Indeed, Kurland et al. as cited in Sayadi (2016) asserted that the quality of a school's leadership is critical to its performance. This shows that for schools to achieve their goals and objectives, they require efficient and effective leaders as well as highly satisfied teachers. As a result, schools cannot succeed without the efforts and devotion of their employees. In this regard, leadership styles and job satisfaction are critical elements for attracting and maintaining well-qualified teaching personnel. Leadership is one of the most significant aspects of employee job satisfaction (Rizi et al., 2013). It has a significant influence on staff motivation, engagement, and dedication. Although the relationship between leadership style and job satisfaction has been studied in a various sectors and settings, few of these studies have focused on the relationship in the context of basic education.

Leadership styles

Scholars and researchers in educational leadership have focused much of their interest and attention on school leadership over the years. This is basically due to the fact that leadership is considered as a motivator for followers and a resource mobilizer for achieving organizational goals (Abelha et al., 2018). In achieving this leadership task, leaders are expected to adopt a particular leadership style. Leadership style has been found to be a significant variable in organizational performance and usefulness in empirical studies on organizations. Given this, the schools need strong leadership to achieve desired outcomes and provide teachers with job satisfaction. House (1976) observed that a leader's style influences the job satisfaction their followers. Leaders’ traits may affect their leadership style, resulting in a favourable image of the leader among followers. This good view of the leader may lead to a beneficial shift in the group's attitude and behavior, resulting in increased job satisfaction and efficiency for the followers (Grosso, 2008). The idea of leadership style is described in this study as the pattern of the head teacher’s interaction or behavior in guiding, structuring,  and  facilitating  activities and relationships in a school. There is several leadership styles discussed and researched in school leadership literature, such as supportive, participatory, servant, spiritual, ethical, democratic, autocratic, laissez-faire, transformational, transactional, etc. However, nowadays, it appears that transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire leadership styles are receiving more interest and attention from educational researchers and experts in both developed and developing countries (Bass and Avolio, 2004; Sayadi, 2016). Based on this proposition, the current study chose the transactional, transformational, and laissez-faire leadership styles, which are briefly explained below:

Transformational leadership style

According to Wahab et al. (2014), transformational leadership is defined as inspiring change and empowering followers to achieve greater heights, improve themselves, and improve organizational processes. It is an enabling process causing followers to accept responsibility and the processes to which they are assigned (Koehler and Pankowski, 1997).

In the opinion of Aydin et al. (2013), a person who practices transformational leadership style is a leader who is concerned with having a good and friendly relation with employees, treats employees fairly and equitably, provides help, advice, and encourages employees’ personal and professional development through employee involvement in the decision-making process as well as concerned with the achievement of a goal or vision set. According to Yammarino and Bass (1990), this leadership style articulates a vision of the future stimulates and inspires the followers and impacts their faith and values. In this regard, “transformational leaders have a great ability to influence organisational commitment by promoting the values that are related to goal accomplishment, by emphasizing the relationship between employees’ efforts and goal achievement, and by creating a greater degree of personal commitment on the part of both followers and leaders” (Sayadi, 2016:57). This in turn, results in attainment of a common vision and goals. DeGroot et al. (2010) reported that transformational leadership is positively related to the effectiveness of the leader, the subordinate’s efforts and job satisfaction of employees. The four transformational leadership dimensions identified by Bass and Avolio (2004) are presented below:

Idealized influence

Idealized influence explains leaders who function as strong role models to their followers due to their exceptional abilities and high ethical and moral conduct principles. The  leader  tends to prioritize followers’ needs as compared to their own needs and offers them a vision. Idealized influence has two aspects: first idealized influence behaviour, which is linked with the leader’s behaviour, and second idealized influence attributed, which is related to the elements that are attributed to the leader by their followers. Thus, this leadership influence indicates whether the leader holds followers’ trust, maintains their faith and respect, shows dedication to them, appeals to their hopes and dreams, and acts as a role model. Hence, idealized influence results in followers attributions of charisma to the leader.

Inspirational motivation

This behaviour measures the extent to which the leader provides a vision, uses appropriate symbols and images to help followers focus on their work, and tries to make them feel their work is significant. In other words, the leader inspires followers by offering appealing visions of the upcoming circumstances, enriching followers’ aims and stimulating passion and optimism. The leader also provokes the group's spirit, conveys clear expectations and expresses dedication to objectives and a collective vision. Consequently, the leader creates and communicates a vision for the organisation.

Intellectual stimulation

Intellectual stimulation refers to the leadership that inspires followers to be creative and innovative and challenge their viewpoints and values and those of the leader and the organisation. Thus, it shows the degree to which the leader encourages followers to be creative in looking at old problems in new ways, creates enabling environment that is tolerant of seemingly extreme positions, and nurtures followers to question their values and beliefs in the organisation. Here, criticism of followers’ errors is not encouraged, and the leader promotes intelligence and careful problem-solving.

Individualised consideration

Individualised consideration specifies the degree to which the leader shows interest in followers’ well-being, assigns tasks individually, and pay attention to followers who seem less involved in the group’s activities. Northouse (2010) observed that individualised consideration represents a leader who focuses on each individual’s needs for accomplishments and growth to their full potential by offering an encouraging atmosphere, recognising the differences concerning each follower's needs and aspirations, and through performing the function of a mentor. That is, the leader gives personal attention  to  his/her  followers  and  treats  each  follower individually.

Transactional leadership style

This leadership style is underpinned by exchange theory, where a leader and followers decide the aims and procedure of attaining objectives through an exchange of rewards and the use of coercion to acquire the followers’ compliance and endeavor to accomplish organisational performance. Thus, transactional leaders use their authority to reward followers by giving them reward and status so that they will expend greater effort (Oguz, 2010). With such leadership, the leader takes the initiative in making contact with followers for the purpose of an exchange of valued things. The exchange could be economic or socio-political or even psychological in nature (Burns as cited in Sayadi, 2016). The two dimensions associated with transactional leadership are discussed below (Bass and Avolio, 2004).

Contingent reward

This leadership behaviour shows the degree to which the leader tells followers what to do to be rewarded, emphasise what the leader expects from followers, and recognise their accomplishments. It is, therefore, an exchange process between a leader and their followers in which a leader with the concurrence of followers decides the aims, defines rewards for achievement of those aims and provides agreed compensation when performance objectives are fulfilled (Northouse, 2010).

Management –by-exception

This assesses whether the leader tells followers the job requirements and standard performance. The leader, therefore, watches for and seeks out deviations from norms and takes corrective action where differences exist.

Laissez-faire leadership style

This type of leadership style measures whether the leader requires little of others to let things ride and let others do their own thing. In other words, it is characterised as non-leadership or the absence of leadership. A laissez-faire leader renounces his/her liability, delays decisions gives no feedback and offers less attention to assist followers in fulfilling their needs and aspirations (Northouse, 2010).

In this study, the conceptual framework encompasses the transformational, transactional and laissez-faire leadership   styles   of   headteachers’   and   is  taken  as independent variables.

Job satisfaction

Many educators and scholars appear to have discussed the idea of job satisfaction extensively, and the construct appears to have evolved over time. The majority of research on attitudes related to job performance now focuses on job satisfaction. Measurement of work satisfaction has been a crucial focus and attention of educational scholars in improving human resources more dynamically and efficiently in education (Ali et al., 2011). Teachers who work in schools as curriculum implementers deal with educational administration, management, curriculum, and instructional periods, all of which contribute to the growing job satisfaction crisis. As a result, school leaders must take a more proactive role in overcoming the hurdles and complexities that arise in order to maintain high levels of job satisfaction. This is because schools have more satisfied teachers who can deliver great instruction and guide students to success (Demirtau, 2010). According to the literature, the concept of job satisfaction appears to lack a common definition, resulting in a plethora of meanings. Job satisfaction, according to Spector (1997), is an appraisal of the overall quality of one's work. Job satisfaction is defined by Skaalvik and Skaalvik (2010) as positive or negative evaluative judgments about one's work. Job satisfaction refers to teachers' positive and favorable attitudes and emotions toward their jobs (Armstrong, 2006). In the context of this study, teachers' job satisfaction refers to the degree to which a teacher feels secure, rewarded, and successful in the current school setting in which he or she works.

Evans (2001) argued that teachers’ job satisfaction is “influenced much less by externally initiated factors such as salary, education policy and reforms and conditions of service, than by factors emanating from the more immediate context within which teachers work: institution-specific or, more precisely, job-specific factors” (292). Evans further established that “leadership emerged as a key attitudes-influencing factor since it shapes teachers’ work contexts and has the capacity, through policy and decision-making, to enable or constrain and to determine individual’s proximity to their ideal jobs” (294). Consequently, Sulan (2008) stated that job satisfaction amongst teachers in the school is closely related to teacher effectiveness that contributes to student achievement. In supporting this view, Zigarreli (1996) claimed that teachers’ job satisfaction is a strong predictor of effective schools. This shows that job satisfaction must be high because it is one of the school's critical success factors. In Nigeria, especially Nsukka education zone, teachers were less satisfied with their teaching jobs, as evidenced by indiscipline, occasional truancy,   examination   mismanagement,   and  travelling away from the teaching profession (Onwurah as cited in Adeyemi and Bolarinwa, 2013). This implies that a satisfied teacher is more likely to deliver enhanced performance and could be a prime element in improving an educational institution's quality and performance. Additionally, “teachers’ satisfaction from the job is vital for the nexus between teachers and students, for satisfied teachers will be more enthusiastic about investing time and energy in teaching their students” (Bogler, 2001:679). The implication is that the success and effectiveness of schools can be realised without focusing and investing on teachers, who have to be motivated, supervised and need to feel good at their school environments. Thus, teachers’ job satisfaction is crucial factor for achieving schools.

In Ghana, it appears that employee happiness is a major priority; yet, empirical research is lacking. As a result, job satisfaction among teachers is considered a dependent variable in this study.

Relationship between leadership style and teachers’ job satisfaction

Several research studies have been undertaken around the world to study the relationship between leadership styles and employee job satisfaction (Elmazi, 2018; Lumbantoruan et al., 2020). Here are a few of the empirical studies on the issue that have been published. An acceptable leadership style, according to Fowler, as quoted in Amin et al.  (2013), is more likely to boost teachers' job satisfaction. Ali and Dahie (2015), for example, looked into the effects of transactional, transformational, and laissez-faire leadership styles on teacher job satisfaction. The study discovered that in secondary schools in Mogadishu, Somalia, all three leadership styles (transactional, transformational, and laissez-faire) had a significant and positive impact on teacher satisfaction. Amin et al. (2013) looked at the relationship between leadership styles and faculty job satisfaction in a Pakistani public university. According to the findings, there was relationship between leadership styles (transformational, transactional, and laissez faire) and work satisfaction among faculty members. In their study of the factors that influence teachers' job happiness in Karachi, Pakistan, Rahim and Razzak (2013) discovered that leadership styles had a positive and significant impact on teachers' job satisfaction. In Isfahan, Rizi et al. (2013) studied the relationships between leadership styles and job satisfaction in physical education organizations. The finding revealed a strong relationship between overall leadership styles and job satisfaction. Bateh and Heyliger (2014) found that faculty members who identified transformational leadership as dominant had improved job satisfaction, while faculty members who identified transactional leadership as dominant  had  decreased  job satisfaction. They reached the conclusion that academic leaders can take more action by adjusting their leadership styles based on the preferences of their faculty members. Rad and Yarmohammadian (2006) conducted a descriptive study in Isfahan University Hospitals, Iran to investigate the impact of managers' leadership styles on employee work satisfaction. According to the finding, there was a relationship between the use of leadership behaviors and employee work satisfaction. Kiboss and Jemiryott (2014) discovered that principals' leadership styles had a significant impact on teachers' job happiness when they studied the association between principals' leadership styles and job satisfaction among Kenyan public secondary school teachers. Turey (2013) discovered that athletic directors' leadership and job satisfaction had a moderate relationship. In a similar vein, Mohammadi et al. (2012) investigated the relationship between principals' leadership styles and teachers' job satisfaction in the Kabrizak Region and discovered that there was a direct relationship between the two. Based on these previous study findings, it can be deduced that there are mixed findings regarding the relationship between leadership style and job satisfaction.

Transformational leadership style and job satisfaction

Globally, there have been different research studies conducted to examine the interplay between transformational leadership style and employees’ job satisfaction. Abelha et al. (2018) found that there was relationship between transformational leadership style and job satisfaction. Elmazi (2018) revealed that transformational leadership style of principal had a strong positive effect on teachers' job satisfaction in a study that looked at the impact of principal leadership style on high school teachers' job satisfaction. According to Sayadi (2016), transformational leadership style was linked to teacher job satisfaction. Wahab et al. (2014) conducted research on headmasters' transformational leadership and its impact on teacher job satisfaction. The study's finding revealed that headmasters adopted transformational leadership style, and teachers' job satisfaction was also high, with a statistically significant relationship between the transformational leadership style and teacher job satisfaction. Gkolia et al. (2014) found that transformational leadership had an effect on teachers' job satisfaction in a conducted at Greece. Arumugam et al. (2019) found a significant positive correlation between transformational leadership style and employee job satisfaction in Malaysia. The impact of leadership style on job happiness among Iranian hotel employees was studied by Arzi and Farahbod (2014), who found that transformational leadership, intellectual stimulation, vision, and supporting leadership had a significant impact on employee satisfaction.

Transactional leadership style and job satisfaction

Suryani (2018) in a study found discovered a positive relationship between transactional leadership style and job satisfaction. Javed et al. (2014) investigated the relationship between leadership styles and employee job satisfaction in Pakistan's private banking sector. The findings revealed relationship between transactional leadership style and employee job satisfaction, with transactional leadership style being more widely used by leaders than transformational leadership style. Spitzbart (2013) discovered a considerable positive influence of transactional leadership style on employee job satisfaction in the hotel business in the Netherlands when examining the impact of transactional and transformational leadership on job satisfaction. In a similar vein, Utami and Suana (2015) found a favorable correlation between transactional leadership style and employee job satisfaction. Recently, Lumbantoruan et al. (2020) reported that transactional leadership style improved employee job satisfaction. Saleem (2015), on the other hand, found a negative association between transactional leadership style and teacher job satisfaction. Elmazi (2018) found that transactional leadership style has no effect on high school teachers' job happiness in a study that looked at the impact of principal leadership style on teacher job satisfaction. According to Oino and Asghar (2018), transactional leadership style has a negligible impact on job satisfaction. Based on the preceding empirical review, it can be concluded that the relationship between transactional leadership style and job satisfaction has mixed results.

Laissez-faire leadership style and job satisfaction

Adeyemi and Bolarinwa (2013) conducted a correlational study in secondary schools in Ondo State, Nigeria, to evaluate principals' leadership style and teachers' job satisfaction. There was a statistically significant relationship between principals' leadership style and teacher job satisfaction in the schools, but there was no such relationship between laissez-faire leadership style and job contentment. Teachers were also found to have a modest level of job satisfaction in the survey. Munir and Iqbal (2018) found a negative relationship between laissez-faire leadership style and teacher job happiness in a study that looked at the relationship between principal leadership styles and teacher job satisfaction.

Similarly, Obongo (2019) investigated principals’ leadership styles and their relationship with teachers’ job satisfaction in Kenya and reported a negative significant correlation between laissez-faire leadership style and teachers’ job satisfaction. Deshpande et al. (2018) also found negative correlation between lasseiz-faire leadership style and job satisfaction.

From the above empirical reviews, the relationship between the leadership styles and job satisfaction are very well-researched area and most studies have focused on business organisations (Abelha et al., 2018; Arumugam et al., 2019; Arzi and Farahbod, 2014; Javed et al., 2014; Lumbantoruan et al., 2020; Oino and Asghar, 2018; Rad and Yarmohammadian, 2006; Spitzbart, 2013) and others concentrated on the educational institutions (Adeyemi and Bolarinwa, 2013; Ali and Dahie, 2015; Amin et al., 2013; Bateh and Heyliger, 2014; Elmazi, 2018; Grosso, 2008; Kiboss and Jemiryott, 2014; Munir and Iqbal, 2018; Obongo, 2019; Saleem, 2015; Sayadi, 2016; Turey, 2013; Wahab et al., 2014). Even those studies centered on the education, most of them focused on university faculty members (Amin et al., 2013; Bateh and Heyliger, 2014; Grosso, 2008; Munir and Iqbal, 2018; Saleem, 2015) whiles others on secondary school teachers (Adeyemi and Bolarinwa, 2013; Ali and Dahie, 2015; Amin et al., 2013; Elmazi, 2018; Kiboss and Jemiryott, 2014; Turey, 2013; Wahab et al., 2014). However, there is lack of research that has been conducted to examine the leadership styles of basic school head teachers’ on the teachers’ job satisfaction. Furthermore, there is limited local literature available at basic education level focusing on this particular aspect, more especially in the Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region. Therefore, the current study only attempts to fill this research void. The main purpose of the study was to ascertain the relationship between head teachers’ leadership style and job satisfaction as perceived by public basic school teachers. Based on this purpose, specifically, the following research questions guided this study.

1) What is the predominant leadership style used by basic school head teachers’ in Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region?

2) What is the level of job satisfaction among the public basic school teachers in the Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region?

3) Are there any relationship(s) between head teachers’ leadership styles (transformational, transactional and laissez-faire) and teachers’ job satisfaction in the public basic schools in the Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region?

This study might be useful for the Ghana Education Service (GES) to initiate further research projects in this area and, consequently, introduce innovations and reforms to develop basic school leadership that may enhance job satisfaction. Moreover, the study would help the GES and head teachers measure the extent to which their teachers are satisfied working in their schools. Moreover, the study will help the GES and headmasters/ mistresses to measure the extent to which their teachers are satisfied in working in their schools. Furthermore, the study may offer an opportunity to compare and contrast the similar research studies from other settings, and  also to explore the influence of country context on the interplay between leadership styles of headmasters/ mistresses’ and teachers’ job satisfaction.

Research design

The descriptive survey design was used in this investigation. This design is non-experimental since it examines relationships between non-manipulated variables in a natural setting (Cohen et al., 2018). The researchers employed the descriptive survey method since the study's main focus was to gather data on public basic school head teachers’ leadership styles on job satisfaction among the teachers. This design provided the opportunity to respondents to indicate their perception to leadership style of head teachers and their job satisfaction through survey.

Participants

The participants in this study were male and female public basic school teachers from the Kwabre East Municipal in Ashanti Region, Ghana. Ten school circuits were chosen using a simple random sampling technique. This technique was also employed to select 30 teachers from each school circuit to form the sample for the study. In all, 300 teachers were involved in the study. The participants were not obligated to participate in the study and might opt-out at any point if they so desired.

Materials

A self-administered questionnaire was utilized to obtain the data. The questionnaire was made up of an introduction and three parts. The introduction section briefly informed the respondents about the purpose of the study and assurance of anonymity for any information they would provide. The first part of the questionnaire was designed to gather demographic information from the respondents. It inquired about participants’ gender, age, educational qualification, and years of teaching experience. Part two comprised of three sections which had 21 items dealing with (1) issues in transformational leadership, (2) transactional leadership, and (3) laissez-faire leadership which was developed by Bass and Avolio (2004) tagged “Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire Form 6S. This part required respondents to make their responses on a four-point scale, ranging; 4 = frequently, if not always, 3 = fairly often, 2 = sometimes, and 1= once in a while. Finally, the third part of the questionnaire was about the teachers’ job satisfaction. The teachers’ satisfaction was examined using the instrument tagged “Teaching Satisfaction Scores” (TSS) developed by Ho and Au (2006). The TSS had five items (I am satisfied with being a teacher) and they were measured on a five-point Likert type with the endpoints 1=strongly disagree to 5=strongly agree.

The validity and reliability of the scales in the study instrument were re-established because they were adopted. As a result, specialists in instructional design, research and educational measurement and evaluation validated the instrument's face validity. The structure, layout, alignment, and arrangement of the questionnaire were checked to determine the instrument's face validity. The instrument was tested for its reliability on a group of 35  teachers (n = 35) from four schools in the Afigya Sekyere District, which was outside of the study area. Basically, there were no confusing items discovered during the pilot test. The Cronbach Alpha index was used to determine the reliabilities of the scales in the  instrument.  For  leadership  styles and teacher job satisfaction, the measures yielded reliability coefficients of 0.86 and 0.83, respectively. A reliability coefficient of 0.78, according to Fraenkel and Wallen (2000), is satisfactory. The high-reliability coefficients of the scales suggest that the items in the scale were internally consistent. As a result, the researchers decided that the instrument was reliable and appropriate for the study, and they continued to administer it to the 300 participants.

Procedure

The researchers initially sought authorization from the Kwabre East Municipal Education Directorate to administer the instrument, which assured that the questionnaires were administered smoothly and without problems. The researchers then personally delivered questionnaires to the respondents in their respective schools. This gave the researchers an opportunity to clarify and direct the respondents on any issues they might have had while filling out the questionnaire. The respondents were given one week to respond to the items in the questionnaire and this enabled the respondents to answer the questionnaire items in their own convenience time. The completed questionnaires were collected back from the respondents after one week in their respective schools. In all, 286 out of 300 questionnaires were completed and returned, representing a 95.3% return rate.

Data analysis procedure

After the data were collected from the respondents, the researchers screened, coded and inputted the data into IBM SPSS version 25, a computer programme for data analysis. Both descriptive (means and standard deviations) and inferential (Spearman Product Moment Correlation) statistics were used in answering the stated research questions. Specifically, research questions one and two were answered using means and standard deviations while research question three was answered using inferential statistics of Spearman correlation.

The results are shown in Tables 1 to 4. The results from the study are therefore presented in the order of the formulated research questions.

Background information of respondents

For this study, data were also obtained on the respondents’ gender, age, highest educational qualification and years of teaching experience. The results are highlighted in Table 1.

From Table 1, it is evident that 157(54.9%) of the respondents were males whiles 129(45.1%) were females. This result indicates that majority of the respondents in this study were the male teachers. On the issue of age, 59(20.6%) of the respondents were aged below 30 years, 124(43.4%) of them were aged between 31-40 years, 68(23.8%) were aged between 41-50 years while 35(12.2%) were aged between 51-60 years. This result means that the majority of the respondents 183 (64%) were aged between below 30-40  years,  indicating that they were youthful. For the highest educational qualification, 64(22.4%) were diploma holders, 197(68.9%) were bachelor holders and 25(8.7%) of the respondents had their master’s degree. This result implies that majority of the respondents had their first degree.  Finally, regarding their years of teaching experience, 62(21.7%) of the respondents had taught for less than 5 years, 119(41.6%) had 6-10 years of teaching experience, 52(18.2%) had 11-15 years of teaching experience, 31(10.8%) had 16-20 years of teaching experience and 22(7.7%) had 21 and above years of teaching experience.

Research question one: What is the predominant leadership style used by basic school head teachers’ in Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region?

This question sought to find out from the teachers about the public basic school head teachers' perceived leadership style. The data collected were analysed using means and standard deviations. The findings are presented in Table 2.

From Table 2, the transformational leadership style was found to be the predominant leadership style used by head teachers of public basic schools in the Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region (M=3.84, SD=1.53). The second most preferred leadership style used by head teachers as perceived by the public basic school teachers was laissez-faire (M=3.01, SD=1.68) and the least used leadership style by head teachers’ of public basic schools was transactional leadership style (M=2.67, SD=1.76). This result implies that most head teachers in the municipality were using transformational leadership style in their schools.

Research question two: What is the level of job satisfaction among the public basic school teachers in the Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region?

This question sought to determine the job satisfaction level among the teachers in the municipal. Therefore, in answering the question, data on teachers’ job satisfaction were collected from the responses of the teachers on teachers’ job satisfaction scale. The data collected were analysed using mean and standard deviation. Table 3 presents the findings.

As shown in Table 3, the teachers, in general were moderately satisfied with their teaching job (M = 3.28, SD =1.87). This means that most of the teachers are pretty satisfied with the teaching job in the Kwabre East Municipal.

Research question three: Are there any relationships between head teachers’ leadership styles (transformational, transactional and laissez-faire) and teachers’ job satisfaction in public basic schools inKwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region?

In answering this research question, data on head teachers’   leadership    style    were   collected   from  the responses of the respondents to subscales of the head teachers’ leadership style questionnaire. Data on teachers’ job satisfaction were collected from the respondents' responses on the teachers’ job satisfaction scale. The relationships were tested using Spearman Product Moment Correlation. The findings are displayed in Table 4.

Results presented in Table 4, revealed head teachers’ transformational leadership style correlated significantly with teachers’ job satisfaction (r =0.539, p<0.01). However, with regard to transactional, laissez-faire and overall leadership styles of the head teachers’, there were no statistically significant relationships between transactional and job satisfaction (r =0.58, p>.05); between laissez-faire and job satisfaction (r =0.-033, p> 0.05);   and    between  overall  leadership  style  and  job satisfaction (r = 0.094, p >0.05).

This present study explored the leadership styles of head teachers’ and job satisfaction as perceived by the public basic school teachers in the Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region, Ghana. In the study, it was found that the transformational leadership style was the predominant leadership style adopted by head teachers’ of public basic schools. It can be said that even though many leadership styles are being practiced, transformational leadership style in the opinion of Hallinger (2007) is the best leadership style that could drive change to the much behaviour of the teachers in the schools. According to Selamat et al. (2013), a transformational leader is a change agent who causes change in the classroom. As a result, school organizations urgently require transformational leadership, particularly in the development of individual teacher potential. According to Klein and House, as described by Spitzbart (2013), how teachers see transformational leadership is often based on the character of the teacher, and such leaders are more inclined to exercise their power and are self-assured among their followers, such as teachers (Brown and Arendt, 2011). This finding is consistent with the finding of Wahab et al. (2014) who found that headmasters in the Temerloh area of Malaysia used transformational leadership style. On the other hand, the finding contradicts an empirical study by Javed et al. (2014) who revealed that leaders preferred transactional leadership over transformational leadership. This finding can be interpreted to mean that transformational leadership creates a collegial working environment that allows basic school teachers to feel more comfortable. Perhaps, the differences in the findings between the current and previous studies could be explained by Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs theory, which suggests that every teacher requires different things at different times within his/her culture and environmental setting.

Furthermore, the study indicated that teachers had a moderate level of job satisfaction. This shows that the public basic school teachers in the Kwabre East Municipal are quite happy with their job. This finding is similar to earlier research finding of Adeyemi and Bolarinwa (2013) who found that secondary school teachers in Ondo State, Nigeria, had moderate job satisfaction in a study that looked at the impact ofprincipal leadership styles on job satisfaction. However, the current finding of this study contradicts a previous study of Onwurah, cited in Adeyemi and Bolarinwa (2013) who reported that teachers in Nigeria, particularly in the Nsukka education zone, were dissatisfied with their jobs, resulting in indiscipline, occasional truancy, examination mismanagement, and leaving the profession.

The finding also revealed that there was no relationship between head teachers transactional leadership style and their teachers' job satisfaction in Kwabre East Municipal. This indicates that transactional leadership style  of  head teachers does not improve teacher job satisfaction. This finding is in line with Bass's (1999) claim that under transactional leadership, followers such as teachers are powerless to increase their job satisfaction. As a result, the study's finding also suggests that transactional leadership is the least effective in transforming the work environment since it assumes that individuals are primarily driven by simple rewards such as punishments and rewards management. A major implication of this current finding is that when head teachers and teachers decide on the goals and procedures for achieving them through an exchange of rewards and the use of coercion to obtain teachers' compliance and effort in order to achieve organizational performance, teachers' job satisfaction is reduced. This finding also contradicts previous researches of Javed et al. (2014), Lumbantoruan et al. (2020), Rizi et al. (2013), Spitzbart (2013) and Suryani (2018). For instance, Utami and Suana (2015) found that principals' transactional leadership style correlated significantly and positively with their teachers' job satisfaction in a study conducted in Kenya's Nandi South District. However, this current finding is consistent with previous findings of Elmazi (2018) and Oino and Asghar (2018). For example, in their empirical study, Kiboss and Jemiryott (2014) reported that there was no statistically significant association between principals' transactional leadership style and teachers' job satisfaction.

Head teachers' transformational leadership style was found to have a strong positive relationship with teachers' job satisfaction, implying that head teachers' transformational style enhances teachers' job satisfaction. This indicates that, head teachers might have motivate, inspire, create a positive environment, and serve as role models for teachers.

According Bass (1999), transformational leaders are capable of motivating and inspiring teachers to collaborate in order to achieve the school's goal and vision. They normally encourage and strengthen each teacher who is eager to work and succeed (Arumugam et al., 2019). Teachers' job satisfaction will be induced in facilitating the achievement of organizational goals if the practice of transformational leadership can be improved in school organizations. This finding is consistent with prior   researches  of   Arugugam  et  al.  (2019); Arzi and Farahbod (2014), Elmazi (2018); Gkolia et al. (2014); Sakem (2015); Sayadi (2016); Turey (2013); and Wahab et al. (2014), all of which reported comparable findings that there was positive relationship between transformational leadership style and job satisfaction. The current discovery is not surprising at all, as transformational leaders pay close attention to their followers' needs and motivations, as well as attempting to help people attain their full potential (Northouse, 2010). The findings suggest that head teachers may have addressed teachers' demands and concerns, satisfied their wants and expectations, inspired them to go above and beyond what was expected of them, and pushed them to be creative and inventive, resulting in higher teacher satisfaction.

Furthermore, the lack of a significant relationship between head teachers' laissez-faire leadership style and teacher job satisfaction implies that when head teachers demonstrate a "I don't care policy" or "carefree" attitude in their leadership style, teachers' job satisfaction is more likely to suffer. This result supports the earlier research finding of Adeyemi and Bolarinwa (2013), who found that principals' laissez-faire leadership style had no significant relationship with job satisfaction among Nigerian secondary school teachers in a study done in Ondo State. The current finding also supports the findings of Deshpande et al. (2018), Munir and Iqbal (2018), and Obongo (2019), who found that a laissez-faire leadership style does not have any relationship with job satisfaction. The study's findings, on the other hand, contradict prior findings of Ali and Dahie (2015) and Amin et al. (2013) who indicated that school leaders' laissez-faire leadership style had a significant relationship with teachers' job satisfaction in their separate studies.

Additionally, the study result revealed that there was no significant association between overall head teachers' leadership styles and teachers' job satisfaction. This suggests that head teachers' general leadership styles are completely unrelated to their teachers' job satisfaction. As a result, the leadership styles of head teachers have little bearing on teacher job satisfaction. This current finding, however, contradicts the finding of Amin et al. (2013) who reported a significant association between overall leadership styles and teacher job satisfaction. This finding is not consistent with assertion made by Rizi et al. (2013) that in determining the job satisfaction of teachers, leadership style is viewed as an important predictor and plays central role as well. The current finding is also at variance with other previous studies of Ali and Dahie (2015); Kiboss and Jemiryott (2014); Mohammadi et al. (2012); Rad and Yarmohammadian (2006); Rahim and Razzak (2013) and Turey (2013).

According to the findings of  this study, the  transformational leadership style was found to be the predominantly leadership style utilized by the public basic school head teachers in Kwabre East Municipal of Ashanti Region. More importantly, the fact that teachers are moderately satisfied suggests that they are more likely to teach effectively in the classroom even though they might have some reservations. Furthermore, the findings of the study led the researchers to the conclusion that teachers' job satisfaction was completely unrelated to the overall leadership styles employed by public basic school head teachers.

Based on the findings and conclusions of this study, it was recommended that all head teachers of public basic schools in the municipality should be given requisite training on the transformational leadership style so that they can use it effectively in their day-to-day administrative functions. Additionally, Ghana Education Service should encourage head teachers to adopt transformational leadership style since this leadership style has positive relationship with job satisfaction of teachers. Furthermore, in order to improve job satisfaction among the public basic school teachers, head teachers must be aware of their own behavioral patterns and leadership styles. Moreover, Ghana Education Service should provide teachers with an appropriate work environment –both in material and moral aspects to achieve the ultimate goals of modern education. Finally, Ghana Education Service should train head teachers so that they would be cognizance of teachers’ job satisfaction patterns and styles of leadership in order to enhance better job satisfaction.

In the course of this research, certain areas of limitations were identified for which further research can be carried out. Firstly, this study adopted cross-sectional descriptive survey which looked at teachers’ job satisfaction at a given time. Since teachers’ job satisfaction change over time, it is suggested that longitudinal studies should be conducted to enable researchers and educational authorities to track, monitor and address teachers’ job satisfaction over a longer period. Secondly, further studies on the same study area may be done by extending to cover more schools in Ashanti Region or other parts of Ghana to assess the relationship between perceived school heads’ leadership styles’ and teachers’ job satisfaction. Lastly, further studies on the same area should assess the effect of demographic information like gender, age, educational qualification on school heads’ leadership style and teachers’ job satisfaction.

The authors have not declared any conflicts of interests.