The impact of transformational leadership on the delivery of safety and productivity excellence at Impala Platinum

Abstract

The underground hard rock mining industry in South Africa is faced with the challenge of simultaneously delivering both safety and productivity excellence. Frontline supervisors need to manage the inherent trade-off between safety and productivity to achieve excellence in both. Previous research suggests that supervisors with a transformational leadership style have delivered safety and productivity in separate studies. This study examined the relationship between the transformational leadership style of underground mining supervisors at Impala and the simultaneous delivery of both safety and productivity. It also investigated the mediating effect of group safety climate on the relationship between transformational leadership and injury rate, and the mediating effect of group cohesiveness on the relationship between transformational leadership and productivity. The relationship between transformational leadership and the perception of leader effectiveness was also investigated in the study context. The research design was a case study using mixed methods in the form of a sequential explanatory design. In the first quantitative main phase of the study, survey questionnaires were completed by respondents to determine the leadership style of the mine overseers who were the unit of analysis. Data was also collected using survey questionnaires for group safety climate and group cohesiveness. The injury rate and productivity data for the mine overseer sections was recorded for a one year period prior to the survey. In the second qualitative phase of the study selected mine overseers were interviewed and a focus group of mine overseers was conducted. Also, underground observations were carried out and documents were scrutinised. The focus of the qualitative research was to interpret and explain the results that were obtained in the quantitative first phase of the study. The results indicate that transformational leadership is related to the perception of supervisors’ effectiveness. This relationship is partially mediated by group safety climate and group cohesiveness. The relationship between transformational leadership and the objective measures of injury vi rate and productivity were not supported in the quantitative results. This may indicate that these measures were too narrow to determine supervisors’ leadership effectiveness, and/or were contaminated by confounding variables as was suggested in the qualitative phase of the study. The qualitative findings indicated that supervisors’ perception was that transformational leadership style is effective in delivering safety and productivity excellence. The overall conclusion of this study is that in the context of Impala or similar operations, that the effective supervisor should employ the full range of leadership. This behaviour includes maintaining discipline and using contingent reward to motivate the achievement of goals. The effective supervisor also uses the transformational leadership style giving meaning to work and creating a feeling of team membership. Transformational leadership inspires the diverse workforce to deliver safety and productivity excellence in the difficult and risky mining conditions. Furthermore, supervisors’ behaviour is greatly influenced by management’s priorities.