Leading By Serving: Servant Leadership

Servant leadership isn’t applied or adequate to only one type of culture or even one type of culture. Servant leadership can actually be applied to all walks of life and all parts of the world. For example, the culture of the Japanese and the religion of the Hindu people both embrace a sense of what we call servant leadership. All religions and cultures have their own unique way in which they apply servant leadership, either based on their beliefs, history, or lifestyles. The significance of servant leadership is demonstrated in different ways within each culture and religion even when some cultures are not aware that what they are implying is servant leadership. As religions and cultures change and expand through time the concept of servant leadership is adapted and applied in different ways.

The foundation of my personal leadership philosophy can be found in the principles of servant leadership as spelled out by Greenleaf (1970, 1977). Leadership is granted to individuals who are by nature servants. An individual emerges as a leader by first becoming a servant. Servant leaders attend to the needs of those they serve and help them become more informed, free, self-sufficient, and like servants themselves. Leaders and those they serve improve, enhance, and develop each other through their connection. A leader must also be conscious of inequalities and social injustices in the organizations they serve and work actively to resolve those issues. Servant leaders rely less on the use of official power and control, but focus on empowering those they

One study found that servant leadership leads to higher levels of commitment to the supervisor and efficiency in work. My experience agrees with this finding. By exercising the four servant leadership practices mentioned above, I believe one will not just become a better leader, but also a better person as

From the group Biblical Integration Paper, it was understood that servant-leadership is not only a gift of purpose that God places in the hearts of His people, but it is also a calling in one’s life to truly touch the lives of others in need. Living a successful life, as a servant-leader is not one that focuses on self-fulfillment, rather it is in seeking a fulfillment that comes from Christ when one pours him/herself out for the sake of others. It is through servant-leadership that one is able to bring hope into hopeless situations (Group Integration Paper,

What do you think the goals are for the program as a whole? How do you see yourself fitting with these goals? As the Lone Star Band continues to grow in size, I visualize the number of servant leaders growing as well. I believe that it is the duty of current student leaders to build up the future leaders of the band, and I would like to take part in this responsibility. I think that the goals for the band as a whole are to continue seeking excellence in all that we do. We are not trophy-chasers, but I believe it is the band’s goal to be the best version ourselves in and out of the field. I will always remember Mr. Golden telling us that his goal for us was to experience greatness, and I see myself fitting with this goal through motivating my peers by modeling persistence and hard

Servant leadership is best know for placing the needs and wants of others above those of the leader; this helps to create a trusting and empowered team of followers to help organizations reach their goals (Mahembe & Engelbrecht, 2014). The servant leadership model is able to help nonprofit organizations gain a competitive advantage in ways that are not necessarily profit driven, such as improving employee satisfaction and commitment to the organization (Center for Servant Leadership, n.d.). The improvement of employee satisfaction has been linked to improved customer satisfaction, which helps to build support for the organization (Center for Servant Leadership, n.d.).

The terms servant and leader are typically thought of as being contradictory terms. However, the theory of servant leadership has started gaining more and more notoriety over the last several years. Many organizations are learning that the management and leadership styles of the past are no longer inspiring or influencing the workers of today (Hunter, 1998). Servant leadership combines being able to identify and meet the needs of employees and patients by using the characteristics one poses to positively impact and influence them. Most simply put it is the combination of utilizing ones characteristics to do the right thing (Hunter, 1998). The Servant describes many characteristics that make a leader a good leader and this paper will explore a few of those characteristics and how they influence the nursing profession. Namely, commitment to the growth of others, empathy and being an active/receptive listener.

John Barbuto and Daniel Wheeler (2006, 300)—authors of “Scale Development and Construct Clarification of Servant Leadership”—state that Greenleaf (1977) developed 11 dimensions of servant leadership that include: “calling, listening, empathy, healing, awareness, persuasion, conceptualization, foresight, stewardship, growth, and community building.” Again, it should be noted that although Greenleaf (1977) uses the term “calling,” he does not use it in a spiritual sense, but more on a secular level (Barbuto and Wheeler 2006, 300). The results from Barbuto and Wheeler’s (2006) investigation found only five dimensions that relate to servant leadership and not all of them the same as those put forth by Greenleaf (1977). These five dimensions include

Upon completing studies at Concordia University, Graduate students are equipped for service in various settings, such as a member of a faith-based organization, at work, in your home, in the community and in the world. However, simply having the knowledge to serve others is not enough. Service to others is not about watching and waiting for service opportunity to arise. Instead, one must actually “pick up their mat” and look for ways to be of service to other and then act on upon those opportunities.

According to Greenleaf (2002), a servant leader is “one who serves first”, In addition, Greenleaf has argued that there are several characteristic that a servant leader should display. These included listening, empathy, healing, awareness, persuasion, conceptualization, foresight, stewardship, commitment to the growth of people, and building a community. Of all the ten characteristics that were identified, listening was the epitome of them all. Listening can be proven to be a very vital part of the success of an organization. Increased trust and communication skills can be produced when the characteristic of listening is present.

Values of Servant Leadership 6 This section will consider four leadership styles and expatiate on the primary values that distinguish servant leadership. Transformational leadership is said to take place when leaders build, broaden, and raise the interests and commitment of their employees or followers towards a shared purpose and mission, and empower them (followers or employees) to accomplish those purposes and mission (Stone, Russell, & Patterson, 2003). A person who exemplified transformational leadership is Mother Teresa. Transactional leadership is the leadership style which involves the exchange of valuable things and contractual agreement between the leader and the follower or employee in other to achieve a win-win balance in objective (Northouse, 2007). Charismatic leadership according to Hay & Hodgkinson

Servers are thought to be submissive followers and leaders are thought to be powerful decision makers and as contrast as serving and leading can seam to be at first thought they can have much more overlapping roles. Helping others so they will in turn help you is by no means a new concept; it is one that has in fact been around for at least the last two thousand years. However, it was Robert K Greenleaf that took that general idea and reshaped the roles of serving and leading molding then into one philosophy of Servant Leadership (Keith, 2015). Greenleaf’s concept was that “the servant-leader is servant first” meaning not that a leader should be slavish or submissive but that they should have a desire to know the needs of others and ensure those needs are meet (Keith, 2015).

Accepting the position at UCCC stimulated a nervous feeling that overpowered the feeling of excitement. One of the first task that needed to be done was to write my own job description. This was the first sign that lead me to believe that I walked into a turmoil. However, my preconceived ideas quickly disappeared as I realized this was my opportunity to grow as a leader and to lead the staff to their own success.

As written in the lines above, employee engagement has a significant impact on an employee and their engagement. Although there has been many articles and research written about leadership and servant leadership, in this study, it will provide and overview, key traits and influences that servant leaders use in collaboration to address significant problems with strategy and other individuals. Therefore, how do managers and leaders facilitate the engagement of their employees? Leaders do this through their leadership style. In 1970, Robert K. Greenleaf identified servant-leadership, which was different from the traditional views of leadership. According to Greenleaf, “The servant-leader is a servant first. Servant

This review acknowledges that additional empirical research is needed on servant leadership especially its current and potential future role in organisations. The authors state that Greenleaf warned that servant leadership would be extremely difficult to apply in an operational setting such as a company.