Abrupt Implementation of Telework in the Public Sector During the COVID-19 Crisis

Abstract. Lockdown regulations during the COVID-19 outbreak resulted in abrupt changes to work situations and presented new leadership challenges. This short report explores how leaders perceived their options for leading transformationally when their teams were forced to rapidly switch to virtual collaboration. We interviewed 20 supervisors using semistructured telephone interviews who described their general leadership behavior before the lockdown and the evaluated possibilities and difficulties of leading transformationally during the lockdown. The article provides insights into the preconditions for transformational leadership in the public sector during change processes. High workload, time pressure, and role conflicts, combined with restricted freedom of action, restrained their options of transformational leadership. Communicative problems further hindered the transfer of transformational leadership behavior to new working arrangements during the Covid-19-crisis. The article derives implications for ways of helping managers to employ the potentials of transformational leadership in virtual settings and during change processes in the public sector.