The relationship between communication competence and team leadership behaviours of principals

The purpose of this research is to determine the levels of communication competence and team leadership behaviours of school principals according to teachers' views; to identify whether the views of the teachers differ according to variables such as gender, marital status, level of education, field, age, occupational seniority, working period with the present school principal, the districts where they work and to reveal degree and direction of the relationship between communication competence and team leadership behaviours. The teachers working in the state secondary schools in Bağcılar, Başakşehir and Esenyurt districts of Istanbul province in 2018-2019 educational year constituted the universe of the research. The samples from the identified districts were chosen with simple random sampling. As a result, it was reached to 408 teachers in Bağcılar, 361 teachers in Başakşehir and 398 teachers in Esenyurt, 1167 teachers in total. "Personal Information Form", "Communication Competence Scale" and "Team Leadership Scale" were used as data collection tools for the research. SPSS 22 and Lisrel 8.7 programs were used to analyze the collected data. The results about the level of the school principals' communication competence according to the teachers' views were ranked from high to low in the order of support, empathy and social relaxation. The results about the level of the school principals' team leadership behaviours according to the teachers' views were ranked from high to low in the order of empowering and motivating, effective communication and establishing reconciliation and cooperation. A high, positive and significant correlation was found between communication competence and team leadership behaviours. Communication competence was a significant predictor variable on team leadership behaviours.