Transformational

Leadership:
A Quick Start Guide

Growing, Supporting,
and Empowering People
to Amplify Change in
Organizations

2018
 25 NW 23rd Pl
Suite 6314
Portland, OR 97210

Transformational Leadership: A Quick Start Guide:

Growing, Supporting, and Empowering People to
Amplify Change in Organizations

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Preface

In March of this year, we at IT Revolution once again had the pleasure of hosting
leaders and experts from across the technology community at the DevOps Enterprise
Forum in Portland, Oregon. The Forum’s ongoing goal is to create written guidance to
overcome the top obstacles facing the DevOps enterprise community.
Over the years, there has been a broad set of topics covered at the Forum, including
organizational culture and change management, architecture and technical practices,
metrics, integrating and achieving information security and compliance objectives,
creating business cases for automated testing, organizational design, and many more.
As in years past, this year’s topics are relevant to the changing business dynamics we
see happening across all industries and the role technology has to play within those
changes.
At the Forum, as in previous years, participants self-organized into teams, work-
ing on topics that interested them. Each team narrowed their topics so that they could
have a “nearly shippable” artifact by the end of the second day. Watching these teams
collaborate and create their artifacts was truly amazing, and those artifacts became
the core of the Forum papers you see here.
After the Forum concluded, the groups spent the next eight weeks working
together to complete and refine the work they started together. The results can be
found in this year’s collection of Forum papers.
A special thanks goes to Jeff Gallimore, our co-host and partner and co-founder at
Excella, for helping create a structure for the two days to help everyone stay focused
and productive.
IT Revolution is proud to share the outcomes of the hard work, dedication, and col-
laboration of the amazing group of people from the 2018 DevOps Enterprise Forum.
Our hope is that through these papers you will gain valuable insight into DevOps as
a practice.

—Gene Kim
June 2018
Portland, Oregon

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 3

Introduction

At some point in our careers, most of us have likely experienced working for a truly
great leader. How do we know when this happens? When we are truly inspired and feel
like we are able to unleash all of our talent, energy, creativity, and capacity for work.
If you were asked what level of ability and effort that leader got out of you, you would
probably say, “More than 100%!”
Teams and organizations with these kinds of leaders have an advantage. They
perform better, deliver better business results, and in many cases, do truly great and
amazing things. Sometimes we attribute the “secret sauce” of success to technology
or product, but what if a truly strategic advantage originated from the team or orga-
nization’s leadership style?
The characteristics and attributes of “transformational leadership” have been
shown to do just that. Recent research1 has shown the following:

• Organizations and teams with transformational leaders obtain better busi-

ness results.
• Transformational leadership is a predictive factor in software delivery and
organizational performance, with high-performing teams having leaders
with the strongest transformational leadership traits.
• Strong transformational leaders also create a good work climate and culture
for their teams, with their employees reporting the highest employee Net
Promoter Scores.

Said another way, “A transformational leader’s influence is seen through their sup-
port of their teams’ work…The positive (or negative) influence of leadership flows all
the way through to software delivery performance and organizational performance.”2
Thus, transformational leadership becomes both a tactical and strategic asset to an
organization.

1
Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, and Gene Kim, Accelerate: The Science of Lean Software and DevOps—Building and
Scaling High Performing Technology Organizations (Portland, OR: IT Revolution Press, 2018).
2
Forsgren, Humble, and Kim, Accelerate, p. 120.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 4

 If this isn’t enough to convince you, in a 2015 analysis by Gartner they predict that
by 2020 half of the CIOs who have not transformed their teams’ capabilities will be
displaced from their organizations’ digital leadership teams.3
Being a leader, wouldn’t you want that for your team and organization? If you are
driving a DevOps transformation, wouldn’t you like to increase its chance for success?
Leaders generally fall into the following three “maturity states”:

1. The leader already exhibits transformational leadership characteristics but wants

to continue to improve and grow.
2. The leader exhibits behaviors that are counter to transformational leadership prin-
ciples, thereby diminishing the results of the organization.
3. The leader has the desire to improve but is unaware or inadvertently employing
certain behaviors that inhibit the team or individuals in specific ways.

One of the greatest advantages of a transformational leadership style is that it

prioritizes creating an environment and interactions that allow a person to truly
grow. In his seminal article in Harvard Business Review, “How Will You Measure Your
Life?,” The Innovator’s Dilemma author and Harvard Business School professor Clayton
Christensen observed the following:

. . . the powerful motivator in our lives isn’t money; it’s the opportunity to
learn, grow in responsibilities, contribute to others, and be recognized for
achievements. I tell the students about a vision of sorts I had while I was
running the company I founded before becoming an academic.
In my mind’s eye I saw one of my managers leave for work one morn-
ing with a relatively strong level of self-esteem. Then I pictured her driv-
ing home to her family 10 hours later, feeling unappreciated, frustrated,
underutilized, and demeaned. I imagined how profoundly her lowered
self-esteem affected the way she interacted with her children. The vision in
my mind then fast-forwarded to another day, when she drove home with

3
Gartner. Gartner Predicts. 2016. https://www.gartner.com/doc/3165520/predicts--new-technologies-business.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 5

 greater self-esteem—feeling that she had learned a lot, been recognized
for achieving valuable things, and played a significant role in the success of
some important initiatives. I then imagined how positively that affected
her as a spouse and a parent. My conclusion: Management is the most noble
of professions if it’s practiced well. No other occupation offers as many
ways to help others learn and grow, take responsibility and be recognized
for achievement, and contribute to the success of a team.4

The following guide to transformational leadership can help leaders in these differ-
ent states identify behaviors, attributes, and areas for improvement.

Transformational Leadership

Transformational leadership is an approach in which leaders “motivate followers

to achieve performance beyond expectations by transforming followers’ attitudes,
beliefs, and values.”5 Through authentic engagement and persuasion around a shared
vision, leaders coach and mentor their employees to drive toward the common good.
Transformational leaders offer choice and motivate the right behavior by appealing to
their employees’ self-interest. This allows employees the freedom to look for innova-
tive solutions.
Transformational leadership stands in stark contrast against transactional lead-
ership, which rewards employees for “complying with a leader’s wishes. Transactional
leadership encompasses contingent reward and management-by-exception.”6 Trans-
actional leadership is better suited to cultures that prize maintaining the status quo,
depending on preset processes and measurement to drive behavior.
We note that servant leadership is another popular management style. While
there are some similarities between servant and transformational leadership, a key
difference lies in the focus of the leader. Servant leaders focus on their followers’
development and performance, while transformational leaders focus on achieving

4
Clayton M. Christensen, “How Will You Measure Your Life?” Harvard Business Review (July-August 2010).
5
Alannah E. Rafferty and Mark A. Griffin, “Dimensions of Transformational Leadership: Conceptual and Empirical
Extensions,” The Leadership Quarterly 15, no. 3 (2004): 329–354.
6
Rafferty and Griffin, “Dimensions of Transformational Leadership.”

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 6

mission goals while also encouraging and supporting followers’ development and per-
formance. It is this focus on mission goals and outcomes that makes this leadership
style compelling and particularly important in organizations today. Indeed, transfor-
mational leadership has been found to be predictive of performance outcomes, while
servant leadership has less evidence of driving performance outcomes.7

Dimensions of Transformational Leadership

Vision Intellectual Stimulation

• Understands organizational direction • Challenges team status quo
• Understands team direction • Challenges team to constantly ask
• Understands 5-year horizon for team new questions
• Challenges team on basic
assumptions about the work
Inte
Stim llec
on ula t
V isi t
ua n
l
io

Personal Inspirational
a ti o n
m m ir a ti o n al
Recogn

Recognition Communication
P e r s o iti o n

u nic

• Commends team for • Inspires pride in being

na

better-than-average work part of the team

Co nsp
l

• Acknowledges • Says positive things

I

improvement in quality S u p p o rtiv e about the team

of work Le a d ership • Inspires passion and
• Personally compliments motivation; encourages
individuals’ outstanding work people to see that
change brings
opportunities

Supportive Leadership
• Considers others’ personal feelings before acting
• Is thoughtful of others‘ personal needs
• Cares about individuals’ interests

Figure 1: Dimensions of Transformational Leadership

(adapted from the 2017 State of DevOps Report  )

7
Forsgren, Humble, and Kim, Accelerate; Rafferty and Griffin, “Dimensions of Transformational Leadership.”
8
Rafferty and Griffin, “Dimensions of Transformational Leadership.”

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 7

 It is very likely that you may find yourself in a culture or environment that some-
times embraces an encouraging, motivational, transformational leadership style while
at other times exhibiting a leadership style that is very transactional in nature. The
change from transactional leadership to transformational isn’t an immediate one. It
takes time, and some parts of the journey will go faster than others. Measuring your
progress can help you know if you’re moving in the right direction.

Measuring Transformational Leadership

Transformational leadership can be measured. How? By using carefully written and
validated surveys. In their article “Dimensions of Transformational Leadership:
Conceptual and Empirical Extensions,” Rafferty and Griffin provide a great fifteen-item
measurement survey for transformational leadership that is predictive of organiza-
tional outcomes.8 The 2017 State of DevOps Report, conducted by DORA and Puppet,
validated that this model of transformational leadership drove key capabilities in the
context of technology work, which in turn contributed to software delivery and organi-
zational performance.9
So the next question you may be asking yourself is this: How do I rate on this scale
of transformational leadership? Answer the questions in the assessment below (Table
1) to get a quick look at your or your leader’s transformational leadership behaviors.

Transformational Leadership Assessment Instructions

Each aspect of transformational leadership has three questions. Answer each one on
a scale of 1 to 7, where:

• 1 = Strongly disagree • 5 = Slightly agree

• 2 = Disagree • 6 = Agree
• 3 = Slightly disagree • 7 = Strongly agree
• 4 = Neither agree nor disagree,
or neutral

8
Rafferty and Griffin, “Dimensions of Transformational Leadership.”
9
Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble, Gene Kim, Alanna Brown, and Nigel Kersten. 2017 State of DevOps Report (Portland,
OR: Puppet and DORA, 2017), https://www.ipexpoeurope.com/content/download/10069/143970/file/2017
-state-of-devops-report.pdf.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 8

 When you read and answer these questions, you can answer them for:

• Your leader: In this case, answer the questions as they are written.
• Yourself: In this case, there are two ways you should think about answering the
questions:
• First: Directly for yourself. Every time you see the prompt “My leader or
manager,” change it to “I” or “me.”
• Second (and probably the most insightful): For yourself as others would
rate you. Every time you see the prompt “My leader or manager,” change
it to “My team or those that I lead would say that I . . . ”

Average the three scores in each category to come up with a composite score that
provides a measure of your leader’s or your own transformational leadership behav-
iors across the five dimensions. In all categories, a higher score indicates stronger
demonstration of transformational leadership behaviors. And as you’ll read below,
the more we see transformational leadership, the more support we have to do the
work and the better outcomes we get.

Table 1. Transformational Leadership Assessment

(Adapted from Rafferty and Griffin’s
Dimensions of Transformational Leadership: Conceptual and Empirical Extensions).

My leader or manager:

_____ Has a clear understanding of where we are going.

Vision

_____ Has a clear sense of where he/she wants our team to be in five
years.
_____ Has a clear idea of where the organization is going.
_____ Average Score

My leader or manager:
Communication
Inspirational

_____ Says things that make employees proud to be a part of this

organization.
_____ Says positive things about the work unit.
_____ Encourages people to see changing environments as situations
full of opportunities.
_____ Average Score
1 = Strongly disagree; 4 = Neutral; 7 = Strongly agree

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 9

 My leader or manager:

_____ Challenges me to think about old problems in new ways.

Stimulation
Intellectual

_____ Has ideas that have forced me to rethink some things that I have
never questioned before.
_____ Has challenged me to rethink some of my basic assumptions
about my work.
_____ Average Score

My leader or manager:
Leadership
Supportive

_____ Considers my personal feelings before acting.

_____ Behaves in a manner which is thoughtful of my personal needs.
_____ Sees that the interests of employees are given due
consideration.
_____ Average Score

My leader or manager:
Recognition
Personal

_____ Commends me when I do a better than average job.

_____ Acknowledges improvement in my quality of work.
_____ Personally compliments me when I do outstanding work.
_____ Average Score
1 = Strongly disagree; 4 = Neutral; 7 = Strongly agree

The Five Dimensions of Transformational Leadership

Now that you have your score, what does it really mean? Why is it important? What
additional insight can we pull from this framework of transformational leadership?
How can we use this to help improve? Next, we present some additional thoughts
about each of the five dimensions of transformational leadership.

1. Vision
Vision is the expression of a desired picture of the future based around organizational
values and should answer this basic question: What do we want to become? In addi-
tion to knowing and understanding direction, transformational leaders must be able
to clearly communicate the vision and validate that it was understood as intended.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 10

 . . . the CEO needs to become “the storyteller in chief,” says Aetna’s Mark
Bertolini. That means telling different aspects of the same transformation
narrative to all the constituencies and stakeholders in the company.”10

2. Inspirational Communication
Inspirational communication is the expression of positive and encouraging messages
about the organization, and statements that build motivation and confidence. Trans-
formational leaders continually seek to understand changing factors that motivate
people to do their best work.

Inspirational communication seems to be particularly important when

expressing a vision for the future. In the absence of encouragement and
confidence building efforts, articulating a vision may have a neutral or even
negative influence on employees.11

3. Supportive Leadership
Supportive leaders expresses concern for their followers and take into account their
individual needs. Gallup’s State of the American Manager Report (2017) states that
employees are more engaged when their managers are open and approachable and
not focused solely on work-related items.12 This recognizes that we bring our whole
selves to work and that it is difficult, if not impossible, to leave our personal concerns
at the door.
While transformational leaders don’t have to be managers, they will be more suc-
cessful when they adopt these attributes.

10
Scott Anthony and Evan Schwartz, “What the Best Transformational Leaders Do,” Harvard Business Review
(September 20, 2017.) https://hbr.org/2017/05/what-the-best-transformational-leaders-do.
11
Anthony and Schwartz, "What the Best Transformational Leaders Do."
12
Gallup, State of the American Workplace Report (Washington, DC: Gallup, 2017). http://news.gallup.com
/reports/199961/7.aspx?utm_source=gbj&utm_campaign=StateofAmericanWorkplace-Launch&utm_medium
=copy&utm_content=20170215.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 11

 I feel I can talk with my manager I feel I can approach my manager
about nonwork-related issues. with any type of question.

100% 7
100% 6
12 13
21 30
34
80% 80% 47
38 56 40
65
60% 60 60% 63
57
40% 54 40% 58

55 36 54 50
20% 20% 33
28 22 24
12 8 12
0% 0%
1 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 1
Strongly Strongly Strongly Strongly
Agree Disagree Agree Disagree
27% 73% 37% 63%

Actively Engaged Not Engaged Engaged

Figure 2: Employees Whose Managers Are Open and Approachable Are More Engaged13

4. Intellectual Stimulation
Intellectual stimulation enhances employees’ interest in and awareness of problems,
and it helps to increase creative problem-solving skills, encouraging them to think
about problems in new ways.
In order to spur employee interest in problems and problem-solving, one must
accept the fact that problems do and will continue to exist. Despite the proverb stat-
ing an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, believing that you can prevent all
problems often leads to being caught without the skills to solve a problem when one
does arise. As with all things, balance is key. By embracing the opportunity to involve
employees in a problem’s life cycle, a transformational leader can be a key catalyst for
turning a company into a learning organization.

(Gallup, State of the American Workplace Report [Washington, DC: Gallup, 2017]. http://news.gallup.com
13

/reports/199961/7.aspx?utm_source=gbj&utm_campaign=StateofAmericanWorkplace-Launch&utm_medium
=copy&utm_content=20170215.)

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 12

 Learning organizations are skilled at five main activities: systematic prob-
lem solving, experimentation with new approaches, learning from their
own experience and past history, learning from the experiences and best
practices of others, and transferring knowledge quickly and efficiently
throughout the organization. Each is accompanied by a distinctive mind-
set, tool kit, and pattern of behavior. Many companies practice these activ-
ities to some degree. But few are consistently successful because they rely
largely on happenstance and isolated examples. By creating systems and
processes that support these activities and integrate them into the fabric of
daily operations, companies can manage their learning more effectively.14

5. Personal Recognition
Giving employees personal recognition through the use of such incentives as praise
and acknowledgement of effort upon the achievement of specified goals can be a mine-
field, but traversing it is a necessary act. The key is to understand how incentives can
affect employees’ motivation and engagement, and to find out which behaviors drive
them so that you encourage the right behaviors and keep employees inspired and
wanting to pursue the vision. Transformational leaders use incentives that align with
their employees’ self-interest to encourage a culture of learning and collaboration.

Today, the old ways of running a workplace—annual reviews, forced rank-

ings, outdated competencies—don’t get the intended results. Leaders must
gain scientific insight into employees’ evolving wants and needs and learn
how to build an exceptional workplace.15

Also according to Gallup, 21% of employees strongly agree that their performance is
managed in a way that motivates them to do outstanding work.16

14
David A. Garvin, “Building a Learning Organization,” Harvard Business Review (August 01, 2014). https://hbr
.org/1993/07/building-a-learning-organization. A version of this article appeared in the July–August 1993 issue
of Harvard Business Review.
15
Gallup, State of the American Workplace Report.
16
Gallup, State of the American Workplace Report.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 13

Growing Transformational Leadership

Becoming a transformational leader isn’t something that’s accomplished overnight,

nor is it something you achieve and then sit back on your laurels. Transformational
leaders embrace learning and have a growth mindset. To help you get started in your
journey to becoming a transformational leader, we have provided a Quick Start Guide
that identifies the following:

• Key concepts that are necessary to truly understand each dimension of trans-
formational leadership.
• Behaviors often seen in transformational leaders that reinforce the key con-
cepts for the dimension.
• Tools or techniques that can help you implement good practice behaviors.
• Common missteps that you can avoid.

Transformational Leadership Quick Start Guide

Here is our quick start guide on how to apply transformational leadership. While it
is by no means all encompassing, it is a good start to get you on your way. We’ve
broken down each aspect of transformational leadership and provided things you
need to know about each one, good practice behaviors, tools that may help, and things
to avoid. While this transformation won’t occur overnight, this guide will get you on
your way.

Vision
Need to know:
• Intent-based leadership.17
• Your vision and mission.
• Your organizational values.
• Your competitive landscape.

17
David Marquet, “Intent Based Leadership | David Marquet,” YouTube video, 10:18, posted by Speakers’ Spotlight,
June 6, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzynH2BmoJM.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 14

Good practice behaviors:
• Build a story.
• Articulate why this is is a better future state.
• Ensure the vision has been understood as intended.
• Create or refine the vision and mission if one doesn’t exist.
Tools that may help:
• Briefing/back briefing templates.
What to avoid:
• “Buzzword bingo” vision and mission statements.
• Sharing the “what” of the vision but not the “why.”
• Assuming intent was understood without verification.

Inspirational Communication
Need to know:
• Intent-based leadership.
• Theory X versus Y (motivation).18
• Fixed versus growth mindset.19
Good practice behaviors:
• Evangelize both the “what” and “why” of the vision.
• Ensure that desired change will help achieve the vision.
• Visualize and celebrate progress of various scope and size.
• Use storytelling and parables.
• Communicate on a regular cadence.
• Focus on the future.
Tools that may help:
• “Trophy case” of group-level successes.
• Metrics dashboard highlighting metrics in tension.
• “Story Catalog”: a collection of internal and externalstories that highlight
successes or challenges that helped the group learn.

18
“Theory X and Theory Y,” Wikipedia, last modified May 30, 2018, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_X_and
_Theory_Y.
19
Reza Zolfagharifard, “Growth-Mindset Vs. Fixed-Mindset,” Positive Psychology Program (January 30, 2018),
https://positivepsychologyprogram.com/growth-vs-fixed-mindset/.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 15

What to avoid:
• Using “us” versus “them” messages.
• Focusing on failure stories only, excluding success stories.
• Ruminating over the past or past success.
• Gossipy stories.
• Dancing around or sugar-coating problems/obstacles that need to be overcome.

Intellectual Stimulation
Need to know:
• Your current state problems.
• Systems thinking.20
• Blameless post-mortem cultures.21
• Fixed versus growth mindset.
• Learning organizations.22
• A3 thinking.23
• Lean/Agile leadership.24
Good practice behaviors:
• Encourage the identification of and open communication about problems on a
regular cadence.
• Approach problems as issues with the system not the people.
• Be seen learning and encouraging others to learn; make cross-training a
priority.
• Distribute decision-making to those closest to the knowledge and situational
awareness.
• Encourage regular cadences of self-directed exploration and experimentation.

20
Peter Senge, “What is systems thinking?” by Peter Senge, Author of The Fifth Discipline, YouTube video, 1:08,
posted by Russell Sarder, June 4, 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V38HrPnYkHI.
21
Daniel Schauenberg, “Practical Postmortems at Etsy,” InfoQ, August 22, 2015, https://www.infoq.com/articles
/postmortems-etsy.
22
“Learning Organization,” Wikipedia, last modified May 30, 2018, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning
_organization.
23
John Shook, “Lean Summit 2008 - John Shook - How can lean leaders develop their people through A3 thinking?”
YouTube video, 27:12, posted by Lean Enterprise Academy, April 25, 2012, https://www.youtube.com
/watch?v=MZK_WTT2JpY.
24
“Lean-Agile Leaders,” ScaledAgileFramework.com, last modified November 17, 2017, https://
www.scaledagileframework.com/lean-agile-leaders/.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 16

Tools that may help:
• Visual representations that highlight problems, such as kanban boards and CI/
CD dashboards.
• A library of various retrospective facilitation techniques.
• A3 problem-solving template.25
• Skills liquidity matrix.26
• 20% time, hackathons, bug bashes, or similar.
What to avoid:
• Punishing people for making mistakes without first addressing systemic causes.
• Putting people in situations that are beyond their risk tolerance (via a lack of
safety measures).

Supportive Leadership
Need to know:
• Emotional intelligence.27
• Lean pillar of respect for people.28
• Conflict resolution/crucial conversations.29
• Risk culture.30
Good practice behaviors:
• Be available and approachable.
• Learn about the people themselves, not just about their work.
• Invite people to bring their “whole self” to work.
• Learn what people want/need from you in any givencontext.
• Teach behaviors that enable individuals to grow into leaders themselves.
• Run team building exercises—particularly that help build understanding/
culture/morale/cohesion.
25
Durward K. Sobek, II, Toyota-Style Problem-Solving A3 Reports (Bozeman, MT: Montana State University, Accessed
April 29, 2018), https://www.lean.org/Search/Documents/406.pdf.
26
“FocusedObjective/FocusedObjective.Resources,” GitHub.com, last modified February 28, 2017, https://github
.com/FocusedObjective/FocusedObjective.Resources/blob/master/Spreadsheets/Capability%20Matrix%20v2.xlsx.
27
Daniel Goleman and Richard E. Boyatzis, “Emotional Intelligence Has 12 Elements. Which Do You Need to Work
On?” Harvard Business Review, February 6, 2017, https://hbr.org/2017/02/emotional-intelligence-has-12
-elements-which-do-you-need-to-work-on.
28
Doug Bartholomew, “How to Lead with Respect,” Lean Enterprise Institute website, October 21, 2015, https://
www.lean.org/common/display/?o=3095.
29
Joseph Grenney, “Crucial Conversations | Joseph Grenny,” YouTube video, 14:57, posted by VitalSmarts Speakers,
December 14, 2012, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuJgqTs-G44.
30
Deloitte, “Risk Culture: Three Stages of Continuous Improvement,” The Wall Street Journal, Risk and
Compliance Journal, May 21, 2013, http://deloitte.wsj.com/riskandcompliance/2013/05/21/risk-culture-three
-stages-of-continuous-improvement/.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 17

Tools that may help:
• Office hours (scheduled availability on a regular basis).
• Personality activities (e.g., business chemistry,31 StrengthsFinder,32 SSI, etc.) to
build awareness of how others think.
• Allocate time during one or two staff meetings per period for team-building/
trust-building games.
What to avoid:
• “Forced fun” initiatives—required team activities that no one enjoys.
• Displaying a preference for particular people or personality styles.
• If you’re a manager, continually deprioritizing/moving one-on-one meetings.

Personal Recognition
Need to know:
• Theory X versus Y (motivation).
• The too-much-talent effect.33
• Open source/inner source engineering models.34
Good practice behaviors:
• Ensure recognition drives desired behavior (e.g., reward-sharing, collaboration,
and peer recognition).
• Establish a regular cadence of recognition—even small things that recognize a
standout performance over the past number of weeks. (Note: a leader should
be careful that it should rotate somewhat to avoid the “rockstar” problem and
should also celebrate group-facilitating and collaborating behaviors.)
• Give handwritten thank you notes expressing appreciation and recognition and
one-on-one verbal communication sincerely expressing gratitude, apprecia-
tion, and well-done work.

31
Suzanne M. Johnson Vickberg and Kim Christfort, “The New Science of Team Chemistry,” Harvard Business
Review, July 25, 2017, https://hbr.org/2017/03/the-new-science-of-team-chemistry.
32
Gallup, “StrengthsFinder 2.0,” Gallup Strengths Finder 2.0 website, accessed April 29, 2018, https://
www.gallupstrengthscenter.com/home/en-us/strengthsfinder.
33
Roderick I. Swaab, Michael Schaerer, Eric M. Anicich, Richard Ronay, and Adam D. Galinsky, “The Too-Much-
Talent Effect: Team Interdependence Determines When More Talent Is Too Much or Not Enough,” Psychological
Science 25, no. 8 (2014): 1581-591.
34
“Open-Source Software,” Wikipedia, last modified May 30, 2018, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source
_software; “Inner Source,” Wikipedia, last modified May 30, 2018, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_source.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 18

Tools that may help:
• Skills liquidity matrix (shows goals and progress regarding skills acquisition).35
• Incentives analysis canvas.36
• Peer recognition platforms.
• Cultural totem (part of the recognition/symbol of pride for the team), like col-
lege football helmet stickers. Find an icon that matches your culture. This can
be applied to individuals or teams.
What to avoid:
• Providing recognition that makes people choose between their individual
success and the success of the overall team or organization, including an
appreciation of “rockstars,” “firefighters,” or “heroes.”
• Comparisons pitting team members against each other.
• Offering incentives that haven’t been analyzed for risk versus reward (i.e.,
Will they hurt more than they help?)

Transformational Leadership in Action

So, what does transformational leadership look like? Below are a few examples of
transformational leadership in action.

• Bill Palmer, Parts Unlimited: As the seminal character in book The Phoenix
Project, Bill provides an excellent case study into applying transformational
leadership.
• Gregg Popovich, San Antonio Spurs Coach: Read about how Gregg’s
leadership style has led to 5 NBA Championship rings: http://fortune.com
/2014/06/16/gregg-popovich-leadership/
• Edwin Catmull, Pixar: Read this great article about how Pixar co-founder
has empowered others to achieve the extraordinary: https://hbr.org/2008/08
/how-pixars-ed-catmull-empowers

35
“FocusedObjective/FocusedObjective.Resources,” GitHub.com, last modified February 28, 2017, https://github
.com/FocusedObjective/FocusedObjective.Resources/blob/master/Spreadsheets/Capability%20Matrix%20v2.xlsx.
36
“Incentives Analysis Canvas,” Intentionally Adaptive website, accessed April 30, 2018, https://www.intentionally-
adaptive.com/incentives-analysis-canvas.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 19

 • Satya Nadella, Microsoft CEO: Check out this great article on how Satya
revived a tech giant: https://www.geekwire.com/2017/review-microsoft-
ceo-satya-nadellas-candid-book-hit-refresh-goes-inside-tech-giants-turn-
around/. You can also check out his book on the subject, Hit Refresh: The
Quest to Rediscover Microsoft’s Soul and Imagine a Better Future for Everyone.
• W. Edwards Deming: William Edwards Deming is known as the father of
statistical quality control. His institute, The W. Edwards Deming Institute,
has a host of resources to explore: https://deming.org/.

Conclusion
Transformational leadership is something that all of us can do, and teams with trans-
formational leaders have better outcomes, helping to amplify the work of those they
work with and direct. It can be described along five dimensions (vision, inspirational
communication, intellectual stimulation, supportive leadership, and personal recog-
nition) and can be measured.
In this paper, we provided you with an overview of transformational leadership
and some tips to help you grow your own capabilities, as well as pointers to some of
our favorite resources. We wish you luck in your journey and encourage you to con-
tinue learning and growing, both yourself and your team.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 20

Additional Reading

• Accelerate: The Science of Lean Software and DevOps—Building and Scaling

High Performing Technology Organizations, by Nicole Forsgren, Jez Humble,
Gene Kim.
Research in DevOps, including culture and transformational leadership.
• Radical Candor by Kim Scott.
Leadership communication.
• XLR8 (Accelerate: Building Strategic Agility for a Faster-Moving World) by John
P. Kotter.
Organizational structure/dynamics.
• Culture Code by Daniel Coyle.
Describes three key elements of team and organizational leadership cul-
ture that drives high performance and excellent results.
• Multipliers by Liz Wiseman.
Behaviors that either amplify or diminish employee growth and engage-
ment.
• The Leadership Code by Dave Ulrich.
Key activities that leaders do to grow people.
• Turn the Ship Around by David Marquet.
Articulating vision, intent-based leadership.
• State of the American Manager Report, Gallup.
What makes a good manager.
• Primal Leadership: Unleashing the Power of Emotional Intelligence and/or
Emotional Intelligence 2.0 by Daniel Goleman.
A foundation of effective leadership is emotional intelligence.
• The Leader-Manager by William B. Hitt.
Holistic/structural overview of leadership and management combined
along with coaching advice/tips.
• Four Disciplines of Execution by Sean Covey, Chris McChesney and Jim Huling.
Means of tracking progress toward achieving mission/vision in a visible
way.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 21

 • Managing to Learn by John Shook.
A3 thinking model for problem-solving; building an entire organization
of problem solvers and critical thinkers.
• The Human Side of Enterprise by Douglas McGregor.
Theory X versus Theory Y styles of motivation.
• How Will You Measure Your Life? by Clayton Christensen.
The realization that management and leadership is a noble profession
that can better the lives of people, their families, and their communities.
Also, being able to apply critical business and management theories to
your personal life.
• First, Break All the Rules: What the World’s Greatest Managers Do Differently by
Gallup.
• Leading Change by John P. Kotter.
• “The Real Reason People Won’t Change” by Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey,
Harvard Business Review, https://hbr.org/2001/11/the-real-reason-people
-wont-change.
• Clarity First: How Smart Leaders and Organizations Achieve Outstanding
Performance by Karen Martin.
• Strategic Management: A Competitive Advantage Approach, Concepts and Cases
(16th Edition) by Fred R. David and Forest R. David.

References

Anthony, Scott, and Evan Schwartz. “What the Best Transformational Leaders Do.”
Harvard Business Review. September 20, 2017. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://
hbr.org/2017/05/what-the-best-transformational-leaders-do.
Bishop, Todd. “Review: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella’s Candid Book Hit Refresh Goes
inside the Tech Giant’s Revival.” GeekWire. September 26, 2017. Accessed April
29, 2018. https://www.geekwire.com/2017/review-microsoft-ceo-satya-nadellas
-candid-book-hit-refresh-goes-inside-tech-giants-turnaround/.
Christensen, Clayton M. “How Will You Measure Your Life?” Harvard Business Review
July-August 2010.

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 22

Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High. Performed by Joseph
Grenny. YouTube. December 14, 2012. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://www.you-
tube.com/watch?v=PuJgqTs-G44.
Deloitte. “Risk Culture: Three Stages of Continuous Improvement.” The Wall Street
Journal. May 21, 2013. Accessed April 29, 2018. http://deloitte.wsj.com/riskand-
compliance/2013/05/21/risk-culture-three-stages-of-continuous-improvement/.
Forsgren, Nicole, Jez Humble, and Gene Kim. Accelerate: The Science of Lean Software
and DevOps—Building and Scaling High Performing Technology Organizations. Port-
land, OR: IT Revolution Press, 2018.
Gallup. State of the American Workplace Report. Report. February 15, 2017. http://
news.gallup.com/reports/199961/7.aspx?utm_source=gbj&utm_campaign=Sta-
teofAmericanWorkplace-Launch&utm_medium=copy&utm_content=20170215.
Gallup. “StrengthsFinder 2.0.” Accessed April 29, 2018. https://www
.gallupstrengthscenter.com/home/en-us/strengthsfinder.
Gartner. Gartner Predicts. 2016. http://www.gartner.com/binaries/content/assets
/events/keywords/infrastructure-operations-management/iome5/gartner
-predicts- for-it-infrastructure-and-operations.pdf.
Garvin, David A. “Building a Learning Organization.” Harvard Business Review.
August 01, 2014. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://hbr.org/1993/07/building-a
-learning-organization. A version of this article appeared in the July–August 1993
issue of Harvard Business Review.
Goleman, Daniel, and Richard E. Boyatzis. “Emotional Intelligence Has 12 Elements.
Which Do You Need to Work On?” Harvard Business Review. February 6, 2017.
Accessed April 29, 2018. https://hbr.org/2017/02/emotional-intelligence-has-12-
elements-which-do-you-need-to-work-on.
“Growth-Mindset Vs. Fixed-Mindset.” Positive Psychology Program. January 30,
2018. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://positivepsychologyprogram.com/growth-
vs-fixed-mindset/.
How Can Lean Leaders Develop Their People through A3 Thinking? Performed by John
Shook. YouTube. April 25, 2012. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://www.youtube.
com/watch?v=MZK_WTT2JpY.
“How to Lead with Respect.” Lean Enterprise Institute. October 21, 2015. Accessed
April 29, 2018. https://www.lean.org/common/display/?o=3095.

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“Incentives Analysis Canvas.” Intentionally Adaptive. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://
www.intentionallyadaptive.com/incentives-analysis-canvas.
“Inner Source.” Wikipedia. April 13, 2018. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://en.wikipe-
dia.org/wiki/Inner_source.
Intent-Based Leadership. Performed by David Marquet. YouTube. June 6, 2016.
Accessed April 29, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzynH2BmoJM.
Johnson Vickberg, Suzanne M., and Kim Christfort. “The New Science of Team Chem-
istry.” Harvard Business Review. July 25, 2017. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://
hbr.org/2017/03/the-new-science-of-team-chemistry.
“Lean-Agile Leaders.” Scaled Agile Framework. November 17, 2017. Accessed April
29, 2018. https://www.scaledagileframework.com/lean-agile-leaders/.
“Learning Organization.” Wikipedia. April 01, 2018. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning_organization.
“Open-Source Software.” Wikipedia. April 27, 2018. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_software.
Prokesch, Steve. “Pixar’s Collective Genius.” Harvard Business Review. Septem-
ber 07, 2017. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://hbr.org/2008/08/how-pixars-ed
-catmull-empowers.
Forsgren, Nicole, Jez Humble, Gene Kim, Alanna Brown, Nigel Kersten. 2017 State of
DevOps Report. (Portland, OR: Puppet and DORA, 2017), https://www.ipexpoeu-
rope.com/content/download/10069/143970/file/2017-state-of-devops-report.
pdf.
Rafferty, Alannah E., and Mark A. Griffin. “Dimensions of Transformational Lead-
ership: Conceptual and Empirical Extensions.” The Leadership Quarterly 15, no. 3
(2004): 329–354.
Schauenberg, Daniel. “Practical Postmortems at Etsy.” InfoQ. August 22, 2015.
Accessed April 29, 2018. https://www.infoq.com/articles/postmortems-etsy.
Scott, Kim. Radical Candor: Be a Kick-Ass Boss without Losing Your Humanity. New York
City: St. Martin’s Press, 2017.
Sobek, Durward K., II. Toyota-Style Problem-Solving A3 Reports. Report. Mon-
tana State University. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://www.lean.org/Search
/Documents/406.pdf. This material is based upon work supported by the National
Science Foundation under Grant No. SES-0115352.

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Swaab, Roderick I., Michael Schaerer, Eric M. Anicich, Richard Ronay, and Adam D.
Galinsky. “The Too-Much-Talent Effect: Team Interdependence Determines When
More Talent Is Too Much or Not Enough.” Psychological Science 25, no. 8 (2014):
1581-591. Accessed April 29, 2018. doi:10.1177/0956797614537280.
“Theory X and Theory Y.” Wikipedia. April 23, 2018. Accessed April 29, 2018. https://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_X_and_Theory_Y.
Turtel, Jake. “Another Victory for “Pop.” Another Show of Leadership.” Fortune.
June 16, 2014. Accessed April 29, 2018. http://fortune.com/2014/06/16/gregg
-popovich-leadership/.
What Is Systems Thinking? Performed by Peter Senge. YouTube. June 4, 2015.
Accessed April 29, 2018. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V38HrPnYkHI.

Contributors

• John Esser, Sr. Director Data Operations and Saas, AdvancedMD, @johndesser
• Nicole Forsgren, CEO & Chief Scientist, DevOps Research and Assessment
(DORA), @nicolefv
• Chivas Nambiar, Director, Systems Engineering, Verizon, @ChivasNambiar
• Julia Wester, Co-Founder and Principal Consultant, Lagom Solutions, @Every-
dayKanban
• Dan Zentgraf, Senior Principal Consultant, CA Technologies, @danzentgraf

TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP: A QUICK START GUIDE  | 25