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Answer:Nikole Pagan
PA 720, Managing Organizational Behavior
Spring 2008
Dr. Carol Edlund
TRANSFORMATIONAL LEADERSHIP
Review of “The Leadership Challenge – A Call for the Transformational Leader”
By Noel M. Tichy and David O. Ulrich.
In their article The Leadership Challenge – A Call for the Transformational Leader,” Noel M. Tichy
and David O. Ulrich seek to define a new brand of leadership consistent with the changing nature of the US
Economy and world market. They seek to define the qualities of a transformational leader and delineate
the organizational dynamics of change a leader must manage, in terms of structure, culture and the
individuals that make up an organization. The following discussion provides an over-view of Tichy and
Ulrich’s main points, questions the outcomes of transformational leadership, and compares and contrasts a
transformational leader with the concept of level 5 leadership.
Tichy and Ulrich argue that the changing nature of the US economy in the early 1980s was driving
the need to revise organizational culture to ensure that US companies remained competitive in the world
market. To navigate this cultural shift, Tichy and Ulrich call for a new breed of leaders who can help an
organization develop a new vision, gather support and buy-in from stakeholders, guide the organization
through a transformative phase and possess the capacity to institutionalize changes over time. (1984)
These leaders are called transformational leaders because they create something new from something old.
Whereas a transactional manager might make adjustments to the organizational tri-pod of mission,
structure and human resources, a transformational leader goes beyond, bringing about fundamental
changes in the organization’s basic political and cultural systems. It is the latter that sets transformational
leaders apart from transactional managers.
Tichy and Ulrich begin to develop their argument by presenting Lee Iacocca, former CEO of the
Chrysler Corporation as a case study in transformational leadership. Starting in the late 1970s, Iacocca
Pagan - Leadership 1
“provided the leadership to transform a company from the brink of bankruptcy to profitability” (Tichy * Ulrich,
p. 65). He revamped internal politics and systems, changed management structure, trimmed tens of
thousands of employees, won concessions from the UAW, and translated the “loser” stigma of a
government bail-out into a positive cultural shift.
Beyond the description of a transformational leader, Tichy and Ulrich delineate the organizational
dynamics of change, based on a number of assumptions. The first assumption is that a trigger event
indicates that change is needed, for Chrysler, the trigger was impending bankruptcy. The second
assumption is that change unleashes mixed feelings – a positive impetus for change as well as strong,