Jack Welch once said “before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others” (Fortune, 2016).
To be honest, I was initially skeptical of the concept of “servant leadership” because it sounded so foreign to me. I’ve never heard of it until my husband kept talking to me about it as he applies the theories he learned during his college years to his present personal life, career and family. Seeing my husband model this looked inspiring, hard to reach and yet heroic. I ask myself, “Will I be able to be a Servant Leader?” “…the natural feeling one has… to serve first,” the textbook defines servant leadership as. The aspiration to lead is then a matter of deliberate choice… The servant’s attention is where you’ll see the difference (Northouse, 2022). In a nutshell, this means that the leader is motivated by a desire to serve the group as a whole. Leaders are expected to envision and cultivate a supportive setting for their teams. After giving it some thought, I was struck by how often servant leadership is practiced. While there are many components that go into making up a servant leader, I’d like to zero in on three: empathy, persuasion, and community building. All three of these traits are exemplified by servant leaders, and they demonstrate the widespread applicability of servant leadership.
Once more, I wanted to emphasize empathy as the primary trait. One definition of empathy is “putting oneself in another’s shoes and trying to see things from their perspective” (Northouse, 2022). I think empathy is crucial to being a servant leader. During a group project is just one example of a situation where people can give and receive empathy. Even more so in the current climate with Covid-19, I’m sure that most students have experienced working on a group project with someone who is having trouble keeping up. It’s possible that one of your group members is having trouble keeping up because they’re taking online classes in a different time zone, or because they’re grieving the loss of a loved one, or because they’re just plain exhausted. In this scenario, a leader could exhibit empathy, a trait central to servant leadership, by showing that they “get it” and can confirm and validate the member’s feelings and experiences. In this case, the group leader or other members could help lighten the load of the member by lending a hand without passing judgment. Rather than simply telling the team what to do, the leader is working to improve the situation for everyone involved.
A community can be defined as “a group of people who enjoy spending time together because they share common goals and values” (Northouse, 2022). “providing a place where people can feel safe and connected to others, but are still allowed to express their individuality” is another way of describing the goal of community building (Northouse, 2022).
This trait of servant leadership is evident in settings like offices and conferences. For instance, many businesses hold meetings where employees can voice their thoughts and suggestions. Information gathering is most effective when people feel at ease enough to open up and share their thoughts and ideas. Instilling a sense of values and interests through one’s own actions is at the heart of servant leadership, and this ties back into the concept. The company’s leader is encouraging employees to come up with their own ideas instead of simply telling them what to do, and as a result, everyone in the office is working together to come up with a solution.
So, to answer my question mentioned above: “will I be able to be a Servant Leader?”. The textbook (Northouse, 2022) states that it can be taught but it doesn’t come naturally compared to other leaders. It does need conscious exercising. When leaders are selfless and genuinely interested in making a positive difference in the lives of those around them, servant leadership thrives (Northouse, 2022).
REFERENCES:
- Love, T. (2016, Nov. 17). 3 Tips for Being a Truly Great Leader. Fortune. Retrieved from https://fortune.com/2016/11/16/xerox-key-to-great-leadership/
- Northouse, P.G. (2022). Leadership: Theory and Practice.Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
Your selection of Jack Welch’s assertion on leadershp to quote perfectly summarizes two major phases of leadership one might encounter during their career in my opinion and personal experience. First, we must learn to be followers, we learn to lead, then as leaders, we should either become, or incorporate, servant leadership into our own leadership style. Servant leaders encourage followers to become servant leaders themselves. Ideally providing a model from which they learn to be of service to others and the organization. I take this position myself based on the ten characteristics of servant leaders. One of which, empathy, you’ve mentioned, and I believe is appropriately listed within the top three as essential to the theory and its practice.
To your primary question, if you will be able to be a servant leader, I agree it takes practice. However, as the model of servant leadership highlights, culture and context, leader attributes, and follower receptivity are the preconditons that need to be met in order for servant leadeship to work and be effective. While culture is something that would likely be a feature that is mostly static and engrained, the context could vary significantly to the extent that servant leadership operates rather independently of culture. Thus, allowing servant leadership to flourish as long as the other preconditions are met. Leader attributes are obviously beyond the control of potential followers and future servant leaders. However, assuming the appropriate traits are present that promote servant leader behaviors within the leader, it seems it could come down to simply making a decision to become a servant leader. Follower receptivity appears to be mostly a prefernce for, or choice-based, antecedent condition. Considering your point and the theories position that servant leadership can be learned, I feel the question could really be less of “can you” and more “do I want to”