Joint effects of shared and transformational leadership on performance in street‐level bureaucracies: Evidence from the educational sector

Abstract

Recent theories of public administration emphasize the importance of leadership as shared property. This research focuses on the role of the interaction between vertical and shared leadership in promoting agency performance. Specifically, it examines the joint effects of shared leadership and transformational leadership on team empowerment and performance in public settings. Based on field study data collected from 74 street-level bureaucracies and 423 public servants in Brazil, we find evidence that vertical transformational leadership strengthens the direct relationship between shared leadership and team empowerment as well as the indirect relationship between shared leadership and school performance through team empowerment (a moderated-mediation model). The findings of this study suggest that greater attention should be paid to the dynamics of shared and vertical leadership structures to better understand their consequences for team processes and outcomes in public settings. Evidence for Practice• Agencies with higher levels of shared leadership performed significantly better due to an increased sense of empowerment among employees. • Public managers enhanced the effects of shared leadership on agency performance by demonstrating transformational leadership. • To harness the potential of shared leadership in the public sector, organizations should introduce managerial training that develops transformational leaders who offer clear vision, motivate, and inspire employees.

The role and influencing factors of government performance evaluation: A test of Chinese public officials’ perceptions in Gaoming district

“…However, our test indicates that differences in the nature of departments have no significant influence on officials’ perceptions of the role of government performance evaluation. One possible explanation for this finding is that all public officials belong to a bureaucratic system that requires them to act as “implementers” and strictly follow orders from their superiors and organizations (Lagowska et al, 2022; Evans, 2018; Wang et al, 2019). They carry out organizational tasks on their own initiative and tend to have a similar attitude toward the tasks assigned to them (Lan et al, 2018).…”

“…More broadly, street-level bureaucrats (front-line workers) operate in different working conditions compared to typical public officials (Løberg, 2023). Street-level bureaucrats have direct interaction with citizens and possess substantial discretionary power in policy implementation (Lagowska et al, 2022; Ye & Ma, 2003). However, their performance evaluation methods have not been differentiated or specialized concerning different departments.…”

“…Wilson's (1995) analysis of types of bureaucratic organizations and their complexities indicates that the public sector is not unbreakable. Assessing all the different departments uniformly fails to take into account the diversity among them (Lagowska et al, 2022;Yu & Ma, 2015). The inappropriateness of judging varied departments by the same measures is evident when one considers, for example, the differences between law enforcement, and non-law enforcement, or between departments that interact frequently with the public and those that do not (Jakobsen et al, 2019).…”

The performance function in local government: Does location impact performance data use?

“…We are recommending, as stated previously, that local officials ensure that placing the performance function within the budget office does not impede the fundamental drivers of performance data use as confirmed in this study. Part of this effort would comprise strategies to evolve the budget office from a more mechanistic structure of predictability and control to a more organic structure of flexibility and adaptability (Hatch, 2006), which would include shared and transformational leadership (Backhaus & Vogel, 2022; Lagowska et al, 2022) and trust (Zhang et al, 2022). As recommended by Moynihan et al (2020), public managers must engage professional employees who understand the causes of organizational performance.…”

Epistemic decolonization of public policy pedagogy and scholarship

“…They find that experienced but newly‐appointed, minority leaders tend to visit cities with experienced white or female leaders; policy tourism is pursued by cities embedded in complex and turbulent environments; and cities tend to learn from peers with higher economic prosperity. Lagowska et al (2022) use field study data collected from 74 street‐level bureaucracies in Brazil to examine the joint effects of shared leadership and transformational leadership on team empowerment and performance in public settings. They find evidence that vertical transformational leadership strengthens the direct relationship between shared leadership and team empowerment as well as the indirect relationship between shared leadership and school performance through team empowerment.…”