Why Servant Leadership?

Why Servant Leadership? Stefanie R. Ertel Grace College of Divinity Servant leadership is a global leadership approach. Whether you live in South Africa, the Middle-East, China, or the United States, many integrate servant leadership within their culture. One may think servant leadership is not as prevalent and possibly even counter-cultural; however, one is able to identify aspects of servant leadership within many major businesses, cultures, and religions today. The top three religions across the globe include Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism, and all of these promote servanthood among their constituents for the betterment of humanity and oneself. Religious or not, serving others elevates those around above oneself, and through this the leader is able to empower others. They empower others through their actions to think past themselves, to think about others and the whole of the organization, which ultimately makes a greater impact as everyone comes together to serve people and the organization with a purpose. Why servant leadership? Why should a leader decide to serve and moreover be a servant leader? This leadership approach has been studied and developed by numerous people, but it all started with Robert Greenleaf. Greenleaf (2002) discusses in depth about servant leadership and how the servant leader is a servant first, compared to a leader first. Every nation and every culture has leaders, is it possible for the same to be true about servant leaders? This type of leadership may not be the easiest to follow, but is it worth the reward? The following essay will delve into what servant leadership is, the servant-first compared to the leaderfirst attitude, the global and religious perspective, and add perspective to the question, Why Servant Leadership? Servant Leadership; Servant-First - SLTP. 4(2), 13-26 14 ERTEL Greenleaf posed the question, what if the servant and the leader could be fused together into a real person (2002)? Since then many researchers have attempted to continue to answer this question. Greenleaf (2002) wrote, “The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead” (p. 13). Northouse (2013) also asks similar questions, “Servant Leadership is a paradox – an approach to leadership that runs counter to common sense. Our everyday images of leadership do not coincide with leaders being servants. Leaders influence, and servants follow. How can leadership be both service and influence? How can a person be a leader and a servant at the same time” (p. 219)? Just as Greenleaf emphasizes the need for servant leaders, leaders who are servants first, many have taken this stance and developed it in how to practically apply it today. According to Spears and Lawrence (2002) , there are ten characteristics that are essential in developing servant leaders, which include the following: (1) Listening, paying attention to what is and what is not being said—having a “deep commitment to listening intently to others” (p. 5). (2) Empathy, “strives to understand and empathize with others” (p. 5). (3) Healing, realizing the servant leader is able to be part of other’s healing processes by assisting in mending broken hearts and spirits. (4) Awareness, self-awareness is critical as a leader; a leader must be aware of their own values and ethics to be able to lead others. (5) Persuasion, the servant leader desires to lead through his or her influence, compared to relying on the title one is given. (6) Conceptualization, servant leaders should be visionaries! The ideal for this type of leader is to be able to conceptualize broader thinking, past the normal, everyday realities. (7) Foresight, “Foresight is a characteristic that enables the servant-leader to understand the lessons from the past, the realities of the present, and the likely consequence of a decision for the future” (Spears & Lawrence, 2002, p. 7) . (8) Stewardship, servant leaders should be stewards in accordance with Marsiglia’s (2009 ) definition, “Stewardship is the behavior of responsibly managing another person or organization’s assets that have been entrusted to one’s care” (p. 4). (9) Commitment to the growth of people, servant leaders believe in the value of each individual person and are therefore committed to the development of those people. (10) Building community, “All that is needed to rebuild community as a viable life form for large numbers of people is for enough servant-leaders to show the way, not by mass movements, but by each servantleader demonstrating his own unlimited liability for a quite specific community-related group” (Greenleaf, 2002, p. 53) . Spears and Lawrence recognized that the characteristics they identified are not exhaustive, and therefore the preceding will be compared to other research developed on servant leadership characteristics. Patterson (2003) developed a model of servant le (...truncated)