The Impact of Leadership Styles on Job Stress in the District Secretariat - Jaffna

Abstract

The District Secretariats focus on close interaction with people in the particular region. It is a human-oriented organization, for which the experienced leaders inspire the people through continuou5 training and encouragement and lead them to work hard to achieve their goals. The leader's leadership type plays an important role in achieving performance of the organization. The leader's ability to lead a group of cordial subordinates to work efficiently is the key to success. This paper investigated leadership styles of administrators as perceived by employees and employers’ job stress in the Jaffna District Secretariat. The study population comprised the employees working in various sections. Out of this population, drawing a sample of 80 employees on a random basis, relationships between transformational and transactional leadership styles and facets of stress were tested. Two instruments were used to collect data, Multi factor questionnaire (Bass and Avolio, 2000), (rater form) was used ‘to measure the employees’ perception of leadership style of their leader. Job Stress Questionnaire (Parker & Decotiis 1983) was employed to measure employees' stress. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, correlation and regression. Results revealed that employees' job stress was found to be at a moderate level. Employees who perceive that their leaders’ leadership style was transformational found to have lower stress and transformational leadership has a significant negative impact on job stress. It was recommended that administrators in the District Secretariat should imbibe transformational leadership styles in their administration in order to enhance better job performance through reduced stress among employees