Transformational Leadership Style and Its Influence on Performance of Judicial Staff in Kenya

A Dissertation Report Submitted to the Chandra School of Business in partial fulfillment of the Requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Business Administration (DBA)The purpose of the study was to analyze the influence of transformational leadership style on the performance of judicial staff in Kenya. The research questions were: How does idealized influence of judicial officers influence the performance of judicial staff in Kenya? How does inspirational motivation of judicial officers influence the performance of judicial staff in Kenya? How does intellectual stimulation of judicial officers influence the performance of judicial staff in Kenya? How does individualized consideration of judicial officers influence the performance of judicial staff in Kenya? To what extent does organizational structure moderate the relationship between transformational leadership style and the performance of judicial staff in Kenya? The study philosophy was positivist. Descriptive correlation research design was used to conduct the study. The target population of the study consisted of 770 judicial staff in Nairobi County. The study used stratified random sampling technique to select a sample of 385 judicial staff from the target population. The research instrument for collecting data was a structured questionnaire. Out of the total sampled respondents, 312 returned dully-filled questionnaire representing a response rate of 81%.Bivariate correlations were used to establish the relationship between variables, while one way ANOVA was used to test the differences between group means. Multiple linear regression analysis was used to test hypotheses for the five variables. SPSS version 23 (2015) was used as a tool for data analysis, and results presented in tables and figures. Correlation analysis revealed the existence of positive and significant relationships between performance of judicial staff and individualized consideration, r (312) = .678, p<.05; intellectual stimulation, r (312) =.665, p<.05; idealized influence r (312) = .621, p<.05; and inspiration motivation r (312) =.534, p<.05. Analysis of variance revealed that there was statistically significant difference between the means of the four independent variables. The null hypotheses for the four independent variables were rejected based on the regression results i.e., individualized consideration (R2=.719, F (1,310) = 641.285, p<.05); intellectual stimulation ;(R2=.642, F (1,310) = 552.207, p<.05); idealized influence (R2=.859, F (1,310) = 411.847, p<.05); and lastly inspiration motivation, (R2=.460, F (1,310) = 264.407, p<.05). Regression analysis revealed that all the four independent variables positively and significantly predicted the performance of judicial staff i.e. individualized consideration, β =0.828, t(311) =25.32, p<.05, followed by vi intellectual stimulation, β =.814, t(311) = 23.50, p<.05, then idealized influence β =.762, t(311) = 16.26, p< .05, and lastly inspiration motivation, β =.734, t(311) = 16.26, p< .05. The implication was that an increase in any of the independent variables would result into an improvement on the performance of judicial staff by a factor equivalent to the respective β-value. The study concluded that idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration positively and significantly influence the performance of judicial staff. The study established that organization structure positively moderated the relationship between transformational leadership style and the performance of judicial staff. The study concluded that transformational leadership style significantly influences the performance of judicial staff in Kenya. The study recommends that judicial officers should act in ways that inspire admiration and respect, and make judicial staff have complete trust in them. Judicial officers should communicate optimistically on the tasks that need to be accomplished, inspire confidence, and help judicial staff find meaning in their work. The study recommends that further research should be carried out on the moderating effect of organizational culture on the influence of transformational leadership style on performance of judicial staff