Leadership Styles and Their Effect on Employee Productivity in Zambia’s Parastatal Organizations: A Case Study of Lusaka

Abstract

Leadership is the ability to influence adapted the setting so that everyone feels empowered to contribute creatively to solving the problems. Leadership is an ability meaning a leader has a capacity to do something through talent and skill. this research will investigate the different leadership styles and their effect on the employees’ productivity of Zambia Railways and its employees. The study explored the problem in an interpretative view and investigation, using a descriptive approach which uses focus group, interviews. The research design used both qualitative and quantitative research approach. Qualitative research design focused on open ended questions from which responses from key informants was collected for narration purposes as well. Qualitative research emphasised the understanding of verbal narratives. Quantitative research focused on closed ended questions from which responses given were non-verbal. Data collection was done using self-administered questionnaires as part of data collection from the employees. The interviews scheduled and structured for the key informants was strictly based on the interview guide. Data collected from both open and closed ended questions emanating from questionnaires administered to the respondents was analyzed by the use of a computer software known as the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS 16). With regard to qualitative data collected from the key informants, a narrative report was employed as obtained from them. Then findings of the study has demonstrated that positive relationships between leadership styles and organisational productivity. Overall findings from this study suggest that participative and democratic leadership behaviours do play important roles in determining levels of affective commitment, continuance commitment and normative commitment.