Abstract: Accumulating evidence suggests that transformational leadership is positively associated with such leadership effectiveness as job satisfaction, organizational commitment, job performance, and OCB. However few studies have examined relations between the components of transformational leadership and different work outcomes. Also the mechanisms and processes by which transformational leadership exert its influence have not been adequately addressed in the literature. More work is also needed to examine factors that may serve to mediate the linkage between transformational leadership and work outcomes. As proposed by Vandeenberghe (1999), psychological empowerment may be a powerful mediator of transformational leadership effects. In the present study, we explored the relation between the different components of transformational leadership, on the one hand, and job satisfaction, organizational commitment, on the other hand. We also examined the contribution of each of the four dimensions of Thomas and Velthouse’s (1990) multidimensional conceptualization of psychological empowerment in mediating the relation between transformational leadership and job satisfaction, and organizational commitment.
The following measures were administered to a sample of 744 employees from 14 companies: The Transformational Leadership Questionnaire (TLQ) developed by Li & Shi (2005); the Psychological Empowerment Scale (PES) developed by Spreitzer (1995); the Job Satisfaction Scale developed by Tsui, Egan and O’Reilly III (1992), and the Affective Commitment Scale developed by Allen and Meyer (1996 ). All scales were subjected to reliability analysis and factor analysis before data analysis. Internal consistency reliability estimates ranged from 0.69 to 0.89, suggesting adequate reliability. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) results supported the four-dimension structure (morale modeling, visionary motivating, charisma and individualized consideration) of the TLQ. CFA results also confirmed the four-dimension structure of the PES. Finally, exploratory factor analysis extracted one factor from the job satisfaction items and a single factor was also extract from the affective commitment items.
Structure equations modeling (SEM) was used to explore the relations among transformational leadership, psychological empowerment, job satisfaction and organizational commitment using the model generation strategy described by Jöreskog & Sörbom (1996). The data were randomly spilt into two parts. One part was submitted to an exploratory SEM and the other part was submitted to a confirmatory SEM. The exploratory SEM began with s fully-mediated model in which the components of psychological empowerment fully mediated the relation between the components of transformational leadership, on the one hand, and job satisfaction and organizational commitment, on the other hand. Some meaningful adjustment was later made according to the modification index (MI) generated by AMOS 4.0 until a statistically acceptable model was derived. This model was then submitted to a confirmatory SEM which yielded satisfactory goodness of fit statistics, including c2 /df，GFI，NFI，IFI，TLI，and CFI.
The results showed that different components of transformational leadership had different impact on job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Specifically, morale modeling and visionary motivating were powerful predictors of job satisfaction and organizational commitment, respectively; charisma and individualized consideration were robust predictors of job satisfaction. To a lesser degree, psychological empowerment mediated the relation between transformational leadership and employee work attitude. Specifically, the mediating effect involved the relation between visionary motivating and morale modeling on the one hand and job satisfaction and organizational commitment on the other hand. Similarly, competence mediated the relation between articulate vision and organizational commitment. However, neither self-determination nor impact mediated the relation between transformational leadership and job satisfaction or organizational commitment. A none component of psychological empowerment mediated the relation between charisma and individualized consideration, on the one hand, and job satisfaction on the other. Limitations and future research directions are discussed

Key words: Transformational Leadership Questionnaire, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, cross-validation, TLQ