Motivational/Transformational leadership creates a culture of motivation, inspiration, and development of employees, so that the leader can gain the confidence and assurance of subordinate managers/employees to achieve mission, vision, and objectives of the organisation, and ultimately achieving overall organisational performance.

When the management of an organization motivates the employees into offering their optimum potential, into thinking of belonging to the organization, and into liking the working atmosphere… it can then be described as a leadership. To be a leader, s/he must be among those led & not isolated in an ivory tower. S/he must exchange ideas through direct contact since orders by memos solely, which come from offices with closed doors, cannot be effective enough for “real” progress. A manager, who adopts the system of fear, will never bring about true success & can never be classified as a leader (s/he is just a bossy dictator). An excellent outcome cannot be extracted from persecuted persons even in football games!

After sharing the vision, the leader needs to:

1) ensure his / her employees understand & embrace the vision (this can be verified by Q&A / open forum sessions, how they change the way they work in reference to the vision).

2) after interaction & feedback from employees, the leader needs to adjust or narrow down the vision to achievable goals / steps if required & re-share this with employees.

3) develop a workable plan with major milestones how to move forward from now till realizing the vision.

5) develop pragmatic KPIs, rewards (not necessary monetary) in stages for employees so that they know how they are being measured & where they are performing now.

4) provide conducive environment and resources e.g. tools, training, development, team building, dialogs etc. to the employees so that they are motivated to advance / achieve that vision.

Compassion, honesty, humility, sincerity, commitment, confidence, determinations are some of the qualities required to be as a Leader. People who want to be a leader can develop leadership ability. Leadership is not the exclusive preserve of the wealthy and educated. Leadership is a matter of personal conviction and believing strongly in a cause or aim, whatever it is. Alignment of aims, purpose and values between staff, teams and organization is the most fundamental aspect of motivation. The better the alignment and personal association with organizational aims, the better the platform for motivation.

There is a direct relation between motivational leadership and employees' satisfaction and will to work towards the vision. "We all need to learn from these as we rebuild employee morale following tough economic times, with limited budgets:

• Energize your team
• There’s more to life than work
• Put your people first
• Act with integrity
• Be a great communicator
• Be a great listener
• Be a problem solver
• Lead through experience and competence, not through title or position.

 The fundamentals of leadership don’t change between good times and bad. But when money is in short supply, these principles can be the difference between success and failure. Now is the time to start motivating your employees by applying these principles, and your team will lead you through the hard times."                                 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/martinzwilling/2012/01/10/8-ways-leaders-can-motivate-employees-beyond-money/

In my humble  opinion, motivation and positive thinking along with  the act of inspiring  people  will not get the  organization  going anywhere  unless  we first  change  the cumpus  of our leadership to always  point to  north when  we  are  heading  north! In other  words  when management  is based on principles  rather  than values,  only a culture  that  fosters  such  principles -based  leadership  will eventually  lead  to effectiveness. 

Excellent question and highly enlightening responses and contributions. I like to add that believing in one's employees is a fundamental aspect of leadership.

You motivate through various means.  

(1) You use service leadership and lead through examples, which motivate others who are motivated by such examples. 

(2) You lead through good management of resources and improving the firm in a variety of ways.

(3) You provide convincing arguments for change, reform, and action.  Communication is the key here. 

(4)  You can also motivate simply through consistency which builds trust.  Trust is a key for keeping support from employees over a long haul. 

Leading without motivating followers is unthinkable. ok, how? We don't have one clear and ever successful technique. The choice of the techniques depends on who you are leading. The personality of followers, value systems, economic conditions, wealth of the organization and cultural contexts. Financial techniques might work better when dealing with peoples in financial difficulties. In contrast using financial incentives (like improved salary) is not as such successful means of motivating to those who value recognition and self-development. Using clearly articulated vision and other intrinsic rewards could motivate but with varying level of influence. For those who focus on extrinsic rewards the vision doesn't that much matter, what matters most is what they get out of their work. Hence, my recommendation is that assess who you employees are and know what they value more.    

Indeed, all the authors who talk about leadership, claim that one of the keys to a good leader is to set a course and go beyond the horizon. Among these authors, Kouzes and Posner (1989), claim that "they viewed the future with a positive attitude and promising, are expressive and attract supporters through his sincerity and ability and skill in communications. They show others how mutual interests can be met by commitment to a common purpose."

I would suggest looking at the literature on High Reliability Organizations (HROs).  A defining characteristic of HROs is strong leadership where leaders effectively communicate each individual's contribution to the overriding organizational goals, or what some have termed the "prime directive".  Aboard US Navy aircraft carriers each sailor, from the Captain to the cook understands the ship's mission, "to launch and recover aircraft safely".  A clear understanding of individual and group expectations, and accountability for not meeting them, are part of the fabric aboard ship.  Suggest the following citations:

Roberts, Karlene H. and Bea, Robert (2001). “When Systems Fail,” Organizational Dynamics, Volume 29, Issue 3: pp. 179-191.

Roberts, Karlene H. (1990). “Managing High Reliability Organizations,” Organization, Summer, 1990 issue.

Roberts, Karlene H. (1990). "Some Characteristics of One Type of High Reliability Organization,” Organization Science, Volume 1, Issue 2: pp. 160-176.

Sullivan, John J. (2014), “Modeling Operational Reliability: The Discovery of the Organizational Learning Loop”, Journal of Business and Economics.

Transformational leadership is characterized by vision, creativity, and positive changes in the environment. It promotes high performance, motivation and morale among followers. Transformational leaders act as role models to their followers; this serves as an inspiration and engenders their commitment to the group goals.

http://covenantuniversity.edu.ng/content/download/18604/120214/file/TRANSFORMATIONAL+LEADERSHIP+STYLE+AS+A+CATALYST+FOR+CHANGE+IN+THE+NIGERIAN+ACADEMIA.doc

Transformation leadership:

TMT Support: Establish a managerial power base that will support your vision and even actively involve themselves. 

Support Networking: Get to know the names of each member who will be effected by the transformation, get to know a little about them, their skills, their concerns and remember and reinforce what you learned. IE: ask them how their weekend went or even (if appropriate) their child's football/soccer match went. It is easier to accept change from a leader that one likes. This may not always be possible, nevertheless the effort is necessary. A little personal touch goes a long way.

Communication: Introduce the change bit by bit, using all forms of communication available, the message should demonstrate how the vision will benefit each employee in the longer term. Provide updates at regular intervals in public and private forums. 

Participation: Allow employees to contribute ideas that support the vision, you may find ideas that work better than those you had intended. Recognize the contributions clearly and widely.

Incremental-ism: Small victories that achieve pieces of the overall vision are critical to transformation as they demonstrate progress relative to effort. They should be communicated and the leader must recognize those who made them possible.

Symbols: Ensure that symbols are in place that are representative of the change and that reinforce the vision. The symbols should be meaningful and visible. 

Live the vision: All of your activities will be under scrutiny as will your personal conduct and behaviour. One must live the vision, if it means coming to work at 5:00 AM and leaving at 9:00 PM for symbolic reasons, then that is what is required.  

Benchmark: Ensure you have the metrics and measures in place and that they support your change initiatives. Some of those benchmarks should be made available to those effected by the change. 

A transformational leader is generally energetic, enthusiastic and possesses a passion for the task at hand. This leadership style requires managers to use their ethics, character, personal integrity, and morality to bring about change in individuals and social systems, optimizing a group's overall performance.

The conceptualization of transactional and transformational leadership included seven leadership factors, which he labelled:

John, I like the example of the US Navy Carrier because usually we give an example of hypothetical ship whose leader and subordinates share the same destiny in whatever each person does, therefore full fit is necessary.

Hussin, Yes and the forms of accountability in such an environment take many forms.  For example, if one person is not meeting expectations, it is viewed by leadership that the entire crew is not up to form.  Imagine, punishing 6000 people because one was out of line.  It is an effective technique for implementing a self-policing strategy.  Soon crew members will monitor their colleagues and enforce the rules themselves, so they don't face punishment for another's transgressions.  Leadership's presence becomes ubiquitous and promotes the development of leadership skills in subordinates.

Motivating employees has little to do with senior management. Instead it is significantly related to the actions of the supervisor because the supervisors determines the messages/information, resources, autonomy, job tasks, appraisal process and outcomes and the quality of support (feedback) an employees gets on the job. See the Social Exchange literature about implementing a change. However, it is true that the better the leadership at the top, the better will be the level of support by supervisors because they will be performance managed to be effective supervisors. 

Thank you dear all for your valuable inputs.

Transformational leadership involves motivation of followers to develop their creative potential as well as involves ordinary people in delivering extraordinary results. Motivational leaders are visionary leaders with  passion to act as change agents to nurture human potential through empowerment & ethical decision making, with both resilience and resoluteness, thereby receiving commitment of followers to action. In the process, followers eventually get converted as leaders and thereafter leaders get converted as change agent, and the cycle goes on,  to develop human potential and creativity for larger benefit to the mankind.

To inspire others, the vision must not only be clear but compelling! While clarity of the vision is important, clarity alone can not inspire followers. The vision should equally be compelling.

Vision which inspire in organization is something like intimate relationship (couple relationship, partnership, marriage or similar togetherness/collectiveness). Namely if you have it (internalization of goal, vision, mission, together plans...) everything is easy in togetherness. If you have not such internalized goals, vision, mission, plans there is no inspiration i.e. great motivation, because true group motivation is not achievable without the glue of spirituality. So inspiration comes from the togetherness of goals, plans, vision, mission, purpose, striving, specific human values.

Inspiration is always spiritual concept and often when is without spontaneity and honesty (i.e. manipulation, spin, lying, cheating, coercion, fear) is hardly to achieve.  Although also dark side of management can sometimes create motivated productive organizational environment (e.g. by fear and punishment) it is not inspirational (motivational) situation for knowledge,  information and intelligence riches organizations.

I agree---see my book The Primer Movers...

I have rarely seen inspiration happening without being in tune with those one wants to inspire. Being in touch with those one wishes to inspire, being trusted by them is critical. Being a good listener is crucial to being able to inspire others.

Dear @Edwin, please, do give us full details about your book. I could not find it under your contributions at Research Gate.

Dear Edwin

Please provide at least contents of the book or some highlights.

Being a role model can be a powerful source for inspiration and motivation . Followers look for models  to emulate the good qualities and styles in a good and effective leader.

To reply to queries, the book, Prime Movers: Traits of the Great Wealth Creators is available on amazon. Second edition. 2008. It is a qualitative study of some 80 great wealth creators-- It deals with core philosophical issues (what wealth creation is), the role of the mind, traits--etc. It is politically incorrect: egoism is viewed as a core virtue--altruism is not--

Great leaders have to set very challenging goals or not much will be achieved--this is in my book took-

Top 10 Qualities That Make A Great Leader

http://www.forbes.com/sites/tanyaprive/2012/12/19/top-10-qualities-that-make-a-great-leader/

"A great person attracts great people and knows how to hold them together."

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

My question is how to inspire others? any solid techniques?

Thank you so much.  

.................................

          I have made millions in revenue, while leading organizations and as an entrepreneur.  Team business was about making good decisions and sharing collective wins.  The leader must build a team that can be trusted and emotional intelligence must be shared with each team member, both privately and publicly.  The leader must surround himself with employees that are skilled and team driven.  If the leader is sincere and transparent with his actions, then the followers will respond with desirable traits and outcomes that inspire others to be competitive.  Motivation is about drive and direction, as a collective group.  There has to be short-term goals for team business and the leader has to cast a clear vision across the organization.  Every member must be on the same leadership page.  Followers that are not honoring the leadership direction must be removed from the organization.  Toxic people can destroy an organization.  Leadership must be contagious and directional.  Transformation is about pushing and pulling the team in the right direction.  Guide with a purpose and motivate the team, by producing results and outcomes (small or large), that are shared with a collective, team effort.   Members must have value and be rewarded for being valuable with words and salary.  Team business has to be at the top of the organization; it is often overlooked in transformational leadership, especially in larger organizations.  People that feel valuable will add value to the organization.

Hooray to that, Pete. Excellent exposition.

Try the book "The fish rots from the Head: The Crisis in our Boardrooms: Develop the crucial Skills of the Competent Director by Bob Garratt. It might be useful for you.

Tank You Peter!  I agree with you and I see visions as stars witch give over journey light. Help us to think big,  goals we can achieve and evaluate, while visions are  of the nature is attainable.

I like how you see vision as the "Light" of the organization.  One item that needs more attention in organizational inspiration and motivation, taking an honest evaluation of the team's progress.  Leadership needs to take a quarterly assessments, not waiting to evaluate the team at the end of the year.  It is exciting when members brand the organization on their own time. Thank you Marianne. :-)

But: motivation is not the primary--the org. has to be doing the right things (products, strategies) else motivation will do no good--in fact, it may be harmful to work very hard doing the wrong thing because you will sink faster--business leadership is first and foremost an intellectual process-- imagine the analogy of rowing a boat very hard: in the wrong direction!

• effective communication of ideas,
• confidence,
• commitment,
• insight into the needs of others
• ability to take the action necessary

http://www.angelfire.com/ns/southeasternnurse/LeadershipMotivation.html

As a leader you need to listen, consult your subordinates in any initiative/project and involve them  entirely during a decision making process. Mentoring, coaching, advising and constructive criticism are major factors of inspiring your subordinates or colleagues.  

Listening is a very important skill for a leader. "Leaders communicate. They connect with others. They engage in dialogue to learn, encourage and direct. But in a digital era, with a new array of communications tools allowing both one-to-one and mass communications, many leaders are confused and wary..."

The Conscious Lifestyle: A Leader Must Look and Listen is fine article about. 

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/careers/management/listen-share-connect-a-digital-1-2-3/article23749628/

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20130102223336-75054000-the-conscious-lifestyle-a-leader-must-look-and-listen

I  think as Prof. Umachandran, If you try to share your vision, you have a participatory culture, and you procure employee's empobrecerme y and feed-back, you could be a great leader and your workers will be motivates.

Article El carácter sistémico del liderazgo

Sorry, in my answer, I would say employee's empowerment

 Every organization is a cooperative system. In organizations the relation between manager and inferiors is an open system: management and obedience are alternative activities, leadership is a cooperative system.

Listening to your employees is important but do not make a mantra out of it-participation is a means of transmitting knowledge--but someone has to have the knowledge--the leader needs a vision of what will work and to implement it--leadership is not just psychological--

Thank you dear sir Edwin A. Locke for your great inputs.

Of course, I agree, the leadership is not anything psychological exclusively. The leadership of the executive always will be different because his knowledge and his vision of the organization is different but, I think that, in some cases, the employees can acquire a knowledge on having carried out his work that provides new information to the executive, and this feedback will be wealth-producen for the executive and for the organization.

The first step I think is to know what you want to achieve--what is your organization's purpose and how will it be attained (some form of a strategic plan which can be modified based on feedback from reality)--if such a vision makes sense this does inspire employees --but they have to think your vision make sense and that the goal is worthwhile--those that don't will self select out--

Adding to Edwin's comment that a suitable culture has to be in place to guarantee homogeneity of purpose and clarity of execution of the vision. The existing leadership has to respect the potential of the employees as well, a factor that may influence their "signing in" to the proposed vision and to avoid excluding good elements of the organization.

Creating a long term value for a company, working toward the realization of the vision with employees need good communication strategy that corresponds to core values and business objectives. Also, as @Edwin has stated, continuous feedback is needed for improvements.

 In my second contribution, I really wish to see a "true" assessment for the managers in our region to see if they are fit or not. They ought to be subjected to an evaluation which measures if they are motivational, inspirational, developers, and with vision or NOT. When a management considers an organization as its personal property or playground, then such organization is or  will become a failure whatever how much COSMETICS are used to hide its ugly interior.

"The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly."

Jim Rohn

I wish Dr. Nizar as well.

Yes . Motivational administaror induces a motivation in each employee and enhaces his/her morale.

All more or less true, with a couple minor challenges.  Being able to motivate an employee requires more than simply 'painting a picture' of a desired (or desirable) future vision.  Putting that picture in context is what can be the make-or-break connection for an employee.  The context is most often identified as providing cues so that employees can see how their day-to-day activities can make a positive contribution to the vision.  If employees cannot make this connection, even though the vision might sound 'desirable,' it will be harder for an employee to become committed. A second piece, and of equal importance, is the ability of the leader to paint the future vision picture in more than one dimension.  Too often, speakers provide a wonderful (or what they think is wonderful) picture of a desired future, but only in one dimension.  For a future vision to be clear and worth committing to, it is important to make all the dimensions of the vision emotionally obtainable.  "All" the dimensions means that not only should the events of the desired future be clear, but also the patterns of behaviour that will need to be demonstrated in order to realise the events; the systemic structures (including policies and procedures, both explicit and implicit) that will need to be in place for the patterns to be able to surface; and the mental models of the employees and management and shareholders.  To inspire others to buy-in and become committed to a potential future vision, make sure that you provide them will all the dimensions of that vision, as well as enable them to see how their day-to-day activities can contribute to making the vision reality.

Thank you dear James, indeed explicit and tacit knowledge are required to be shared both as shortcuts to success.

Also, how their day-to-day activities can make a positive contribution to the vision is so crucial to be in. I do agree.

You answers are so appreciated. Thank you all. 

Motivation is reflected by passion of the leaders. All their activities are blended towards achieving the set goals of the organization. The focus of the leader pulls the members to align organizational objective and synergies departmental goals. As a strategic business unit optimising the various sub-units creates a formidable position for the organization.

I like the wise comment of Professor Krishnan Umachandran. Unfortunately, managers of organizations in some 3rd world countries are not fit to be called leaders, at all. These "bosses" are taught to remove any passion or sentiment towards the employees. Antagonism rules the scene most of,if not all, the time. A senior old lecturer at a certain 3rd world university wrote tens of letters to a top manager on many things & the reply of that manager was always:" Please tell him that his request is NOT accepted"! How come such organizations will have "real" progress???

@ Nizar, Thanks for your comments, i reciprocate your responses with great reverence and more just 

That's why, dear Nizar Matar, leaders/managers are autocrats in the third world organizations/universities/institutions!

I totally agree

I think that the autocrats leaders not only belongs to the  third words leadership culture. It will be overall. Leaders are still managers and  their leadership talents will bee far from modern leadership theories. We can see lot of Webers ideas still in the public sector. Are over leaders still unclear about their roll, and low self -esteem?

Leader vary widely in their personalities--but the most important things is to have a vision of a viable strategy and know how to execute it--participation is not a magic wand-

I do agree with you Sir Edwin.

A transformational leader attempts to understand employees’ cultural perceptions and their shared values, beliefs, and norms and how they affect performance and productivity during the change process. Thus, effective change management requires a sound understanding of the culture’s influence on each employee. This understanding assists the transformational leader to integrate employee mental and emotional participation into the organization’s day-to-day operations and decision-making processes. To accomplish this task, the transformational leader is willing to adopt a broader paradigmatic perspective that emphasizes the systems and actors approaches.

http://www.che.nl/~/media/Academie%20Mens%20en%20Organisatie/MO/J-term%20Europe%202014/Lowder_transformation_vs_servant_leadership.pdf

Thank you dear Krishnan for your valuable answer. 

Be clear that motivational leadership is not the only kind--cognitive leadership (the right vision and strategy) are more fundamental--what's the use of working hard doing the wrong thing?

I agree with you dear Sir Edwin. 

Intangible assets such as leadership styles, culture, skill and competence, and motivation are seen increasingly as key sources of strength in those firms that can combine people and processes and organizational performance

http://www.arcjournals.org/pdfs/ijhsse/v1-i2/2.pdf

It is rare to find motivational leadership in organizations of the 3rd world countries. Let us admit that the managements of organizations in such countries are generally of these types: blocking or preventive , deterring or hindering , discouraging, and depressing. Such organizations are part of the ailment in such countries & the presence of them is maintained so as the countries stay in the 3rd world league.

Dear Nizar Matar,

Such type of leaders are autocrat or benevolent autocrat, those undermine the positions of subordinates.

The challenge requires leaders to recognize the true purpose to be achieved and understand how people and organizations behave also the ability to match behavior to purposes subtle to organizational endeavors that will, directly, indirectly, influence people to help achieve those purposes.

I agree. Indeed, the role of the leader is vital to the construction of adequate scenarios so workers become genuine «knowledge» managers and this will allow that organizations are permanent bodies of continuous learning.

"Robert D. Behn enlists eight great governance challenges for top public leaders:

• He argues that leadership challenge requires the articulation of an inspiring mission, personal persistence and a commitment of generating enthusiasm among employees.
• Strategy challenge requires leaders recognize the true purpose to be achieved and an understanding of how people and organizations behave and also the ability to match behavior to purposes by crafting concrete yet subtle organizational endeavors that will, directly, indirectly, influence people to help achieve those purposes.
• Motivational challenge is the mobilization of individual and collective efforts to produce results.
• The collaboration challenge is the cooperative work with other (public, nonprofit, and private) organizations that have similar, yet not identical, missions to achieve broader, overlapping purposes.
• Accountability challenge is the necessity for public organizations to abide by the rules for finances and fairness while, at the same time, producing real results.
• The learning challenge is the uncovering basic principles of action, management and leadership from a plethora of details in new and very specific circumstances followed by the application of these general principles in new situations.
• The external-communication challenge is the enlisting of support for the organization’s mission, strategies, targets, and activities from a diversity of stakeholders..."

http://g-gov.weebly.com/governance-challenges.html

Dear Sir Ljubomir Jacić,

Thank you so much for your kind contribution. 

Yours,