Charismatic Leadership, Essay Example

Charismatic leadership transforms the values, preferences, needs, and inspirations of their followers from self-interest to collective interests. The concept of charismatic leadership exhibits values such as emotional attachment to the leaders, motivational and emotional arousal of followers, and improvement of follower self esteem confidence, and trust in the leader. Despite the lack of motivational explanations on the effects of such leaders, research indicates effects of charismatic leaders on the attitudes, performance, and the satisfaction of followers.

In this regard, therefore, the study suggests that charismatic leaders motivate their followers in a number of ways. The theory puts forward has four parts, which are, the behavior of the leader, the effects on the self-concepts of the followers, further effects on the followers and motivational processes because of the leaders behavior. In essence, charismatic leaders achieve transformational effects on their followers by implicating the self-concept of the followers. This is achieved through increasing the intrinsic value of effort, increasing the expectancies of effort accomplishments, instilling assurance in a better future, creating individual commitment, and improving the inherent valence of goal attainment.

Moreover, two categories of leadership behavior activate these motivational processes: role modeling, which involves the representative character of the leader, and frame alignment that refers to the linkage of both the leaders and followers interpretive orientations. In essence, the theory on charismatic leaders uniquely uses the behavior of the leader to activate self-concepts, which subsequently affect further motivational mechanisms. Although the theory in support of charismatic leaders is speculative, the study acknowledges contemporary theories of charismatic leadership, which warrants the explanations, and accounts for the insightful effects of prior charismatic leadership behaviors.