The purpose of the paper was to determine the influence of transformational and transactional
leadership stylesof the deans' on academic staff promotion and professional development. Three
research questions guided the study. It was a correlational design that involved 210 academic staff
purposely chosen from three federal universities in Nigeria. Two instruments are used in data
collection. Data are analyzed using Correlation coefficient. Results show a significant positive
relationship of deans' transformational leadership style on the academic staff promotion and
professional development. There was a very weak correlation of the deans' transactional leadership
style on the staff promotion but a positive correlation was obtained on professional development. A
significant positive influence of faculties on staff promotion and professional development was
observed. The paper concludesthat universitiesrequire academic leaders who can execute their jobs
with professionalism, honesty, discipline and uprightness in realizing institutions objectives with
exceptional managerial competences and leadership capacities.The paper suggests that the deans of
faculties in Nigerian universities should be utilizing transformational and transactional leadership
stylesin their administration to ensure thatstaff commitments and job satisfaction are enhanced and
sustained.
