Effects of junior high school heads leadership styles on teacher job satisfaction in the ahanta west municipality

Abstract

The study sought to assess the effect of the leadership styles of Junior High Schools Heads on job satisfaction among teachers in the Ahanta West Municipality. The study was underpinned by Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs and Douglas McGregor's theories X and Y. The descriptive survey was chosen as the best design for the study. A sample size of 186 teachers from a population of 357 was used. Due to vast variations in the number of teachers in each circuit, the proportionate stratified sampling technique was used. Data were collected with a questionnaire and analysis was carried out using percentages, means, standard deviations, multiple regression analysis, as well as independent t-test. The study indicated that the most important leadership styles exhibited by school Heads were democratic, transformational, and transactional. The study also revealed that transactional, democratic, and transformational leadership styles have a statistically significant relationship with the job satisfaction of teachers. Furthermore, no statistically significant difference was observed in the job satisfaction of teachers based on leadership styles adopted by male and female school Heads. It was therefore recommended that the democratic leadership style should be supported and used by all school Heads in their administrative responsibilities rather than the autocratic or laissez-faire styles. Also, given that all predictors together provided less than 50% explanations of the variance in job satisfaction, there is a need for future researchers to build up a model that includes other relevant variables that are likely to provide greater explanations of job satisfaction.