Self-determined leader motivation and follower perceptions of leadership

Abstract

Purpose A critical assumption of the organizational leadership literature is that leaders want to engage in effective leadership behaviors (Gilbert and Kelloway, 2014). However, leaders may vary in their motivation to be effective in a leadership role, leading to different levels of performance. Drawing on self-determination theory, the authors address the question of what motivates leaders to engage in transformational leadership behaviors (Gilbert et al., 2016). The paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach The current study examined the effects of self-determined leader motivation for transformational leadership on aggregated follower leadership ratings using a sample of 37 leaders matched with 179 followers in two organizations. Findings Results show how leaders’ own motivation relates to followers’ perceptions of leader behavior, and specifically that, across contexts, some autonomous levels of leader motivation are positively related to follower perceptions of leaders’ active-constructive leadership and negatively related to follower perceptions of passive avoidant leadership. Research limitations/implications The research is limited by a small level-two sample size and cross-sectional design. The results suggest that some forms of leader motivation relate to follower ratings of leadership behavior. Originality/value This study is the first to examine how self-determined motivation for transformational leadership predicts follower perceptions of leadership behavior using a multilevel design.