More handpicked essays just for you.
Explain the concept of servant leadership in theory and practice
Servant leadership compares and contrasts to other forms of leadership
Application of servant leadership
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
As implied by its name, servant leadership can be defined as “providing leadership that focuses on the good of those who are being led and those whom the organization serves’’ (Hamilton & Nord, 2005, p. 875). Greenleaf (2002) suggests that as opposed to being the central focus of the group, servant leadership places the leader in alignment with the group, allowing for support and resources to be allocated to its members. Moreover, servant leaders act as organizational directors, fostering a sense of community between organizational members (Greenleaf, 1977). In contrast to the traditional top-down paradigm of leadership, the servant leader is placed at the bottom of the hierarchy (Rieke, Hammermeister, & Chase, 2008), thereby allowing for the needs of followers to be met. The major focus of this approach to leadership is to encourage the growth, autonomy, and learning of followers, which in turn will influence and enhance future organizational leadership and growth (Bass, 2000). Through behaviors such as empathizing and nurturing followers, the servant leader places the concerns of his or her followers at the forefront, allowing them to reach their own personal capabilities (Northouse, 2012). Moreover, an overarching theme of servant leadership is the ethical behavior the leaders exhibits toward followers (Walumbwa, Hartnell, & Oke, 2010). That is, the servant leader possesses a sincere concern for the well-being of followers (Caldwell et al., 2011). Thus, this brand of leadership focuses on the altruistic behaviors of the leader and the effects that these behaviors have on the followers.
Since the initial framework of servant leadership was developed by Greenleaf (1970), the approach has been adopted by a variety of organizatio...
... middle of paper ...
...realized as gains in organizational functioning and performance. For example, servant leadership behaviors target the contextual activity of employees, allowing for teams and organizations to function more smoothly. As a result, the potency and task clarity of team and organizational are enhanced.
Societal impact. In addition to improvements to organizational performance, servant leadership is expected to enhance the larger community and society. Although societal impact is not often measured in servant leadership research, and beyond the scope of this study, examples include organizations providing jobs to the members of the community it serves and positively impacting society though charity. Additionally, servant leadership is theorized to propagate through society by those exposed to it by putting others first and promoting positive change within the community.
The Servant Leader discusses the importance of leaders who adopt a service oriented attitude in which they care for the needs of others before their own. A servant leader need not be an actual servant or have ever been a servant to become a servant leader. Rather, a servant leader is born with or adopts an “others first” disposition. Climbing through the ranks may help to create a servant leader, though it is not necessary. When leaders choose to see that the needs of their followers or their organizations are the highest priority they become servants.
Servant leadership is a philosophy and set of practices that augments the lives of individuals, builds better organizations, and creates a more just and caring world, they put the team first, and themselves second (MindTools, 2015). Servant leaders are able to demonstrate their traits through interaction with followers and other leaders within the organization. The characteristics of servant leaders include their commitment to the growth of people, stewardship, and building community, and provide leaders with the opportunity to experience change and to invite followers to change (Savage-Austin & Honeycutt 2011). Servant leadership encourages leaders and followers to ‘raise one another to higher levels of motivation and morality’, and set their leadership focus: follower’s first, organizations second, their own needs last (Sendjaya, Sarros, & Santora, 2008). The servant leader focuses on the needs of others to include team members.
Servant leadership is a perplexing theory. It takes on radical ideas like a lifetime employment policy, or employee-wide furlough, to illustrate how putting the leader at the service of their employees can result in efficient leadership. “When individuals engage in servant leadership, it is likely to improve outcomes at the individual, organizational, and societal levels (PSU, 2014)". The servant leadership actions of Charlie Kim and Bob Chapman depict how the proper use of servant leadership creates trust, and inspires productivity; benefiting their organization, their employees, and
Servant leaders are servants first, have a genuine want to serve others, and ultimately make a conscious decision to lead others (Greenleaf, Senge, Covey, & Spears, 2002)Click and drag to move. Servant leadership is based upon twelve unique principles that ultimately improve the wellbeing of the followers and the community (Greenleaf et al., 2002)Click and drag to move. Many great leaders utilize a multitude of these principles to help motivate, influence, and lead others. Individuals that exhibit servant leadership qualities, such as Martin Luther King, Jr., possess skills and qualities that help motivate others and driven by a sense of a higher calling (Northouse, 2016)Click and drag to move.
The quality of any organization that uses servant leadership improves, because of the organization’s continuous efforts on development. These efforts help create more efficient, content, empowered and innovative teams to generate more profitability (Schmidt, 2013). Starbucks’ employee satisfaction rate has increased and they have markedly grown since 2014 with their attempt to build a community by offering the free college tuition (Business Wire,
The development of the Servant Leadership Questionnaire (SLQ) by Barbuto and Wheeler (2006) provided a means to conduct empirical research on servant leadership behavior. Sendjaya, Sarros, and Santora (2008) have also published another instrument claiming to measure servant leadership called the Servant Leadership Behaviour Scale. Servant Leadership Questionnaire (SLQ), through meticulous scale and construct validation, has developed an instrument to highlight five distinct characteristics of servant leaders: altruistic calling, emotional healing, wisdom, persuasive mapping and organizational stewardship. My research seeks to answer the drive that brings about these characteristics in an individual, thus making the individual a servant leader and also to know if spiritual inclination of an individual can be the thrust of altruistic calling and stewardship of an
Servant-leaders constantly strive to be visionary, competent, trustworthy, caring, empowering, relational, self-aware, community builders, and good stewards. While as in a Transformational leader, increases morale, performance, and motivation of people through a various of mechanisms. This involves linking the follower’s sense of identity and self to the development and the group identity of the Human Resource Framework. It also involves being a role model for employees, motivating them and keeping them captivated. Transformational leadership also plays a role of challenging people to take bigger ownership for their duties, and comprehending their strengths and weaknesses, aligning with their tasks that improve their
Egalitarianism and Empowering were recommended more strongly in western cultures but less so in Asian and similar cultures. However, servant leadership dimensions of Empathy and Humility more strongly endorsed in Asian cultures than Western cultures. Such a leader by example, willing to become a servant to serve to lead; Its leadership is also the result of the to extend its service function. Servant leaders encourage cooperation, trust, seer, listening as well as the power of moral purpose. Servant leadership is not necessarily formal leadership positions. The advantage of servant leadership: the first is the servant leadership is a long-term work, the way of life evolution, it can stimulate positive changes within the community. The second one is Servant Leadership often compared with Transformational Leadership. The latter also attaches great importance to the collaboration. When both are shown to be the leader of grave concern, servant leadership more highlight its service characteristics, and the aspirations of transformational leadership are the leader in the service of organizational goals. Center of gravity in the organization for leadership is lead employees; this is the watershed of transformational leadership and servant leadership. However, the limitations of servant leadership: the first
Servant leader’s impact extend beyond the boundaries of their organization, they use their position of power to create a better society. “We live at a time when holders of power are suspect, and actions that stem from authority are questioned.” ( )
Parris, D. L., & Peachey, J. W. (2013). A systematic literature review of servant leadership theory in organizational contexts. Journal of Business Ethics, 113, 377-393. DOI: 10.1007/s10551-012-1322-6
While there is a body of research for transformative leaders, there is very little for servant leadership. This is changing as more efforts are applied to understand servant leaders. This has led to conjecture that servant leadership is little more than an extension of transformative leadership. However, as demonstrated here, there very clear and marked differences between the two. Humphreys has proposed a model of servant and transformational leadership that includes the contextual variable a model of servant and transformational leadership that includes the contextual variable. With all of the available evidence, transformative leadership is best suited for a dynamic external environment, since a transformational leadership would be aggressive enough to meet the organization’s needs. (Humphreys) In a more stable external environment, a servant leader would find the most success, since their efforts would be more evolutionary versus revolutionary in
In the article by Udani and Lorenzo-Molo, the need for servant leadership was viewed as the nation being a downward state and in the throes of transitioning from a dictator into an unknown future. Although viewed in retrospect, a valid case is made that a servant leader can be quite effective when leading a bounce back. The traits of Corazon were just the medicine needed to not only heal the Philippines but lead them into their path to democracy. In a general sense the need for servant leadership can come in other forms. In the article “Promoting leadership effectiveness in organizations” by Shekari and Nikooparvar two areas of the need for servant leadership is touched upon. They look at challenges
Servant Leadership is a way of life, serving others first, it is not just a leadership technique. “Servant leadership is a leadership philosophy which addresses the concerns of ethics, customer experience, and employee engagement while creating a unique organizational culture where both leaders and followers unite to reach organizational goals without positional or authoritative power” (Carter & Baghurst, 2014, p.1). As stated by Ann McGee-Cooper “anyone could lead perfect people, if there were any.” The challenge “is to learn to develop the imperfect people who we all are” (as cited in Spears, 1995, p.59). A leader who adopts the Servant Leadership philosophy looks like a part of the team, patient and caring, not someone directing
Gene Wilkes (1998) states, “A servant leader serves the mission and leads by serving those on mission with Him.” (p. 11) A servant leader listens to their employees and inspires the ethical use of power and empowerment. F. Jaramillo (2015) states, “In servant leadership, the behaviors of the leader are driven by moral and ethical principles. (p.109) Servant leaders do not look at leading employees as a title but as a stewardship. As a leader in the organization we are there to serve the people, we are leading as well as the organization. Furthermore, since servant leadership bases their leadership on their moral and ethical principle, the servant leader should have a positive influence on the employee. Satterlee (2013) states, “The test of a servant leader is based upon the growth of his or her followers.” (p. 113) If a servant leader is following his moral and ethical principles, putting the person before him or herself and allowing God to work through them; each person they lead should become healthier, wiser, and more likely to become servants
Melchar, David and Susan Bosco. “Achieving High Organization Performance through Servant Leadership.” The Journal of Business Inquiry 9.1 (2010):74-88. http://www.uvu.edu/woodbury/jbi/volume9/journals/achieving_high_organization_performance_through_servant_leadership.pdf