As was expected, the various accounts of “most effective leadership” consisted of
attributes which loaded almost exclusively on the four I’s of transformational
leadership and occasionally on contingent reward. In all sessions this proved to be a
convincing way to introduce the model in order to begin a process of becoming aware
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of the behaviors that were being encouraged. The point was made that the type of
leadership participants would be encouraged to embrace did not emanate so much
from some purely theoretical proposition, but rather from their own experience as to
what works best. The additional point was made (for the first time, but to be often
repeated) that it was not necessary, or even possible, to be high in each of the four I’s
of transformational leadership. Participants were advised that the object of the
development project was not to make them become a completely different person, but
to increase the behaviors associated with effectiveness and to reduce the behaviors that
are not. Much of the rest of the day was spent on additional activities to help
participants become more aware of the elements of the model and to convince them of
its efficacy. Videos, short case studies, and exercises were used to facilitate this process.
The aggregate data from the base-line study, showing the strong relationship between
the transformational and contingent reward leadership behaviors and productivitywas also reviewed