Characteristics Of Servant Leadership: Application For Nursing

Servant Leadership: Application for Nursing Servant leadership has been increasingly gaining in popularity not only in the business world but also in the world of nursing (van Dierendonck & Patterson, 2015). In order to encourage servant leadership one must first understand what servant leadership is, and what one’s personal role is within the position. One must also take a closer look at how these ideals of servant leadership affect one’s life and what qualities one can use to help enrich the communities, businesses, and lives around oneself. Conclusions can then be drawn about how one is better able to apply servant leadership in the care of patients to reduce cost and increase value of the care that is provided.
Characteristic of a Servant

However, there is a competing goal to lower cost but increase the value of the care provided (Trastek, Hamilton & Niles, 2014). In order to achieve these goals it is important that health care providers be trained in leadership so that they can provide the most effective care possible for their patients (Trastek, Hamilton & Niles, 2014). Of the many leadership styles available, the one most suited to fit health care from a nursing perspective is servant leadership because of the ingrained idea of serving people as a nurse (van Dierendonck & Patterson, 2015). It is often times considered to be one of the driving factors for people entering the nursing field to serve patients to enable them the best opportunities to regain or maintain wellness (Trastek, Hamiliton & Niles,

The characteristics brought forth in the book revolve around the ideas of Christianity and so they are not new ideas, but are ideas that were re-imagined for the current world. The basis of the book’s ideas comes mostly out of I Corinthian’s chapter 13 which is often quoted as the “love” chapter. This chapter speaks about how important love is in the Christian faith. However, Hunter (1998) brings forth knowledge of the different types of love from the Greek words used in the Bible. The type that is most important according to “the teacher” from the book is the agape love. This love is the most important kind because it is the kind of love we are meant to show to each and every person no matter who they are or what their position is in life (Hunter, 1998). This author strongly believes that agape love guides and acts as one of the foundations for servant leadership. Without this love for each person we cannot truly serve their needs and help them become the best possible version of themselves. The struggle is of course to treat each person we meet with agape love because it is not always easy to love everyone we meet. It is important, however, that we as nurses act in agape love to ensure that our patients receive the best care possible on their way to optimum