organizational learning through the intellectual stimulation, inspirational motivation openness, open trust and relationship [19].
Zagoršek also stated that the transformational leaders encourage the openness, open dialogue and trust, and open relationships and develop the culture of cooperation and dialogue among the team members, thus make the remarkable help to acquire, distribute and interpret the knowledge; Moreover, the transformational leaders facilitate the organizational members' cognitive and behavioral changes which result from the organizational learning [34].
Kavita Singh claimed that changing the organization to a learning organization requires the total changes in the system and this change is not possible without the transformational leadership. This research focuses on understanding of transformational leadership role in creating the learning organization. He argued that the main characteristic of transformational leadership, stating the vision and intellectual stimulation, make the creative thinking which in turn lead to the organizational learning [28].
In a study with the aim at investigating the managers' learning strategies and the transformational leadership, Trotman [32], concluded that the effective learning through the experience satisfactorily predicts the transformational leadership. Furthermore, the analysis of data obtained from this study indicates that the continuous application of thinking and practical learning strategies has the positive and satisfactory relationship with the transformational leadership. The results of studies by Kurland also indicate that the transformational leadership style can predict the organizational learning processes, and vision, which is created by the transformational leader other personnel, is the most powerful factor in the development and creation of organizational learning [14].
Vera and Crossan suggested after analyzing the results of studies that the transformational leaders facilitate the organizational learning through creating the vision and the environmental dynamics act as an important mediator in the perception of relationship between the organizational learning and leadership [33]. The obtained results of study by Newberry [22]. also indicate that the human resources is considered as the main element in any changes either transformational or evolutionary and the leadership is a key tool in improving the organizations and changing them towards the effectiveness and efficiency [22]. Thus, in responding to this question whether the gender and work experience affect the organizational learning, he concluded that the organizational learning is different between men and women, but the work experience is not different; finally, he confirmed the role of transformational leadership in the organizational learning. Furthermore, Ash indicated that the transformational leaders' behaviors and their actions often stimulate the individual, group and organizational learning [3]. His research suggests that the organizations should teach their leaders through the training programs that they play the important roles in the organizational learning, systematic thinking, and creation of a learning organization. Correa also claimed that the leadership, especially the transformational leadership, has a positive effect on organizational learning through the innovation. They argue that the transformational leadership and organizational learning lead to the creativity and the transformational leadership focuses more on the group decisions and individual competencies than the traditional one [8].
Investigating the relationship between the transformational leadership and organizational learning from the perspective of faculty members and administrative staff at Islamic Azad University. Subsidiary objective :Subsidiary objective 1: Investigating the transformational leadership status and organizational learning from the perspective of administrative staff at Islamic Azad University. Subsidiary objective 2: Investigating the difference between the employees' organizational learning in terms of gender, experience and education; Subsidiary objective 3: Investigating the relationship between the overall transformational leadership and its dimensions (idealized influence (behavior), idealized influence (attitude including the Intellectual Stimulation, Individual Consideration, Inspirational Motivation) with the overall organizational learning and its components; Subsidiary objective 4: Investigating the multiple relationships (correlation) between the dimensions of transformational leadership and the organizational learning.
Research Methodology
Since the aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between the transformational leadership and organizational learning, this study is applied in terms of objective and has the correlative type
Statistical Population and Sampling Method
The statistical population of this study consists of all university administrative staff (bachelor or higher) at Islamic Azad University. The sample size was obtained equal to 220 through Cochran Formula and the questionnaires were distributed among them through the simple random sampling and 200 questionnaires were obtained. 70% of samples were men and the rest of them were women; moreover, about 20% of employees had the work experience less than five years, 70% between 5 and 10 years, and 10% over 10 years. In terms of educational level, about 62% of employees were Bachelor, 30% master, and nearly 8% PhDs.
Measurement tools and statistical methods
The questionnaire is the main tool in this study and the questions on the multifactor leadership aspects are applied for measuring the transformational leadership and the ones about the organizational learning aspects are used for measuring the organizational learning. The Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire was initially in the studies by Bernard Bass and its new version has 9 sub-scales which ultimately measures 5 factors of transformational leadership. The dependent variable questionnaire (organizational learning) is also made of 8 factors with 30 questions. This questionnaire was previously designed by Mirkamali [27].and its reliability was reported equal to 0.78. The factors of mentioned questionnaires are presented in details in the following table [28]. The obtained data was analyzed after collecting data from the questionnaire through the statistical software and the following statistical methods.
1-Descriptive statistics such as the means, percentages, and standard deviations for investigating the status of university experts and managers' organizational learning and transformational leadership;
2-Correlation coefficient test for measuring the relationship between the transformational leadership factors and organizational learning;
3-ANOVA test for determining differences among the individuals' organizational learning;
4-Multiple regression analysis for examining the multiple relationship between the transformational leadership and organizational learning.
5-Validity and reliability of research tool :To determine the validity of organizational learning questionnaire, the experts and university professors' viewpoints were utilized as well as the conducted local studies and as the result of consensus this questionnaire had the content validity. Furthermore, Cronbach's alpha method was used to determine the reliability. Finally the Cronbach's alpha coefficient was obtained equal to 0.88. The Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire was also standard.
The findings of this study are discussed in the framework of outlined objectives;
First objective: Investigating the status of transformational leadership and the organizational learning at the university.
Table (1): The mean and standard deviation of transformational leadership and its subscales
Based on the table above, the highest mean is associated with the Inspirational Motivation with the mean of 3.78, and then with slightly difference the mean equal to 3.71 for the Idealized Influence of behavior, 3.40 for the, 3.37 for the Individual Consideration, 3.27 for the Intellectual Stimulation and finally 3.505 for the Transformational leadership. Based on Table 2, the highest level of commitment and responsibility has the mean of 3.939, and then the with slightly difference Interpersonal belongs to the organizational improvement with a mean of 3.879, the interpersonal interaction 3.878, customer-orientation 3.727, utilization of experience 3.740, finding the reasons for mistake 3.747, risk-taking 3.875 and finally the organizational learning 3.749 and efficiency of organizational structure 3.563. As observed, all factors of organizational learning and the overall organizational learning is put at the higher than average level.
Table 2: The mean and standard deviation of organizational learning and its subscales
Second objective: Investigating the difference between the individuals' organizational learning in terms of gender, experience and educational level.
According to the Table 3 and the values of t for the organizational learning components at Alpha level of 0.05, which is less than the value of table (1.98), it is concluded that there is no difference between the women and men in terms of organizational learning. As the obtained values of significance level (Sig 2-tailed) for eight components of organizational learning including the commitment and responsibility, organizational improvement, interpersonal interaction, utilization of experience, customer-orientation, and efficiency of organizational structure are higher than alpha level of 0.05, thus the difference between men and women in terms of organizational learning is rejected with 95% of confidence level, while among those eight components, there is a significant difference between the men and women in terms of risk-taking and finding the reasons for mistake. Men are better than women in terms of risktaking and finding the reasons because the obtained value of t (2.99) at Alpha level (0.05) is greater than the value of t in the table (1.98).
Table (3): The results of Students't statistical test for investigating the difference between the men and women in terms of organizational learning
According to Table 4, the mean difference of groups in risk-taking and utilization of individual' dimensions experience was significant in terms of organizational learning. According to the results of post hoc test, it is indicated that the more the people are at higher educational levels, the more their risk-taking is enhanced and they utilize the other individuals' experience.
Table 4: The results of one-way ANOVA test for determining the difference of organizational learning and its dimensions in terms of individuals' educational level
Table 5 indicates that four groups of people have no difference in terms of organizational learning components.
Table 5: The results of one-way ANOVA for determining the difference of organizational learning and its dimensions in terms of work
Third Objective: Investigating the relationship between the transformational leadership and its components with the organizational learning
The obtained results indicate that there is a significant positive correlation between the transformational leadership and its components with the university staff's organizational learning at alpha level 0.01 (r=110, sig=0.01). In this regard, the idealized influence of behavior had the correlation coefficient of 0.723, the Individual Consideration 0.626, and Inspirational Motivation had the correlation coefficient of 0.593 with the staff's organizational learning.
Fourth objective: Investigating the relationship (correlation) between the dimensions of transformational leadership with the dimensions of organizational learning and providing a linear model for it.
According to the results, obtained from the regression analysis (stepwise method) as shown in Table 6, the idealized influence (behavior), and individual consideration have a significant multiple correlation with the organizational learning. In other words, the mentioned independent variables have predicted 0.78 of variance of employees' organizational learning as the dependent variables. F test implies the significant correlation between the dependent variable y (the rate of organizational learning) and the independent variables. Thus, among the five predictive variables, the idealized influence (behavior) and individual consideration are considered as the best predictors of employees' organizational learning.
Table (6): The relationship between the transformational leadership and organizational learning from the perspective of university staff
Table 7- The results of multivariate regression analysis between the components of transformational leadership and the organizational learning through the stepwise method
The globalization and technological advances in the world have changed the business and led to the challenges. To face with the challenges of the 21st century business environment, the organizational capabilities and competencies are the major factors in the success of organization[21]. This study is designed in order to gain the knowledge about the development of organizational learning based on the transformational leadership and it suggests that the transformational leadership can be so helpful to transfer an organization to a learning organization and encounter with the environmental challenges. This study enables the researchers to better understand the organizational learning and be aware of the role of transformational leadership in the creation of organizational learning. Furthermore, it also helps the organizations to employ and choose the individuals who develop the organizational learning and have the necessary skills to develop a learning organization [30] .Investigating the relationship between the university employees' organizational learning and the transformational leadership, as the main objective of this study, indicates that the organizational learning and its components are generally in the appropriate status because their scores are higher than the average. Like the transformational leadership, the existence of organizational learning has advantages for the organization; for instance, Dodgson (1993) argued that the organizations learn to reform and improve their power and adaptability against the environmental changes. Grantham (1993) also stated that learning enables the organizations to have faster and more effective to the complex and dynamic environment. The results, obtained from investigating the transformational leadership status from the perspective of university staff, indicate that the leaders' scores are higher than the average and it can be concluded that the leaders had proper status in the components of transformational leadership and the overall transformational leadership. The existence of transformational leadership in the organizations will lead to the advantage for them. Through making an emotional link, they stimulate the employees and encourage them to work to potential their maximum power. These leaders make a long-term success and improve the performance and also make the tendency for their followers to seek to fulfill the requirements of higher levels (successes and self awareness) and accomplish the group objectives [23].Moreover, the results of investigating the organizational learning status from the perspective of university employees indicate that the more the individuals' educational level is enhanced the more their risk-taking and utilization of more experience is increased; furthermore, the men have greater risk-taking than the women and can utilize the other individuals' experience. In this regard, Newberry (2008) suggested in his study that the organizational learning is different between the men and women, but there is no difference in the field of work experience[2]. However, the research results indicate that not only there is a significant positive relationship between the overall transformational leadership and the organizational learning, but also a direct relationship between its components. The important point is that the Idealized Influence of behavior has the highest correlation with the organizational learning. Shine (2004) argues that the transformational leadership and organizational learning are integrated and these two variables are considered as the necessary strategies for changing in most of the organizations [17]. The leadership, especially the transformational leadership plays the important role in stimulating learning, creativity, innovation, creation and application of knowledge. They facilitate the organizational learning through the guidance, making the structures and facilitating the activities and relationships within the groups; and these two organizational variables have a direct positive relationship. Finally, the results of regression analysis for predicting the organizational learning from the transformational leadership and its subscales indicates that the idealized influence (behavior) and individual consideration are known as the most important predictors of organizational learning [17].
Suggestions
According to the findings of this study, the following suggestions are offered in order to pay attention to the transformational leadership factors and thus improve the organizational learning:
-The employees should be encourage to work based on the information and support the organizational changes through emphasizing on the organizational vision and mission and empowering the individuals;
-Through creating an atmosphere of trust and respect, the leaders should encourage the followers to apply all available resources and consider the ways and tools for obtaining the internal and external information and the moral consequences of their own decisions;
-Creating a healthy competitive environment for developing the employees' potential capacities by giving the material and spiritual rewards to the superior individuals and groups;
-Encouraging to provide new solutions through giving reward to the innovative and creative thinking styles;
-Delegation of authority and empowerment of followers;
-Application of creative encouragement techniques such as brainstorming technique;
-To have high expectations of followers and delegate the challenging responsibilities to them for improving their performance;
- Involving the followers in the future vision, mission and strategies of organization in order to attract their higher participation in achieving the objectives and being optimistic about the future;
-Paying attention to the followers' needs and creating the opportunities for their development, and promoting them to higher levels of individual development through determining their levels to participate in training courses;
-Applying the appropriate methods and procedures for motivating the employees to participate in these courses;
-Workplace preparation for the teaching staff
Finally, the leaders can create a trust and cooperation atmosphere, in which the organizational members participate in creating the organizational vision through the culture of organizational learning. The power and efficiency of organizational learning, in which there is the collaborative learning and sharing it among the people, determines the need for making the participatory learning. The leaders should be sensitive to the learning-centralization of their organizations and give this opportunity to their followers in the workplace because learning from the experience lead to enhanced individual abilities and competencies. The leaders should give their followers the freedom to make use of different learning strategies. The leaders should improve learning at all levels and create the opportunities for followers to acquire the knowledge from different sources because they have powerful effects on the acquisition and distribution of information. They also need to establish and create the opportunities for employees to distribution the information, meet and discuss about the ideas and facilitate the interpretations based on deeper insights. The leaders can encourage the individuals in learning by creating the appropriate environment.
