Impact of Leadership Styles on Employees' Work Performance in Some South-Western Nigerian Private Universities

Abstract

This study examined the impact of leadership styles on employees’ work performance in some selected South-western Nigerian private Universities. For employees’ to perform at their utmost best, Universities need leaders who can adapt to different situations and possess various leadership styles that fit in every situation and at any given point in time. Purposive sampling technique was adopted in selecting 10 private universities majorly in Ondo, Ekiti and Osun state respectively out of the 36 private universities in south–west, Nigeria. To measure transformational, transactional and laissez-faire leadership styles, a subordinate’s perception of his/her superior’s leadership style was collected by reviewing Multi-factor leadership questionnaire (MLQ-Form 5X) by Bass and Avolio, (2000). The researchers personally designed questions to measure the impact of autocratic leadership style. Data collected were analysed based on descriptive analyses of demographic information. The four hypotheses presumed for this study were tested using linear regression and Pearson correlation. All the hypotheses are examined at 0.01 and 0.05 alpha levels of significance. The study concluded that Universities driven by the desire to achieve better performance from his/her employees should try to exhibit more of transformational and transactional leadership styles and less of laissez-faire and autocratic leadership styles. This study recommends that good and effective leadership style is what Universities need to survive in this competitive and hostile business environment. Therefore, Universities should implement leadership training and development programmes in order to meet the essential knowledge and skills necessary in developing the leadership capabilities of employees.