Daily transactional and transformational leadership and daily employee engagement (2014)
"The aim of this study was to examine the the daily influence of transformational leadership, contingent reward, and active management-by-exception (MBE active) on followers’ daily work engagement.
Multilevel regression analyses revealed that, after controlling for followers’ work engagement the previous day, cadets were more engaged on days that their leader showed more transformational leadership and provided contingent reward. MBE active was unrelated to followers’ work engagement. As predicted, transformational leadership and contingent reward contributed to a more favourable work environment (more autonomy and support), while MBE active resulted in a less favourable work environment (less autonomy) for the cadets.
The authors pointed out some important implications to be considered; a) Day to day fluctuations in leadership behaviour has an impact on employee engagement. On days when leaders express primarily transformational leadership, followed by transactional leadership and did no management by exception (monitor direct reports for mistakes), employee engagement was at its highest; b) Because leaders may not always be aware of how their behaviour affects followers, it may prove useful to provide leaders with feedback about their behaviour. Feedback can be used to create development plans; c) Transformational leadership behaviours are particularly important in populations with low employee engagement."