An Introduction to Servant Leadership

Another view of leadership emerged in parallel with transformational leadership: the idea that the
best leaders are servants. Initially considered an approach rather than a theory, servant leadership
has begun to crystallise as a theory since the turn of the century. Although seeming paradoxical, this
theory postulates that leaders, when most effective, are really servants. When thinking of our
followers and how to best provide them with an effective intervention, are we not actually providing
them with the service of leadership, a service to ensure they will be successful in their job
performance? And are effective leaders also in service to their organisation or to an ideal?

If this is the case, then a successful leader will be attentive to the concerns and needs of his or her
followers – nurturing, empathising, developing and empowering them. Servant leaders are also
ethical, as they bear in mind the greater good of the community, shareholders and stakeholders
alike.

The idea was initially developed by Robert Greenleaf who, after working at American Telephone and
Telegraph for 40 years, began trying to understand how organisations could better function. He
coined the phrase ‘servant leadership’ in his initial book (Greenleaf, 1970) and then went on to
extend the concept through further writings and the founding of the Greenleaf Center for Servant
Leadership. Greenleaf began thinking about the leader as servant after reading Hermann Hesse’s
(1956) book The Journey to the East, which tells the story of a mythical group of travellers who are
accompanied by a servant. The servant not only does menial chores but also inspires the group
through his good nature, songs and attentiveness to the travellers’ needs. When the servant is
separated from the group, the travellers lose focus and cohesiveness, and the journey disintegrates
and is abandoned. The servant was actually the leader of the group through his selfless care and
concern about their well-being.

Greenleaf’s view of servant leadership was that it would result in follower devel- opment and
performance, a high-performing organisation and a positive impact on the stakeholders and, indeed,
the society in which the organisation exists.

Towards a Model of Servant Leadership:

The work of Greenleaf did not leave an empirically validated definition of servant leadership. But by
the turn of the century, servant leadership began to come into its own as a theory. A number of
well-known writers such as Warren Bennis (2002), Stephen Covey (2002) and Peter Senge (2002)
wrote in positive terms of servant leadership. Additional writers began to formalise the concept,
though, not surpris- ingly, with considerable overlap as well as diversity.

We note that there is also considerable overlap of servant with transformational leadership.
However, servant leadership focuses on humility, authenticity, and interpersonal acceptance, traits
which are not explicit in transformational leadership. The charisma of the transformational leader is
of little concern in servant leadership; the servant leader shows humility and is not found in the
limelight. Transformation- al leaders focus on organisational outcomes and inspire their followers to
support those outcomes. Servant leaders focus on the individual, their development and well-being,
and trust that the follower will support organisational outcomes as a result. Similarly,
transformational leaders show a primary allegiance to the organisa- tion while servant leaders’
primary allegiance is to the followers.

A Three-Component Model of Servant Leadership:

The formulation of a consensual model of servant leadership is still a work in progress. However,
Liden et al. (2008), van Dierendonck (2011) and others have developed a model which exemplifies
the major components of servant leadership. Such a model displays three major components: the
antecedent conditions affecting servant leadership, the behaviours of the servant leader and the
outcomes.

1. Antecedent conditions. There are a number of antecedent or existing conditions which will
inevitably affect the application of servant leadership.
a. Leader attributes. Naturally, one condition is leader attributes. Traits such as
emotional intelligence, moral development, previous experiences and commitment
to a higher calling will influence the leaders and how they impact on followers.
However, the core concern for the servant leader is the desire to lead combined
with a felt need to serve.
b. Culture. The culture or context within which leaders and followers work is a second
antecedent condition. A healthcare setting is likely to be quite different from a Wall
Street stock brokerage. The culture of northern European countries (see Module 6)
is likely to provide a different background for the servant leader than eastern
European countries. There is some indication that two cultural dimensions in
particular impact servant leadership: the humane orientation (fairness, generosity,
kindness) of the culture and its power dis- tance (authority, power differences,
status privileges).
c. Receptiveness of followers. Unsurprisingly perhaps, servant leadership is found to
be most effective with followers who desire that approach from their leaders
(Meuser et al., 2011). Some followers are not receptive to that approach from their
managers, seeing such behaviour as micro-managing and not wanting their leaders
to know them so personally with the attendant guidance and help. So servant
leadership will have a positive impact for some followers while for others it is not so
effective.
2. Behaviours of the servant leader. How does a servant leader act, particularly in comparison
with other leadership approaches? Work has been done to delineate the behaviours of the
servant leader. One of the more comprehensive efforts was by Spears (2010), who reviewed
Greenleaf’s writings and identified 10 characteristics which illustrate servant leadership.
(However, our review of the literature found at least 44 characteristics among various
authors!) The characteristics suggested by Spears are exhibited in Table 4.3. As such
behaviours are identified and agreed among theorists, they provide a template for
leadership development and for research into the components of servant leadership and its
effectiveness.
 Table 4.3: Characteristics of servant leadership:

A learnt discipline by which followers are acknowledged through

1. Listening the leader’s hearing and understanding of their viewpoint.

Followers feel validated as the leader demonstrates an understanding

2. Empathy of their position, what they are thinking and feeling.

Attending to followers’ needs and personal problems helps followers

3. Healing and leaders alike to become whole – to, in essence, be healed.
Beginning with self-awareness, understanding how they are perceived
4. Awareness by others, the leader is able to understand situations in context.

Avoiding the use of positional power and coercion and gaining

5. Persuasion compliance through gentle, clear, persistent and non-judgemental argument.

Providing a long-term vision and clear goals and direction while understanding
6. Conceptualisation the complexities of the organisation and its environment.
The ability to predict what reasonably will happen in the future and being held
7. Foresight accountable for any failure to anticipate such outcomes.
Acceptance of the responsibility of the leadership role and the responsibility
to
8. Stewardship carefully manage the people for whom they are responsible.
A commitment to see each individual as unique and intrinsically valuable and
9. Commitment to Follower to
Growth help them grow personally and professionally.
Building the community of individuals to allow followers to see the value of a
10. Building Community whole that is greater than any individual.

3. Outcomes of servant leadership. The outcomes of servant leadership can be catego- rised in

a. Follower outcomes. Van Dierendonck (2011: 1248) wrote that, based on Greenleaf’s
writings, three dimensions of follower outcome can be anticipated from followers:
‘personal growth in terms of self-actualization; becoming healthier, wiser, free, and
more autonomous in terms of positive job attitudes; and becoming servants
themselves in terms of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and collaborative
team work.’ He also points out that several research studies tend to support such
outcomes and their resultant positive impact on follower performance. The
relationship between leaders and followers tends to be reciprocal in that an upward
spiral of morality and motivation occurs for both parties. And the followers also
 b. Organisational performance. Servant leadership is seen to have a number of positive
outcomes for the organisation in terms of positive follower attitudes: their
performance tends to go well beyond basic job requirements. Such posi- tive
attitudes then convert to enhanced commitment, job performance and corporate
citizenship behaviours (Walumbwa et al., 2010; Liden et al., 2014). Hu and Liden
(2011) also found enhanced team effectiveness under servant leadership. They
found that teams had enhanced group processes and clarity, and individuals had
more confidence in their ability to succeed when working as a
c. Societal impact. With its emphasis on the greater good, servant leadership can be
expected to have a positive impact on society. Although such impact has not been
well studied so far, the work of Mother Teresa exemplifies the endeavours of a
servant leader. Through a life of tireless work, she created a new religious order
devoted to serving the poor, which now has thousands of members active in over
130 countries. Greenleaf did not specifically view servant leadership as a method of
changing society. But as organisations with servant leaders grow and develop, the
surrounding environment is positively impacted as well. In his book, Small Giants:
Companies that Choose to be Great Instead of Big, Bur-lington (2005) described a
number of prosperous small to mid-size organisations which have a policy less
oriented towards profit and replaced with a focus on creating a great working
environment, stakeholder relations and good community citizenship. The
organisations, all privately owned, vary immensely: a brewery, a document storage
firm, a manufacturer of warn lights, a restaurant group and more. Most of the
owners of these prospering firms had been influenced by the concept of servant
leadership.

Servant Leadership Advantages:

Servant leadership offers a clear alternative to other theories of leadership in terms of the use of
power. While other theories posit the ways leaders can best use their power and influence to affect
follower behaviour, servant leadership is counter- intuitive: the theory argues that leaders should
give up their influence and power, that it should be shared with followers. Control is to be given up
rather than sought by the leader. Servant leadership focuses on humility, authenticity, and
interpersonal acceptance, none of which is an explicit element of transformational leadership.

And though transformational leadership includes an ethical component, servant leadership regards
ethical behaviour as central to the leadership process. It proposes without exception that the well-
being of others is key, through concern about their growth and a sharing of influence. However, as
opposed to other theories, servant leadership is clear that the approach will not be effective when
the antecedent condition of receptive followers is not in place.

Servant leadership also appears to be providing an approach to leadership re- search which
measures aspects of leadership that are unique. For example, Liden et al. (2014) have developed a
Servant Leadership Questionnaire which assesses seven dimensions of servant leadership. Their
research shows that through the question- naire they are able to measure aspects of leadership
which are different from transformational leadership and leader–member exchange theory. This
work opens a rich avenue for additional research in the future.
Criticisms and Concerns about Servant Leadership

As an emerging theory, there is not yet a generally agreed process of servant leadership. As noted
earlier, there are various behaviours proposed by a variety of researchers but without general
agreement. And there is as yet a question over whether the behaviours are all actually behaviours.
For example, is ‘conceptualising’ really a behaviour or is it an ability? The mechanism by which
servant leadership exerts influence is not fully explained.

The name of the theory, ‘servant leadership’, can also be a concern. Serving is the opposite of
leading, so how can following provide the leadership required in today’s demanding organisations?
It seems counter-intuitive to the usual view of the process of leading and may cause some to view
the theory as a whimsical ‘pie in the sky’ approach to leadership.

Work is also yet to appear on how those followers who are not receptive to servant leadership are to
be managed. Would they be provided with more traditional types of leadership, undergo
development processes so they come to see the advantages of servant leadership, be left behind as
the organisation develops – or what? And should receptiveness to servant leadership become a part
of the selection process as new followers are recruited for the organisation?

And a final concern is how servant leadership, putting followers first, will work in organisations
which are more traditional in their approach to leadership: those where a vision is set from above,
where goals are demanding and constantly changing, where work may not be particularly satisfying
for all workers and where individual creativity and effort is highly valued. Are there situations where
the servant leadership approach is contraindicated? Could servant leadership prevail in some
sections of an organisation but not in others? Again, these are rich areas for future research which
will undoubtedly be addressed in due course.

Servant Leadership in Perspective:

Servant leadership has begun to receive greater attention in the last 15 years and has provided a
thoughtful and appealing alternative to questions asked about leadership failures, such as those of
the 2008 financial crisis which so severely affected not only followers within those organisations but
many members of society as well. Servant leadership offers the promise of a method of engaging
employees and stakeholders to create flourishing organisations and positively impact the societies in
which they exist. Its very emphasis on morality and the well-being of people has fostered
considerable interest and activity within the fields of leadership research and will probably continue
to do so for some time to come.
An Introduction to Distributed Leadership

A further and related theory of leadership which we shall discuss is distributed leadership, which,
like servant leadership, has begun to take form as a defined theory only since the millennium. The
concept initially emerged from improvement programmes within primary and secondary schools in
the US and spread substan- tially into higher education institutions and worldwide. Rather than
focusing on individual leaders, it proposes that the leadership be distributed among numerous
individuals across an organisation, based on each individual’s expertise and interests. Leadership, as
a result, is based on task rather than position. Therefore, distributed leadership is a function of the
organisation rather than of any individual or selected group of individuals.

Distributed leadership is not the only theory to propose such a reframing of leadership, as other
titles such as emergent leadership, collaborative leadership, collective leadership, shared leadership
and so on have been coined by various sources. Similarly, self-managed teams have been
implemented and assessed for a number of years, with generally positive results (Goodman et al.,
1988; Wageman, 1997). We will recall that some of the leadership theories previously discussed in
Module 3 and the present module – situational leadership, leader–member exchange theory,
transformational leadership, Blake and Mouton’s Managerial Grid and others – referred to some
individuals who require little from their leader because they are competent and motivated, in
essence leading themselves. Therefore certain leadership responsibilities are shared or delegated
with followers. In these examples, leadership responsibility is given to and accepted by individuals or
teams: leadership is pushed downward and outward into the organisation, but at the initiative of
those who hold formal leadership positions. Distributed leadership goes far beyond this viewpoint.

How Distributed Leadership Works

Bennett et al. (2003) wrote that ‘Distributed leadership is not something “done” by an individual
“to” others, or a set of individual actions through which people contribute to a group or organization
… [it] is a group activity that works through and within relationships, rather than individual action.’
Furthermore, they propose that distributed leadership has three components:

1. A network of interacting individuals. Distributed leadership can occur in settings where

individuals have the same general overall goals and can interact to meet those goals. Leadership
then is emergent from the group or network, the result of conjoint activity. Much of the application
of distributed leadership has occurred in educational institutions where individuals may have quite
different responsibilities and skills and yet can work together towards a shared overall outcome.

2. Openness of leadership boundaries. There is no prescription for how widely leadership can or
should be distributed. In the educational setting, for example, the distributed leadership could be
shared not just among management and teaching staff but also teaching assistants, students,
support staff and perhaps even stakeholders within the community. An initiative could begin
anywhere and be supported and moved forward by others throughout the network or organisation.
3. Expertise distributed across many. The third component is the assumption that expertise, and
therefore resultant leadership contribution, is widespread. Expertise is not limited to the few but
rather is spread throughout the organisa- tion laterally and vertically. Bringing this varied expertise
together will result in a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. Distributive leadership is
viewed not as the antithesis of or a replacement for formal leadership; rather, it is most accurately
seen as an addition to formal leader- ship. Woods et al. (2004) describe distributive leadership as
taking form in conjoint action, either somewhat formally as teams, committees or taskforces or less
formally as, for example, a community of practice. In either form, distributive leadership can engage
the expertise of a diverse group of people and focus it towards conjoint action. Furthermore, the
authors identified a number of characteristics of distributed leadership:

 leadership based on respect versus regulation;

 a culture of trust and individual support;
 activity managed collectively versus formal leadership;
 agreement on conflict resolution mechanisms.

And if distributed leadership is to be effective, it may require specific conditions. Jones (2014: 139)
stated: ‘for a distributed leadership approach to be applicable and effective in higher education it
needs institutional commitment, support from formal institutional leaders, tailoring to the specific
institutional context and culture, and underpinning by an action research process.’

Distributed Leadership Research Findings

As a newer leadership theory, it can be understood that research into either the effectiveness of the
process or into how it is best practised is limited. Most sources describe how the process is
implemented. However, a number of research findings have been published, most with positive
results. The outcomes, mostly from work within educational institutions, fall into three areas of
improvement:

1. Organisational change. As a process that involves numerous individuals in a collegial relationship

across the organisation and with involvement requested from senior management, several
authorities note that distributed leadership is a positive factor in planning and implementing
organisational change (Graetz, 2000; Glickman et al., 2001; Gold et al., 2002). Specific results were
seen as en- hanced leadership capability throughout the organisation, greater cooperation between
professionals and formal leaders, and an organisation which continued to provide improved results.
There is also some evidence that distributed leader- ship enhances organisational development
efforts if cultural and structural impediments are removed (Harris, 2008).

2. Professional learning communities. Distributed leadership also features predominantly in the

literature relating to professional learning communities which have been shown to make a
significant positive impact on student achievement (Louis and Marks, 1998). Stoll and Seashore Louis
(2007) have also shown that distributed leadership is a key influence in maintaining these learning
communities. Professional learning communities also tend to support profes- sional development,
and Murphy (2005) found that distributed leadership impacts on the teachers themselves in terms of
morale and self-efficacy.
3. Student learning outcomes. The research regarding distributed leadership’s effect on student
learning outcomes is not at all clear. A problem in conducting empirical analysis is that, by the nature
of the process, learning outcomes would be an indirect result of a differing approach to leadership
within the teaching staff. However, a number of studies report positive effects. For example, in Eng-
land, Harris and Muijs (2004) found that the degree of teachers’ involvement in decision-making was
correlated with student motivation and efficacy as well as teacher morale. And Day et al. (2007)
found that distributed leadership positively impacted on conditions such as staff morale, which in
turn resulted in improved student behaviour and learning outcomes.

Concerns about Distributed Leadership

As an emerging theory, distributed leadership theory raises two particular concerns. First among
them is whether distributed leadership is significantly different in terms of results than any other
type of leadership approach in which the decision-making process is shared and pushed downward
into the organisation. Would not any leadership approach where senior management involved staff
and made them feel valued offer similar results?

Secondly, although there have been a few papers published in healthcare, engi- neering and other
areas, the vast majority of articles describe distributed leadership involving professional teaching
staff in the field of education. With so little work being done in other fields such as government or
the private sector or in other cultures, it is not at all clear how widespread the applicability of the
theory might be. Some authorities within the field of education question distributed leadership. For
instance, Timperley (2005: 417) voiced her concern that ‘distributing leadership over more people is
a risky business and may result in the greater distribution of incompetence’. Later, Corrigan (2013:
70) wrote, ‘Despite the attractive packaging and broad congeniality of distributed leadership, it does
not have an enduring impact to make in Educational Administration research and practice.’

Distributed Leadership in Perspective

Distributed leadership will probably have considerable appeal to more highly educated followers
who work in a climate where participation in decisions is valued or even expected. The sense that
control of major decisions is a shared process, supporting a democratic approach to organisational
decision-making, is therefore attractive. There is also an advantage in terms of follower
development.

However, the concept that leadership is the responsibility of a faceless (or multi- faced) organisation
may be less appealing and many will doubtless question whether such an approach can prove to be
realistic or universal in today’s fast-moving and competitive world. Just as situational leadership and
leader–member exchange theories describe how varied approaches work in some situations but not
others, perhaps distributed leadership will be found to be effective in some settings but not others.
This is an emerging field and has potential for development.