Improving Innovative Work Behavior Of Myanmar Primary Teachers:The Role Of Transformational Leadership And Faculty Trust

Education plays a crucial role in diminishing the poverty rate and cultivating peace.The education era has many challenges to every organization;it leads them to innovate their work to achieve their goals.Hence,Myanmar is in the state of curriculum reform to catch the international standards in order to cover the era of crisis in which Myanmar has lagged behind the developed world for a long time.It lays the responsibilities of implementing the curriculum reform on teachers,especially primary teachers who take part in the first place in molding the soul of children.As the primary teachers are key players in innovation development,their innovative work behavior is vital in the education sector.Besides,a principal's leadership style plays a crucial role in the followers'innovation,and the colleagues can help teachers innovate their teaching process.Thus,it becomes the main issue to find how transformational leadership and faculty trust improve innovative work behavior.Quantitative and qualitative data were collected at some phase of the research process within a single study.A total of 953 primary school teachers were surveyed in this cross-sectional quantitative study using a convenient sampling method.Male participants(n=264)represented 27.7 percent of the whole sample,and females(n=683)participated in the study at 71.7%.The largest age group of participants(n=383,40.2%)was under 25 years.Age over 30 participants got the lowest percentage of respondents(n=76)at 8%.Most of the participants were unmarried(n=711,74.6%),and married participants were 229 at 24 percent of the whole sample.In terms of educational qualification,625 of respondents got Primary Teacher Qualification(PATC),Junior Teacher Qualification(JATC),and Preservice Primary Teacher Training(PPTT)at 65.6%(these qualifications are teaching license got after graduating).As under-graduate programs,321(33.7%)primary teachers possessed a Diploma in Teacher Education(DTEd)and Diploma in Teacher Education Competency(DTEC).The group of respondents with undergraduate programs was lower than the group of those with post-graduate programs.The largest group(n=704)of respondents included the teachers with 5 years or less teaching experiences at 73.9%.More than 16-years-experienced teachers(n=25)participated in the study at the lowest percentage(2.6%).Most of the respondent teachers(n=621,65.2%)in the study had 3 years or less tenure with their principals,whereas more than 3 years tenure with their principal were 327 teachers(34.5%)participated in the study.The demographic characteristics(gender,age,and marital status)were not applied for research purposes,but the professional characteristics(qualification,teaching experience,and tenure with principal)were employed to explore the differences in transformational leadership,faculty trust,and innovative work behavior.In collecting quantitative data,the questionnaire was adopted/adapted.One of multi-dimensionality was innovative work behavior consisting of three dimensions(idea generation,idea promotion,and idea implementation).The second one was transformational leadership,which comprised four dimensions(setting direction,developing people,redesigning organization,managing the instructional program),and the last one was faculty trust with two dimensions(collegial trust and trust in principal).A panel of professors first assessed the questionnaire,followed by the pilot study conducting a small sample to cover content validity and internal validity.Afterward,Exploratory Factor Analysis(EFA)was employed to extract the items with less factor loading or less community through principal component analysis(PCA)and Oblique rotation with Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin(KMO),related to the respective latent variable(factor)in the individual measurement model.After assessing the individual measurement model,the pooled measurement model was also conducted to examine whether all the variables were well-constructed with the required fitness indices.The model was re-specified again and again to reach the required state.Moreover,the researcher conducted the convergent,construct,and divergent validities and internal reliability,composite reliability,and Average Variance Extracted(AVE)within the measurement model.Accordingly,the researcher assessed normality,linearity,homoscedasticity,and multicollinearity at both univariate and multivariate levels.The descriptive and inferential statistics were conducted using Statistical Packages of Social Sciences(SPSS)version 23 and AMOS version 23 for quantitative data.From the descriptive statistics,the researcher concluded the dimensions of innovative work behavior that Myanmar primary teachers applied ideas in the classroom rather than generating the ideas.They were weak at sharing or promoting ideas to each other.In line with transformational leadership dimensions,redesigning the organization was the highest,but developing people was perceived as the weakness of their principal.Moreover,the Myanmar primary teachers trusted their colleagues more than they trusted in their principal of faculty trust.After all,Pearson Product Moment Correlation indicated that transformational leadership,collegial trust,and trust in principals had a positive relationship with innovative work behavior.Trust in principal had a low correlation with IWB,whereas transformational leadership and collegial trust had a moderate correlation.The inferential statistics were conducted to investigate whether innovative work behavior,transformational leadership,and faculty trust differed in teacher qualifications.Regarding three dimensions of teacher innovative work behavior,the MANOVA results showed that the teachers who possessed PGDT,PPTT,JATC,and PATC promoted ideas with their professional partners more than those who possessed DTEd and DTEC.However,idea generation and idea implementation,two dimensions of innovative work behavior,did not differ for teachers with different qualifications.On the other hand,the result of the independent sample t-test showed that the teachers who possessed PGDT,PPTT,JATC,and PATC perceived that their principals had transformational leadership behaviors,set the direction,developed people,and managed the instructional work compared to the perception of those who possessed DTEd and DTEC.Concerning two faces dimensions of faculty trust,one-way MANOVA results indicated that the teachers who possessed PGDT,PPTT,JATC,and PATC had more trust in their colleagues than those of DTEd and DTEC qualifications.Regarding the difference of innovative work behavior by teaching experiences,the MANOVA and follow-up Game-Howell post hoc test results revealed that teachers with 6-to-10-year experience generated ideas and implemented those ideas more than those of less-than-5-year experience did.Regarding transformation leadership and its dimensions,the results of one-way ANOVA and Game-Howell post hoc test showed/proved that the more experiences the teachers had,the more they could perceive their principal behaviors of transformational leadership developing people,redesigning the organization,and managing the instructional program.For faculty trust,MANOVA,and Game-Howell post hoc test results revealed that 11-to-15-year experienced teachers significantly differed from those with less than 5 years and 6 to 10 years for collegial trust,and teachers with experience of more than 16 years significantly differed from other three experienced groups.It could be interpreted that the more the teachers experienced in their work,the more they trust in their colleagues as well as in their principal.Regarding the dimensions of innovative work behavior to find the differences of tenure with the principal,one-way MANOVA results showed that teachers with principal-tenure of more than 3 years promoted ideas more with their colleagues than those of less-than-3-year tenure with their principal did.Along with transformational leadership,the independent sample t-test results showed that teachers of more than 3 years tenure with their principal highly perceived that their principal behaviors of transformational leadership,and setting the direction,developing people,redesigning the organization,and managing the instructional program compared to those of less than 3 years tenure with their principal.No significant difference was found in faculty trust by tenure with the principal.Based on SEM results,transformational leadership had a meaningful causal association with teacher innovative work behavior.Moreover,transformational leadership was highly related to collegial trust and trust in the principal.It was also observed that these faculty trusts(collegial trust and trust in principal)had a remarkable effect on teacher innovative work behavior.Regarding the full model with a significant association between the constructs,the construct's exogenous variables could explain 10%of the total variance in teacher innovative work behavior.It could be interpreted that transformational leadership,collegial trust,and trust in principals played a crucial role in improving innovative work behavior.Furthermore,this study revealed an indirect but meaningful association between transformational leadership and innovative work behavior through collegial trust and trust in principals.However,the direct effect was not significant between transformational leadership and innovative work behavior;it led to the full mediation effect.In other words,transformational leadership was indirectly but not directly associated with innovative work behavior.It could be interpreted that the primary teachers who perceived the transformational leadership behavior of their principal could improve their innovative work behavior when having trust in colleagues and principal.Therefore,this mediated model could show the full mediation effect of collegial trust and trust in principal on the relationship between transformational leadership and innovative work behavior.From the qualitative phase results,the principal with transformational leadership behavior and collegial teachers with mutual trust played a significant role in improving the innovative work behavior of Myanmar teachers,especially in idea generation and promotion,but not in idea implementation.Then,acquiring new ideas from experience,reading books,and online searching helped develop the teachers' innovative work behavior.Moreover,the qualitative phase results revealed that their daily challenges were their workload and personal concerns,requirements(inadequate teaching materials and insufficient time),and lack of expertise(language barrier,low proficiency,shortage of professionals).In conclusion,the current findings could be interpreted that transformational leadership and faculty trust(collegial trust and trust in principal)played a crucial role in improving the innovative work behavior of Myanmar primary teachers.Moreover,faculty trust could mediate the relationship between transformational leadership and innovative work behavior.That is why the present study suggests that the critical role of transformational role and faculty trust should be taken into account to improve and develop teachers' innovative work behavior.The principals,parents,school committee,educational stakeholders,and policy-makers should provide more support to teachers to innovate their professional works;the principal should also practice transformational leadership behavior.The teachers should develop the new idea with their principal and colleagues with mutual trust.Moreover,primary teachers need to have innovative behaviors for their professional development and achieve organizational goals.This study's findings also describe the challenges which the primary teachers encountered in implementing the new curriculum,and this information reminds stakeholders and curriculum reformers to respond appropriately in addressing these issues.Focusing on this topic,this classic thought will indeed stimulate further studies to conduct in these crucial areas of transformational leadership,faculty trust,and innovative work behavior.