TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP OR EFFECTIVE MANAGERIAL PRACTICES

Over the past several years, much attention has been given to Bass and Avolio's notion of transformational leadership. However, there are st riking similarities between Bass and Avolio's conceptualization and se veral fundamental managerial practices. To examine this concern, we co nducted a study that compared the transformational leadership scales f rom Bass and Avolio's Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) with four scales from Yukl's Managerial Practices Survey (MPS). The results provided mixed support for the distinctiveness of the MLQ. A confirma tory factor analysis supported a distinction between the underlying co nstructs measured by the MLQ and MPS scales. In addition, a composite measure of transformational leadership did account for a significant p roportion of variance in ratings of leader effectiveness, beyond that accounted for by the MPS scales. However, the proposed dimensionality of the MLQ was not supported, and the MLQ scales were highly related t o the MPS scales.