Transformational Leadership Style and Work Outcomes of Healthcare Professionals: A Review of Literature

Transforming the healthcare environment to be more supportive of healthcare professionals and meet the rising demands of today's healthcare environment is crucial to the attainment of quality patient care in Africa. Meanwhile, the literature suggests a positive relationship between transformational leadership and work outcomes in health systems. The study aimed to investigate the association between transformational leadership and its associated work outcomes for healthcare professionals in healthcare settings in Africa using a structured literature review. The literature search was conducted in four electronic databases. The review identified nine studies relevant to the research question. Extracted data were synthesized, summarized, and correlated using narrative synthesis. The review showed that transformational leadership style is associated with work outcomes such as job satisfaction, teamwork, intent to stay, job motivation, increased compliance, organizational culture, organizational change outcomes, reduced work pressure, and patient outcomes. Furthermore, healthcare professionals had a higher perception of transformational leadership styles than other leadership styles.