Nigerian Public Administrators’ Leadership Styles and their perceived Effectiveness

Leadership is a phenomenon that have been widely studied but there are few studies of leadership in the field of public administration compared to other fields. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to examine the perceived leadership effectiveness of Nigerian public administrators’ leadership practices based on Bass’s full range leadership theory (FRLT). Data were collected through the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaires administered to a randomly selected sample of 240 department heads in the 30 local governments in Osun State, Nigeria. Regression results shows a statistically significant relationship between local public administrators’ perceived leadership effectiveness and transformational leadership factors (p < 0.05). The model accounted for 25% of the variance in perceived leadership effectiveness. This suggests that there are other factors affecting the perceived leadership effectiveness other than leadership styles. The implications for positive social change include the opportunity to move the Nigerian local administrators’ leadership practices towards transformational leadership practices based on FRLT. Transformational leadership is effective, efficient and ethical leadership style which in turn may discourage corruption and help build a sustainable public institutions that are responsive and accountable to the Nigerian public.