Leader-member Exchange and Transformational Leadership Style: A Prediction to Thriving at Work

Abstract

The world’s economic and organizational growth is increasingly becoming difficult as a result of harsh leadership styles and highhandedness in imprinting certain policies and rules into the organization. Going by this trend, this study explored leader-member exchange and transformational leadership style: a prediction to thriving at work among employees of Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra, Nigeria. The sample population of the study comprised of 102 non-teaching staff of Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra, Nigeria. Thirty-two (32) males and sixty-eight (68) females with age range of 23 to 56 years with a mean age of 32.5 who were selected through simple random sampling. Instruments used for data collection were leader-member exchange scale, transformational leadership inventory and thriving scale. In the method section, predictive design was adopted and hierarchical regression statistics was used to analyze the predictive strength of the variables. Three hypotheses guided the study and the results indicated that leader member exchange and transformational leadership style independently predicted thriving at work at B=.80 and .34, p<.05 respectively. Also, leader member exchange and transformational leadership style jointly predicted thriving at work at B= .62 and B=.34, p <.05 respectively. The findings from this study imply that leader member exchange and transformational leadership style can greatly impact thriving at work and this would in turn lead to greater work commitment and organizational effectiveness among public sector employees. It was recommended that organizations put to use transformational leadership styles and as well grant leaders the opportunity to share ideas and opinions.