Transformational Leadership and Group Climate-Empirical Results from Symphony Orchestras

Abstract

The study investigates the degree to which the conductor's transformational leadership style and a cooperative climate in the orchestra favorably effect the orchestra 's artistic quality. The authors study the assertion that the conductor's transformational leadership style promotes the orchestra s artistic quality only if there is a cooperative climate in the orchestra. An empirical study of 208 musicians from 22 professional German symphony orchestras confirms the assumed interaction effect of the conductor's transformational leadership style and the cooperative climate among the musicians on the orchestra's artistic quality. Conclusions for the effectiveness of transformational leadership in organizations are drawn.

A Critical Assessment of Charismatic—Transformational Leadership Research: Back to the Drawing Board?

“…Climate for innovation was found to moderate the relationship with firm innovation (Jung et al, 2008) and individual adaptive performance (Charbonnier-Voirin et al, 2010), and in interaction with identification with leader creativity (Wang & Rode, 2010). Cooperative climate was found to moderate the relationship with self-rated performance (Boerner & von Streit, 2005), and cohesion with safety climate strength (Luria, 2008). Wang and Walumbwa (2007) found that family-friendly programs moderated relationships with organizational commitment and work withdrawal.…”

Transformational and transactional leadership styles, followers' positive and negative emotions, and performance in German nonprofit orchestras

“…Within nonprofit leadership research, it is not uncommon to draw samples from orchestras (Allmendinger and Hackmann, 1996;Boerner, 2004;Boerner, Krause, and Gebert, 2004;Boerner and von Streit, 2005). For example, Boerner, Krause, and Gebert (2004) explored the effects of directive-charismatic leadership in German orchestras and found that this leadership style was related to the artistic quality of ensemble playing.…”

“…Thus, leaders of these orchestras might be compared to their for-profit counterparts in that they aim at leading their musicians to group goals such as public performance, regular meetings (rehearsals), and high artistic quality. Orchestras represent large, heterogeneous work groups with highly interdependent work tasks (Boerner and von Streit, 2005) that are characteristic of other nonprofit organizations such as the Red Cross. With regard to the German culture, recent research demonstrated little difference between German and U.S. transactional or transformational leadership cultures (Felfe, Tartler, and Liepmann, 2004;Kröger and Tartler, 2002;Rowold, 2005).…”

Evaluation in Music Theater: Empirical Results on Content and Structure of the Audience's Quality Judgment

“…Since the conductor is expected to have a considerable impact on the overall performance quality in opera (Boemer, 2002;Boemer & von Streit, 2005), we included the construct "conductor" in the questionnaire. Moreover, a scale for the construct "overall performance" was developed and added.…”