Transactional Leadership
This theory looks at the exchanges or transactions that occur between leaders and followers. These exchanges can be found in systems of reward or punishment within organisations. These must be consistently applied so that top managers are conform to the same systems of reward and punishment. This can be very difficult for organisations to achieve. Gilbert illustrates this with reference to Staffordshire County Council and the Pindown scandal when a large number of children where abused in the care of the local authority. Gilbert comments that ‘senior management had different expectations of front-line and middle management than they had of themselves, and this created a dysfunctional department which had to be effectively rebuilt {Gilbert 2005: 48} For transactional leadership to work there must be a consistently high standard set of ethical transactions between leaders and followers.