Do Social Workers Lead Differently? Examining Associations with Leadership Style and Organizational Factors

ABSTRACT

What training leaders need to successfully shepherd high quality human service delivery remains less understood. This study aims to evaluate associations between social work training, leadership style, and organizational factors. Participants included leaders (N = 49) and employees (N = 224) working in 10 behavioral health organizations who completed a survey. Hierarchical linear models were used to analyze multilevel associations. Analyses indicated that leaders with social work training were rated higher in transformational leadership and organizational factors (e.g., lesser stress) on average within both samples. Findings begin an empirical argument for the value of social work leaders for the success of human service organizations.

KEYWORDS:

• Social work
• leadership
• organizational context
• mental health recovery

Practice Points

• Leaders with social work training are associated with transformational leadership style, which has a robust evidence-base supporting its impact on organizational effectiveness and success.

• Leaders with social work training are also associated with organizational factors (e.g., stress and cohesion) that have been associated with the effective translation of evidence-based practices.

• This study compares social work to nonsocial work leaders and points to the value of social work training for leading organizations that practice social work.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health [F31MH110120,R01MH099012].