Mediator role of positive psychological capital in the relationship between school leaders' transformational leadership characteristics and innovation management competence

In order to maximize the performance of its members, the organization emphasizes the concept of positive psychological capital in contemporary education. Human psychology affects work performance. It is thought that the members of the organization will affect the psychological situation in the organization, their innovative behaviors and leadership characteristics. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of transformational leadership characteristics of education managers on innovation management competence and to analyze the mediator role of positive psychology in this relationship. Quantitative research method was used in this study. The universe of the study consists of the formal primary and secondary school teachers who work in Bayraklı and Karşıyaka districts of İzmir in 2017-2018 academic year. The sample of the study was taken by simple random sampling to represent the universe. Personal information form and 3 scales were used in the study. "Leadership Styles of School Principals Scale", Teacher Form of "Innovation Management at Schools Scale", "The Scale of Positive Psychological Capital" were used as the data collection tools. According to the results of study, arithmetic mean, standard deviation , frequency, feature test of difference between two mean (t test), F statictics, "scheffee", LSD- Least Significant Difference, the correlation with LISREL 8.51 program Maximum likelihood Method,factor analysis (DFA) were examined (Şimşek,2007). According to the research findings; school principals 'transformational leadership, innovation management qualification levels are positive and teachers' positive psychological capital is high. Teachers' perception of transformational leadership characteristics of school principals; gender, marital status, age, educational status, professional seniority; perception of innovation management of school principals; gender, marital status, branch, type of school, age, educational status, professional seniority; positive perception of psychological capital; marital status, branch (self-efficacy, extraversion and hope sub-dimensions), type of school they work in (self-efficacy, confidence, extraversion and sub-dimensions of hope), age, educational status, do not differ according to the seniority variables. Teachers' perception of transformational leadership characteristics of school principals; branch, type of school and number of teachers; school principals' perception of innovation management competence: number of teachers in school, positive psychological capital perception; gender (self-efficacy and optimism sub-dimensions), branch (optimism, trust, psychological resilience), the type of school they work in (optimism, psychological resilience sub-dimensions), vocational seniority (self-efficacy sub-dimension), number of teachers (psychological stability sub-dimension) variables it differs. Transformational leadership characteristics of school principals; meaningful innovation management with a high level of competence and positive, is significant and positive relationship with low levels of positive psychological capital. There was a low and positive relationship between the teachers' innovation management competence and positive psychological capital levels of teachers. As a result of structural equation modeling; positive psychological capital has an intermediary effect between transformational leadership and innovation management. Positive psychological capital; The model that deals with innovation management and transformational leadership relationship has yielded a meaningful and correct (0.01) result. Keywords: Transformational Leadership, Innovation Management, Positive Psychology