leadership

1. Introduction

The current concept of evaluation of information technology makes certain assumptions. These centre in broad terms on the ability of evaluation systems to represent initiatives in ways that allow efficacious judgements to be taken. As a consequence of this assumption, representational faithfulness is assumed to be a primary requirement. Given representational faithfulness, it is assumed, rational decisions can be taken, and evaluation can be used to foster learning within feedback cycles. This assumption is consistent with a particular kind of leadership, which has been termed “transactional�. Transactional leadership is based on the premise that leaders clarify the goals of subordinates, and provide rewards and punishments concomitant with performance against goals. Transactional leadership clearly has an important role to play within the modern enterprise but there is an alternative: “transformational� leadership (Burns, 1978). Transformational leadership begins with assumptions which differ markedly from transactional leadership, and thereby implies a different approach to evaluation. In broad terms, these assumptions centre on achieving results by stimulating subordinates; rather than through systems of contingent reward. The central question to be pursued in this paper concerns the relevance and implications of transactional and transformational leadership for the practice of information technology evaluation.

The next section considers transactional leadership and explains its relationship to evaluation. Limitations of evaluation based upon evaluation and transactional leadership are explored both through the existing literature and through an existing study of the views of a group of Financial Directors of UK FTSE top-500 companies (all quotations used within this paper are taken from McAulay et al, 1997). Transformational leadership is then presented and comments made by the Financial Directors are used to suggest ways in which evaluation can be aligned with this form of leadership. The implicit argument is that familiar problems that are associated with the exercise of evaluation as framed by transactional leadership can be avoided within transformational leadership. The implication of the paper is that the exercise of evaluation should not be understood as an ontological inevitability but as a consequence of context, including the context provided by leadership.

2. Transactional leadership

The leader’s role within the transactional view of leadership is one of clarification; leaders clarify the role of subordinates and motivate them through rewards for good performance and punishments for aberrant behaviour. Transactional leadership stresses contract and contingent reinforcement (Bass, 1985). It is underpinned by path-goal theory, which establishes a role for the leader as the person who points out to subordinates the “paths to successful effort�