Abstract:
The aim of this study was to assess the relationship between leadership styles and organizational commitment in governmental Secondary Schools of afar region. In order to achieve the purpose of the study, a descriptive survey design was used. The sample of the study consisted of 214 employees from 12 different government secondary schools of afar region. Both principals/supervisors and teachers participated in the study. Two standardized questionnaires i.e. Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire which was developed by Bass and Avolio (1995) and Organizational Commitment Questionnaire developed by Allen and Meyer (1990) were used to gather data. The data were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics such as frequency counts, percentages, mean and standard deviations were used while inferential statistics such as t-test and a two tailed Pearson correlation were used. The t-test analysis showed that principals/supervisors and teachers have different perceptions on leadership styles of principals/supervisors and teachers. The two-tailed correlation analysis further revealed that there is a positive and significant relationship between transformational leadership behaviors and organizational commitment (affective commitment, continuance commitment and normative commitment) and the relationship was strong. Transactional leadership behavior had a weak but significant and positive relationship with affective commitments. But, continuance and normative commitments had a strong and significant relationship. However, for laissez-faire leadership style, the correlation analysis results indicated that there was no statistically significant correlation between laissez-faire leadership behavior and organizational commitment. From the results, it was possible to conclude that both transformational and transactional leadership behaviors were positively related with affective, continuance and normative commitments whereas laissez-fair leadership behavior had found to be a positive and significant relationship with normative commitments, but it has a very weak and negative correlation with affective organizational commitment at PSSARs. Finally, the study recommended that both transformational and transactional leadership behaviors can play a major role in developing and improving affective, continuance and normative commitments than the laissez-faire leadership style at governmental secondary schools of afar region.
