Leadership Styles and Organizational Management Outcomes in Educational Institutions: A Thematic Literature Review

Abstract

Leadership is broadly linked to the success of organizations in educational settings, including institutional effectiveness, teacher effectiveness and student outcomes. This literature review is themed and looks into the influence of various leadership styles on organizational management in school, colleges and universities. In-depth literature search of various academic databases yielded the peer-reviewed articles, particularly from the past decade, with some classic theoretical articles. Eight major approaches to leadership were examined: transformational, transactional, democratic, autocratic, servant, distributed, instructional, and laissez-faire. Thematic synthesis identified two leadership styles that showed the highest positive relationships with teacher motivation, organizational commitment, and institutional effectiveness: transformational and distributed leadership. On the other hand, teachers' satisfaction and organizational function tend to be negatively associated with autocratic and laissez-faire leadership styles. Democratic leadership became a flexible and context specific strategy that can be used to effectively meet teachers' psychological and professional needs. The review revealed mediating mechanisms that were deemed as critical for the influence of leadership in terms of organizational commitment, psychological well-being, and professional development. Some of the main issues that hinder successful leadership implementation are lack of acceptance for change, lack of training, lack of decentralization in decision making processes, and lack of resources. The results validate a context-adaptive, integrated leadership approach that incorporates features of various styles, depending on the institutional context and demands, with a focus on teacher well-being as well as institutional effectiveness. Future research needs include longitudinal studies, comparative studies across all education sectors, and research on leadership in new education settings such as digital/computer and online learning environments.

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