Volume 19 Number 5 2000

Women Civil Servants and Transformational Leadership in Bangladesh

by Pauline Amos-Wilson Pauline Amos-Wilson is Principal Lecturer in Management Studies/UNDP Consultant, Oxford Brookes University, Business School, Wheatley Campus, Wheatley, Oxford OX33 1HX, England. Introduction During the past decade much research has been conducted in order to determine whether men and women manage and lead in different ways within organisations. Very often such research has been conducted in Western business organisations, but an increasing amount is now concerned with both non-western and public sector institutions. Generally speaking researchers have often claimed that their results demonstrate a number of gender differences, but, in particular, the tendency for women to lead or manage others in transformational ways and men to lead or manage in transactional ways has been alleged. Further it has been claimed that such different styles have organisational implications, and implied that womens styles are more suited to modern organisational needs. (Bass et al., 1996; Gibson, 1995; Smith and Smits, 1994; Lee, 1994; Konek, 1994; Duerst-Lahti and Kelly, 1994; Baack et al., 1993; Bourantas and Papalexandris, 1990; Powell, 1993; Rosener, 1990; Eagly & Johnson, 1990; Fagenson, 1990; Brenner et. al., 1989). This article explores the issues of women and leadership style in a context that is neither commercial nor western. It describes and discusses research that was undertaken with forty-nine women from the Civil Service of Bangladesh to determine their perceptions of their own leadership behaviour. It also assumes that these perceptions are likely to lead to the adoption by the individual of either a predominantly transformational or transactional leadership behviour style. Issues of Gender and Leadership Style Feminist leadership theory in the 1970s often focused on the similarities between male and female leadership values. The notion was that women would have to become equal to men through cultivating characteristics of male culture. In other words, in order to succeed in organisations women should be like men (Hennig and Jardim, 1977; Trahey 1977). Subsequent writers taking the cultural feminism perspective increasingly identified distinctive womens values that would not only make positive contributions at work, but would, they believed, ultimately transform society (Gilligan, 1982; Fergusen, 1984; Morgan, 1989; Ruddick, 1989). Such positions gave rise to increasing numbers of studies concerning womens special contribution and an aspect of this has been research into women and leadership style.

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In much of the literature now concerning issues of gender and organisational leadership style it is claimed that women have a tendency to nurture others, to have highly developed communication skills and to be concerned to maintain positive relationships. These have come to be described as transformational (Alimo-Metcalfe 1998; Konek 1994; Lee 1994; Ferrario and Davidson, 1991; Bass, 1990; Chowdorow, 1985; Rosener, 1990; Jago and Vroom, 1982; Marshall, 1984; Davidson and Cooper, 1993). There is also the suggestion that men tend to be, in Bakans (1966) term, agentic, that is more concerned with transactional relationships with subordinates where the use of rewards and sanctions characterises the relationship. Rosener found in her study that men tend to see the leader-subordinate relationship as one of transactions, where leaders are engaged in exchanging rewards for services rendered or punishment for inadequate performance (1990,p.210). As such they engage in transactional leadership, using constructive power, described as power over by Konek (1994) drawing on Burns (1979), and May (1989). Although other studies emphasise that key issues do not concern biological sex but rather sets of masculine and feminine characteristics, which members of either sex may possess. (Bem, 1974); (Brenner et.al., 1989); (Kent and Moss, 1994) in many cases it has been assumed that female (biological sex) leadership style is the same as exhibition of feminine characteristics and male (biological sex) leadership is the same as the exhibition masculine characteristics (Dubinsky et.al., 1996); (Smith and Smits, 1994). Both positions have been taken up in the study of organisations. Although it is not necessarily believed that all women behave in one way with respect to leadership, all men in another, there is still sufficient of a distinction made that enables statements such as most women tend to engage in feminine leadership, and most men in masculine leadership. The opportunity for a study which considers women in leadership in a context which was neither commercial nor western arose with senior women employed in the Bangladeshi Civil Service. These women were somewhat distant from western theories of leadership, indeed they became available to the study because they were taking part in leadership development programmes that had two aims. These were the introduction of western concepts into the reform of the Bangladeshi public service and the development of women in the Bangladesh Civil Service for leadership roles. Research Methodology Before the training programme commenced a questionnaire was administered to the forty-nine women taking part in it to determine whether they tended to hold transformational attitudes towards leadership in their workplace. These women were selected from the entire Civil Service as the most likely to benefit from the training provided within the programme, on the basis of seniority/length of service and English language proficiency. Seniority and length of service were virtually the same, as promotions hitherto in the Bangladeshi Civil Service had been determined by length of service. In summary the sample comprised, in the most senior grade among the women selected, 13 women who had 13 years experience; in the middle grade 28 women who had 10 years experience, and in the junior grade eight women, with seven years experience. These latter, despite relative lack of seniority were selected because they were considered to be rising stars. The women represented a variety

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of departments of the Civil Service, which in Bangladesh extends to local administration and were not only to be found in stereotypically womens ministries. Hence some worked in Defence, Finance and Telecommunications. They were all professional administrators, not technical specialists. The questionnaire drew upon a 35 item five point Likert scale devised and validated by Konek (1994). Transformational leadership style in this attitude questionnaire is defined along three dimensions, leadership aspirations (LA), social responsibility (SR) and professional enhancement (PE). Eighteen items on the questionnaire refer to LA, eleven refer to SR and six to PE. Respondents are asked to state whether they completely disagree/partially disagree/are neutral/partially agree or completely agree with the 35 items. Agreeing or completely agreeing with the statement indicates attitudes favouring a transformational leadership style. It was thought appropriate to administer the questionnaire face-to-face in this case because although all the women spoke English it was useful to be on hand to explain the terms used. Results The null hypothesis for this inventory is that responses would be normally distributed. It was found that on each of the three dimensions most respondents indicated that they partially agreed or completely agreed, that is, the distribution was skewed. Applying a one sample sign test for the median to this distribution indicated that there was no level of significance and thus this distribution could not have occurred by chance. Clearly respondents favoured those attitudes indicative of transformational leadership, along all three dimensions. In addition the question was posed as to whether seniority level, senior, middle, and junior, had any relationship with attitudes concerning transformational leadership. A Kruskal-Wallis test was applied to the data and it was found that there were no significant differences between the distributions for each grade level. Thus grade level was not related to attitudes towards transformational leadership. Discussion These Bangladeshi women civil servants did hold attitudes that suggest that they might be more likely to lead in a transformational rather than transactional style. If they had been ambivalent about this then the distribution of responses could reasonably be expected to be evenly distributed. If transactional style was favoured then responses disagreeing with the statements would be higher. However, the questionnaire concerned attitudes, not behaviour so of further interest is whether these Civil Servants were able to express transformational attitudes in their work behaviour. As a result of this analysis some further observational work was undertaken in Bangladesh where seven of the 49 respondents were shadowed in their work for a day. Although this provides only a snapshot what was apparent from this experience was that on occasion the women used a more transactional style than the one which they espoused. To some extent this was dictated by the bureaucratic structures of their employment, particularly in the office. Thus, for example, they were observed to threaten some subordinates, along the lines of you had better do this again or next time I come here I want to see this office tidy. Once out in the district, visiting field stations or villages, matters were somewhat different. Here the individuals concerned, two Deputy District Officers, and five magistrates questioned their sub-

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ordinates closely about what resources were needed to complete tasks satisfactorily, and what extra training staff might need. In their interactions with the general public which was a significant part of their role, they also tended to exhibit a considerate and supportive role. For example, in one village visited, where there had been some difficulties in water supply, and where the older women tended to remain secluded, a gentle encouragement from the Deputy District Officer enabled these women to discuss openly with the visitors, including the author the problems they were experiencing. Perhaps not too much should be read into these limited observational data for it has seldom been claimed in the literature concerning transformational and transactional leadership that individuals always operate exclusively in one way or another. What is of interest here is why the women surveyed seemed to value transformational approaches as expressed in their attitudes? One answer might be that they thought it was the right and modern approach to take. However the group had had little access to recent management practice or literature from the West. Aspects of the Bangladesh Civil Service were still located in 1940s British Empire administrative culture, promotion on seniority being a case in point. A second answer however might be found in the generalised role of women in Bangladeshi society, and the particular position of highly educated women within this. Although a lesser developed economy, education is available to a greater number of women their than in some other states with a comparable degree of economic development. Wealthier women certainly have access to high levels of education and are to be found in a range of disciplines. Employment however is not so easy to come by. In recent years more women have entered the Civil Service and some are now focusing on the development of a career within that employment (Kahn, 1992). They are however, for the most part, without female role models in post. They are familiar with the role behaviour of senior male officers, but, it is by no means clear that these exhibit transformational leadership styles to any great extent, in fact it is rather the opposite. Having inherited a system of imperial rule overlaying indigenous bureaucratic structures of government this should not be surprising. Imperial rule was in essence modelled on army organisational precepts, with the emphasis on power over. In order to elucidate this somewhat unexpected result, of preference for transformational style among Civil Servants, albeit women, the results of the questionnaire were fed back to the participants and a round table discussion ensued on the implications of the findings. On being probed about how each individual decided to act in certain ways that demanded leadership in the job, no clear information was forthcoming. Many claimed it was just common sense but it was not obvious where such common sense came from. Further discussion produced the view that such a leadership style was natural to women, deriving in part from their particular upbringing. The women who took part in the study were atypical of the Bangladeshi female population. Unlike the vast majority of Bangladeshi women they were brought up in comparatively comfortable surroundings, with servants to perform many of the family domestic chores. As children they had ayahs (nannies) and other servants on-call. Although society has changed in Bangladesh since their youth, most of this group currently employ servants to help in household chores. However oversight of the housework was not and is not the only role of Bangladeshi women of this class in

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the family. As elsewhere, even where servants are employed, mothers are responsible for family care, in short, for reproductive work. Thus attitudes of care for others and nurturing are inculcated in the Bangladeshi woman, just as much as they are elsewhere. In the absence of an occupational role model, then a model from family life might well serve. Thus a woman looks after the development of others in the home and in the workplace. This is in contrast to the role of the male head of the family, which includes the extended family. He is expected to have power over others, and to be transactional in his relationships in the home. This too is transferred to the workplace. While it is probably no bad thing that this group of women are able to engage in transformational leadership most commentators agree and research has found that a balance of styles between transformational and transactional are necessary for effective leadership within organisations (Bass, 1998; Burns, 1979). It may well be the case that many women feel uncomfortable or unable to act in a transactional way, preferring at home to leave it to the male heads of household and in the workplace to their male colleagues. It is easy to imagine an inner conflict where the tendency towards nurturance and support, whether learned or innate encounters the need to sanction. In studies of what women would like to develop in the way of personal leadership qualities, and on training programmes, increase in confidence is frequently stated (Amos-Wilson 1995; Fritchie, 1981; Larwood and Kaplan 1980). This was certainly the case with this group. Such confidence is related to the capacity to take hard decisions, to feed back to subordinates who are performing badly, and to indicate what the penalties will be if there is no improvement. In the case of the Civil Service in Bangladesh senior women officers are far more likely than their male equivalent to meet with insubordination. Male and female clerks will not always do what the officer requests, they do not take women senior managers seriously and an officer needs the confidence to deal with this effectively. Although the use of a transformational style can lead to a change in behaviour in insubordinate individuals it is not always successful and thus at the round table discussion it was agreed that the participants would experiment, on selected occasions, with a more transactional style than they would normally use. Systematic reports back on these experiments, to take place over a six month period, are not yet available, but informal indications are that individuals are more confident in dealing with insubordination and are suffering fewer instances. Concluding Remarks The project reported here has applied the concepts of transformational and transactional leadership in a non-western non-commercial context and the results reinforce the view that women tend to want to operate in a transformational way, as found elsewhere. Suggestions as to why this might be the case in this particular example have been put forward. Also commented on were the drawbacks to engaging in one style predominantly, together with a mechanism for changing this if necessary, which is in progress among the group surveyed. As such the research adds a small part to knowledge about leadership style and contributes to the continuing debate concerning gender difference in this field. As stated above, to date work undertaken in a western context has tended to indicate that gender difference exists. The results reported here indicate that this might also be the case in a non-western context and

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this must give rise to speculation about whether what is emerging is a universal characteristic of leadership.

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References Alimo-Metcalfe, B., 1998, Are there gender and cultural differences in constructs of transformational leadership? Symposium paper 24th International Congress of Applied Psychology, San Francisco, August 9-14. Amos-Wilson, P.M., 1995, Management training for women - what the West forgot? Public Administration and Development, vol. 15, pp.167-178. Baack, J., Carr Ruffino, N., Pelletier, M. 1993, Making it to the top: specific leadership skills and a comparison of male and female perceptions of skills needed by women and men managers, Women in Management Review, Vol. 8 (2), pp.17-23. Bakan, A., 1966 in The Duality of Human existence: Isolation and communication in western man, Boston, MA : Rand McNally. Bass, B.M., 1990, Handbook of Leadership. New York, Free Press. __________, 1998, Transformational Leadership, London, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Bass, B.M., Alvolio, B.J., Atwater, L., 1996, The transformational and transactional leadership of men and women, Applied Psychology: An International Review, 45 (1), pp.5-34. Belenky, M.F., Clinchy, B.M., Goldberger, N.R., and Tarule, J.M., 1986, Womens ways of knowing: The development of self, voice and mind, New York, Basic Books. Bem,S.L., 1974, The measurement of psychological androgyny, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 42, pp.155-162. Brenner, O.C., Tomkiewicz, J., Schein, V., 1989, The relationship between sex-role stereotypes and requisite management characteristics revisited, Academy of Management Journal, 32, pp.662-669. Burns, J.M., 1979, Leadership, New York, Harper and Row. Bourantas, D., and Papalexandris, N., 1990, Sex differences in leadership, Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. 5, pp.7-10. Chowdorow, N., 1985, Gender, relation and difference in psychoanalytic perspective in Einstein, H.B., and Jardine, A. (eds) The future of difference, New Brunswick, Rutgers University Press. Davidson, M.J., and Cooper, C.L., 1992, Shattering the Glass ceiling; the woman manager, London, Paul Chapman Publishing. Dubinsky, A.J., Comer, L.B., Jolson, M.A., Yammarino, F.J., 1996, How should women managers lead their sales personnel? Journal of Business and Industrial Marketing, Spring, 11 (2), pp.47-59.

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Duerst-Lahti, G. and Kelly, R.M., 1994, Gender, Power, Leadership and Governance, Ann Arbor, Michigan, Michagan University Press. Eagly, A.H., and Johnson, B.T., 1990, Gender and Leadership Style. A metaanalysis, Psychological Bulletin, 108 (2), pp.235-57. Fagensen, E.A., 1990, Perceived masculine and feminine attributes examined as a function of individuals sex and level in the organisational power hierarchy: A test of four theoretical perspectives. Journal of Applied Psychology 75, pp.204-211. Fergusen, E., 1990, The feminist case against bureaucracy, Philadelphia, Temple University Press. Ferrario, M. and Davidson, M.J., 1991, Gender and management styles: a comparative study. Paper presented at the British Academy of Management Conference, University of Bath. Fritchie, R., 1981, Women into Management, Development Digest No. 5, Gloucester, Food Drink and Tobacco Industry Training Board. Gibson, A., 1995, An investigation of gender difference in leadership across four countries. Journal of International Business Studies, Summer, Vol. 26 No. 2, pp.255-80. Gilligan, C., 1982, In a different voice: psychological theory and womens development, Harvard University Press. Goktepe, J.R. and Schneir, C.E., 1989, The role of sex, gender roles and attraction in predicting emergent leaders, Journal of Applied Psychology, 74, pp.165-167. Hennig, M. and Jardim, A., 1977, The managerial woman, New York, Doubleday. Jago, A.G. and Vroom, V.H., 1982, Sex differences in the incidence and evaluation of participative leader behaviour, Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 67, pp.77683. Kahn, S., 1992, The fifty per-cent, Dhaka Publishers, Dhaka, Bangladesh. Konek, C.W., 1994, Leadership or Empowerment in Konek, C.W. and Kitch, S.L. (eds.) Women and Careers, Issues and Challenges, London, Sage. Kent, R.L., and Moss, S.E., 1994, Effects of sex and gender role on leader emergence, Academy of Management Journal, 37, pp.1335-1346. Larwood, L. and Kaplan, M., 1980, Job tactics of women in banking, Group and Organisation Studies, Vol. 5(1), pp.70-79. Lee, C., 1994, The feminization of management.Training, November, Vol. 31 No. 11, pp.25-31. Marshall, J., 1984, Woman managers, travellers in a male world, Chichester, Wiley.

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May, R,. 1989, Power and Innocence; a search for the sources of violence, New York, Norton. Morgan, R., 1989, The demon lover: On the sexuality of terrorism, New York, Norton. Powell, G.N., 1993, Women and men in management (2nd ed.), Newbury Park, CA, Sage. Rosener, J.B., 1990, Ways Women Lead, Harvard Business Review, November/December, pp.119-25. Ruddick, S., 1989, Maternal thinking towards a politics of peace, Boston, Beacon. Smith, P.L. and Smits, S.J., 1994, The feminization of leadership? Training and Development, February, Vol. 48 No. 2, pp.43-46. Trahey, J., 1977, On women and power, New York, Rawson associates.

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