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Meta‐analytic evidence exists that the numerical dominance of one gender group among employees can affect the behaviour of female and male leaders. The purpose of this paper is to hypothesis that leaders will show more transformational behaviour when they hold a minority status. Transformational behaviour might help to mitigate discrepancies between male leaders' gender and the feminine context, as well as between female leaders' gender and the masculine leadership role.

N₁=455 team members answered questionnaires about their work satisfaction and their team leaders' transformational leadership, whilst N₂=142 team leaders answered questions regarding their teams' goal fulfillment.

Female and male leaders are rated more transformational in economic sectors and working groups where they hold a minority status. The paper finds a positive interrelation between transformational leadership and followers' work satisfaction for male leaders, but not for female leaders.

Future research should compare female and male leaders from extremely gender‐typed economic sectors and from higher levels of the organisational hierarchy. This would provide evidence whether the findings could be generalised to other samples.

The findings point to the potential advantage of being a high‐transformational male leader in female‐dominated contexts. Irrespective of the numerical dominance of one gender group, followers of low‐transformational female leaders are more satisfied than those of low‐transformational male leaders.

The paper uses sector‐level (gender‐typicality of economic sectors) as well as group‐level data (gender‐composition of working groups) to account for the numerical dominance of female and male employees.

This paper aims to provide insights into the female transformational leadership behaviours within a socially dynamic environment. Research was conducted in the State of Qatar, a country that is going through a rapid social change.

The research framework was based on the transformational leadership framework (TLF) initially proposed by Burns (1978) and further developed by Bass (1985). A respondent set, consisting of 25 Qatari female managers, was taken from the largest public university in the State of Qatar. In-depth interviews were the main source of collected data. The data were analysed using NVivo 11.

Predominantly, Qatari female leadership behaviours were reflective of transformational leadership. In their dealings, Qatari female managers displayed motherly instincts, encouraged open communication, used relationship adaptations and used trust. From time to time, Qatari female managers displayed non-transformational leadership behaviours. This occasional leadership style switch was part of behavioural flexibility that was required in a mixed age, mixed gender, mixed experience and mixed nationalities work environment. The key reason for the change in transformational leadership approach came as a reaction to subordinates’ attitude. In particular, the male-dominated work environment required behavioural adjustments (such as being more assertive and autocratic) to deal with masculine subordinates.

A range of respondent perceptions were related to defining leadership. There was some overlapping between the tested determinants. For example, idealised influence and individualised consideration shared a degree of similarity in terms of how they were perceived.

Socially dynamic environment should be seen as an opportunity for female transformational leadership development. Social dynamism may result in an evolved TLF that could be more appropriate for Qatari organisations. Hence, experience and problem sharing between Qatari female managers may help in developing a socially and culturally fitting transformational leadership model.

The study presented a perspective of a socially dynamic environment where women were practicing transformational leadership primarily through behavioural flexibility and change management. The study suggests an extended version of TLF that would be more suitable for female leadership within a socially dynamic environment.

The purpose of this study is to investigate gender differences in transformational leadership and social exchange outcomes in public primary schools in Tehran, Iran.

A total number of 400 teachers and 77 principals completed questionnaires. Multivariate analysis of variance was performed to determine gender differences in transformational leadership dimensions including idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration. Also, multiple regression was used to identify the impact of dimensions on three social exchange outcomes including procedural justice, trust in principal, and organizational citizenship behaviors of teachers.

Results showed that female principals as compared to male principals obtained significantly higher scores on transformational leadership dimensions and the greater amount of transformational behaviors displayed by them has accompanied with the greater prediction of social exchange outcomes.

This study suggests that there are some benefits associated with having female principals and schools could particularly benefit from developing principal training programs that focus on developing female principals qualities. Some following limitations could be avoided in future research: only relying on teacher rating of principal, possible effect of the teacher's gender on the relationship of transformational leadership with social exchange outcomes, and principal‐teacher gender mach limitation in rating principals.

Given the limited studies conducted on gender differences in transformational leadership and social exchange outcomes in schools and in Iran, this study provides empirical insights and extends this line of inquiry in public schools. This study confirms the results of previous studies which they have found females as more transformational than male counterparts and also provides new finding surrounding social exchange outcomes. These results could be influential in encouraging Iranian policy makers to further acknowledge women administration in public schools.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of gender on the effectiveness of transformational leadership. Drawing on role congruity theory, it elucidates the moderating effects of leader gender, subordinate gender, and leader-subordinate gender dyad on the relationship between transformational leadership and psychological empowerment.

Employees of companies in Korea responded to a paper-pencil survey, rating their psychological empowerment and leadership behaviors of their direct leader on a five-point Likert-type scale. The analysis includes 339 responses.

The results indicate that a leader’s gender has no significant moderating effect on psychological empowerment, but the gender of the subordinate has a significant moderating effect, with male subordinates more strongly influenced by transformational leadership than female subordinates. Notably, the findings show that the effectiveness of transformational leadership is contingent on the leader-subordinate gender dyad. Specifically, transformational leadership has as significant an effect on female leader-male subordinate dyads as on male leader-male subordinate dyads.

This study contributes to leadership and gender studies in the management field by investigating the effect of gender roles on the effectiveness of transformational leadership. Future research should extend this study and explore whether these findings are generalizable.

The remarkable finding of the effect of female leadership on employee empowerment suggests organizations should use more female leaders.

This is the first empirical study to shed light on gender issues in relation to transformational leadership in Korea.

The focus of this paper is on the effects of transformational/charismatic leadership and feedback on the occupational self‐efficacy (OCCSEFF) of male and female managers. Given that transformational/charismatic leadership fits the female role better than other leadership styles, it seems likely that female leaders benefit from leading transformationally. However, the feedback they receive may not reflect their actual leadership behaviour and, thus, transformational leadership may not enhance female leaders’ self‐efficacy.

The results of three different studies are reported.

Results indicate that women prefer charismatic leadership and that charismatic leadership is rated more female than male. The feedback female and male leaders receive, however, does not differ. There is a moderating effect of gender on the relationship between individualized consideration and OCCSEFF but none on the relationship between feedback and OCCSEFF.

Sample sizes are in part relatively small.

Female leaders seem not to gain from leading transformationally. More feedback in that direction may help to overcome this problem.

This paper contributes to the discussion of female leadership. In contrast to other work, it highlights the consequences for women themselves.

This research aims to examine the indirect relationship between feminine traits and employee contextual performance through transformational leadership. Additionally, it explored the role of leaders’ sex in moderating the relationship between feminine traits and transformational leadership through a moderated mediation model that subsequently influences employee contextual performance.

This study tested and validated the moderated mediation model using a two-wave survey with 295 samples. Bootstrapping was adopted for model testing.

The results indicated that leaders’ sex moderated the relationship between feminine traits and employee contextual performance through transformational leadership, such that the indirect effect was stronger for female leaders than for male leaders.

Female leaders can improve employee contextual performance by demonstrating transformational leadership with feminine traits. Organizations must implement measures (i.e. training) to promote the acceptance and application of leader gender and gender-role trait diversity, reduce the prevalence of gender stereotypes and help leaders benefit from learning and implementing the effective combination of leadership and feminine traits.

The study demonstrated the joint effects of leaders’ sex (difference) and gender-role traits on employee contextual performance through transformational leadership. These results provide female leaders with feminine traits to gain a leadership advantage and an in-depth understanding of role congruity theory from the perspective of leadership effectiveness.

This study focuses on gender differences in the relationship between transformational leadership and leader's occupational self‐efficacy. The aim is to explain how female and male leaders develop their self‐efficacy. This knowledge is important for leaders as well as organizations (e.g. human resources departments).

A total of 58 leaders were asked to indicate their transformational leadership as well as their occupational self‐efficacy, and 113 followers to indicate these leaders' transformational leadership. Hypotheses were examined using regression analyses.

We found no significant relationship between self‐rated transformational leadership and occupational self‐efficacy for women, although we did find a positive relationship for men. No interaction effect with respect to leaders' occupational self‐efficacy could be found between leaders' gender and follower‐rated transformational leadership.

Whereas the relationship between transformational leadership and occupational self‐efficacy was examined for men and women, we could not examine the processes that lead to the differences.

Knowing that female and male leaders differ in the relationship between transformational leadership and occupational self‐efficacy can help organizations to seek ways to build up their occupational self‐efficacy. This is especially important when considering that occupational self‐efficacy is related to performance in organizations.

The paper employs both leader and follower evaluations on leaders' transformational leadership to explore the relationship between transformational leadership and occupational self‐efficacy. The paper sheds light on the different processes involved in establishing occupational self‐efficacy.

To promote gender equality, world leaders at the UN came up with Sustainable Development Goal 5 (SDG5). It proposes to eliminate discrimination against women by providing them with similar opportunities for reaching leadership positions. Hence, this study aims to examine the contribution made by women transformational leaders to their employees’ performance. The study seeks to emphasize the role played by female leaders in the on-job performance of employees and their mental well-being by encouraging intrinsic motivation among them.

For the purpose of data collection, a questionnaire was sent through Google Forms to the employees who had females as their superiors or in the decision-making position. Data from a final sample of 517 respondents was gathered, on which SEM was applied to analyze the direct impact of transformational women’s leadership on employee performance and the indirect impact through the mediation of intrinsic motivation.

The study found that by having feminine traits, women are stronger transformational leaders as they encourage individuals to be self-motivated instead of getting stimulated because of some external incentive. Also, such a leadership style ensures better work performance and mentally healthier employees. In addition, transformational women's leadership creates a better work environment by inspiring a teamwork culture instead of individualism.

The study has implications for not just researchers but other stakeholders as well. The study is useful for organizations as it directs them to hire and promote more women for leadership positions. Also, the results hint that people prefer working for women-led organizations as it will ensure a healthier work atmosphere.

There are many studies from earlier times related to transformational leadership. However, female leadership and the role it plays for employees have not gotten their fair share of attention. Thus, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, the present work is one of the very few where contributions made by women transformational leaders have been assessed.

This paper aims to deal with a study aimed at clarifying the relationship between the dimensions of the perceived transformational leadership style and work motivation in a sample of female employees.

A total of 168 Lithuanian employees participated in the empirical study. Work motivation was assessed using the work extrinsic and intrinsic motivation scale (Tremblay et al., 2009). The perceived transformational leadership style was assessed with the help of the transformational leadership inventory (Podsakoff et al., 1990).

The results revealed that both intrinsic and extrinsic work motivation of female employees was enhanced when the leader was perceived as a person articulating the vision of the future, providing an appropriate role model, fostering the acceptance of group goals and applying intellectual stimulation. High-performance expectations of the transformational leader lead to an increased level of women’s extrinsic motivation.

This study contributes to the limited empirical research into the role of discrete dimensions of transformational leadership in determining both intrinsic and extrinsic work motivation of female employees.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze whether German male and female leaders differ in their leadership behavior, focusing on transactional vs transformational leadership styles.

A field study in which followers were asked to evaluate their respective leaders was conducted in three different organizational contexts in Germany using questionnaires: a recreational sports club (n = 183), a government agency (n = 267), and a public transport services company (n = 203). Additionally, students (n = 518) were asked to evaluate historical world‐class leaders in terms of their leadership styles after a standardized presentation of their life and leadership style using biographies, essays, and movies.

Results in all four samples show that female leaders were perceived as exhibiting more transformational leadership behavior than male leaders. Moreover, female leaders were evaluated as more effective and as producing more satisfaction than their male counterparts.

Self‐report data were used and leadership was assessed from the perspective of the followers. Future research should also include leaders' and peers' perspectives.

The finding that women have a more transformational leadership style than men is extended to another cultural context. The importance of analyzing different organizational contexts is highlighted.