Since our current team was formed more than 4 years ago, I have moved from a role as one of the team into the role of leader for the same team. Initially, there were three of us which grew to six within the first year. Our team would describe our manager as more of a professor than a leader. He always spoke of how to get things done by following the right methodologies and Lean Six Sigma practices, which were great in a classroom, but not as easy to follow in the real world where the pace was fast and the demand was high. To get things done for ourselves we had to do it alone without his guidance and support. This was my first experience in servant leadership. I used my knowledge to step up and get our team the support and materials needed to help us succeed. When the time came for our manager to move up the chain, I was nominated by the team to become their leader.
Since we are a group of highly skilled and intelligent people, my role was immediately realized before I knew what servant leadership was. My primary goals were to make sure they had what they needed to operate at their peak performance level. The projects were fast and difficult and once I took myself out of a contributing role, I could focus on keeping the distractions and noise away from the team. In Northouse’s Leadership: Theory and Practice there is the following graphic (Northouse, 2016, p232) which shows a model of servant leadership:
For the Existing conditions, the context and culture has been one that the team has always looked out for its own needs. My role in that plays in to my attributes of servant leadership and the team is receptive to this role. The second part that show servant leader behaviors and how they are important to the Outcomes. It understands that “viewing servant leadership as a multidimensional process. Collectively, these behaviors are the central focus of servant leadership. Individually, each behavior makes a unique contribution” (Northouse, 2016, p233). We have a Diverse team from many different cultural backgrounds. My job is to help them not only work better with each other as team members, but to also personally grow so they can evolve in their careers. They know that I have an open door and if there is something that needs to be discussed they can approach me without any reservations. Our team has a trust that empowers everyone to make sound decisions that reflect positively on the team and the relationships we build with those projects that we work on last for years after the project is finished. By serving our team and putting them first, the outcome is performance and growth of the individual. I have two of our strongest members being considered for a role that is equal to mine and I am happy to help them with the opportunity. The same values I feel are important as a leader may bleed into their own leadership style and as they become the head of their workstream, the organization benefits from the societal impact had by expanding our work into other areas. While the servant leadership style may not work in all levels of an organization, I have found it to be the driving force to success and job satisfaction in the small are of the organization in which I reside.
References:
Northouse, Peter G.(2016). Leadership: Theory and Practice. SAGE Publications. Kindle Edition.
Hi James,
I find it very interesting that you were in a servant leadership position without even knowing what it was, at the time. According to Northouse, servant leadership encourages leaders to put their followers first, put themselves in their followers’ shoes, and help them grow in their positions and so they can possibly become leaders, as well (2016). Further, as Greenleaf (1970, as cited in Northouse, 2016) described, those who are servant leaders should ensure that their followers are growing as people who are becoming healthier and happier and more likely to serve others as servant leaders. From your description, it sounds like that is exactly what you are doing in your position as a leader in your company. You have not only helped your employees perform successfully for the past four years or more within your team but now two of those members are up for promotion, which, I think, speaks highly of your leadership in addition to their own qualifications.
You stated above that the servant leadership style may not work at all levels, which I agree with. Why do you think it works so well in your area of your organization? Is it because your team is relatively small, and the members need to rely heavily on each other to succeed? Or do you think there are other reasons that your group thrives with this type of leadership? In what ways do you think you could improve your servant leadership skills after learning more about servant leadership in this week’s chapter and lesson?
Thank you for an interesting post!
Katie
Reference
Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and Practice (7th ed.). Los Angeles, CA: SAGE Publications Ltd.
I too moved into a position as the group lead and transformed the method of leadership over time which now very much reflects the Servant Leadership Method. You hit the nail on the head by identifying the prior leader, his leadership qualities and how you as a member of the team understood firsthand the issues resulting from the current leadership regime and how it negatively impacted productivity. Although this leader seemed isolated from a contributing role he clearly was not familiar with the problems the team faced on a daily basis. You have an advantage from the active role knowing what worked, what did not and what needed to fixed to support the high demand and fast pace. There is no excuse for working with outdated processes or processes that are inefficient when expectations are high and it is the leaders fault if these hurdles continue to exist.
A tool that I employed was a Pareto analysis and polled the team to determine what the main problems we face that often delay or introduce errors in our work. The Pareto worked well as this allowed us to eliminate 80% of our problems with only 20% of the work (Haughey, n.d.). Although unrelated to the Servant Leadership Method this nonetheless gives a leader a useful tool, a better understanding of the group’s largest problems and provides them with a plan for execution. This in turn gives a leader better conceptualization of the work flow, empower the followers and an avenue with which to help followers grow and exceed (Northouse, 2016, pp. 233-235).
Your success also reflects the concept that this method of leadership is easy to understand and intuitive (Northouse, 2016, p. 241). You were placed in a position that seemed to have two important antecedent conditions (Context and Culture and Follower Receptivity), but lacked the important condition of Leader Attributes which appears to have been added with your appointment to this position (Northouse, 2016, pp. 231-233). This in a way justifies the basis of this theory showing that all three conditions must exist in order for this method to be effective.
Lastly, you touch on a very important aspect of Servant Leadership or any leadership approach that for the most part goes unmentioned in our text. As a Servant Leader the behaviors we exhibit are intended to help followers grow, exceed and be empowered which should result in positive Organizational Performance (Northouse, 2016, pp. 234, 235, 237). What is absent from our text is the need for leaders to understand that growth of a follower is often rewarded with promotions for the better of the organization, but often leaders pigeon-hole followers into positions and hinder promotion opportunities for their subordinates for selfish reasons such as not wanting to train another person. I feel that under our old management I myself was subject to such injustices which made me realize that in a leadership role I would never allow myself to undermine the growth and advancement of any of my followers.
This was a very interesting and thought provoking post.
Works Cited
Haughey, D. (n.d.). Pareto Analysis Step by Step. Retrieved from Projectsmart: https://www.projectsmart.co.uk/pareto-analysis-step-by-step.php
Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and Practice. Thousand Oaks, California, USA: SAGE.