The Philosophy Of Servant Leadership

Michelle’s life embodies the idea of a person who has the x-factor, she shows that leadership is something that is developed over time and learned through experiences. The x-factor is when individuals in a society spark creativity, it is a multi-discipline that borrows and synthesis existing intellectual resources to generate new ones and approach causation. (Burns, 2003). Michelle is a prime example of the ideals of the x-factor that crates a leader.

The two theories that I chose to do my self-assessment by are the authentic leadership theory and the servant leadership theory. The authentic leadership theory was chosen due to my desire to stay true to who I am and what I stand for. However, the servant leadership theory was chosen because of my desire to meet the needs of others while doing what I can to help others succeed as well as meet their set goals. Being a servant while being authentic are the traits I want in my style of leadership and are assessed throughout this paper along with my strengths and weaknesses in the area of leadership.

The field of nursing is one of the quintessential servant roles in our society today. We serve by taking care of our patient’s physical and mental (and sometimes spiritual) health. As a nursing student, there are three main characteristics that I have seen modeled in leaders that I think are most important to a servant-leader’s success. In my own practice, I hope to focus on all servant-leader characteristics, but these in particular as I strive for a lengthy and fulfilling career.

“Servant Leadership” throughout history has always been a vital concept to grasp as leaders, however the actual term was not coined until the 1970’s by Robert Greenleaf in his essay The Servant as a Leader. Greenleaf depicts the concept of servant leadership as being a servant first meaning the leader is always willing, ready, and eager to assist those around them in order to create the best environment for everyone to work towards achieving goals.

The foundation of my personal leadership philosophy can be found in the principles of servant leadership as spelled out by Greenleaf (1970, 1977). Leadership is granted to individuals who are by nature servants. An individual emerges as a leader by first becoming a servant. Servant leaders attend to the needs of those they serve and help them become more informed, free, self-sufficient, and like servants themselves. Leaders and those they serve improve, enhance, and develop each other through their connection. A leader must also be conscious of inequalities and social injustices in the organizations they serve and work actively to resolve those issues. Servant leaders rely less on the use of official power and control, but focus on empowering those they

The concept of servant leadership has been in practice long before Greenleaf coined the term in the seventies (Spears, 2010). Servant leadership in its most simplistic form is defined as, “serving others before serving ourselves” (Davenport, 2015, p. 301). The characteristics of servant leadership have been developed to aid in today’s leadership roles in regards to nursing practice. The author will discuss three characteristics- listening, awareness, and commitment, and their importance to servant leadership. The author will also discuss the application of servant leadership in nursing practice and the how her viewpoints of leadership have changed with the application of this concept.

Over the past six years of my career as a project manager in an IT company, I have been working as a supervisor to manage a team of programmers and designers. Reflecting on this period of time which I have applied my leadership philosophy, I believe the leadership type, servant leadership, aptly describes my leadership style. I agree with what a servant leader stands for, and I aspire to become a better servant leader in the days ahead of me.

I work in a hospital that has gone through several changes recently. These changes have caused the workloads to increase and a lot of the teamwork which existed before has broken down. Patient ratings have subsequently dropped. Due to these changes and stress, sometimes I catch myself with the mindset of working independently of others. However working independently and not serving my team members will not ultimately improve patient care which is my vision and my organization’s vision. I am working on keeping this vision of improving healthcare outcomes and others lives at the forefront of my mind when I do simple tasks. When I can effectively organize my day to include helping other nurses or CNAs I know that patient outcomes will improve and staff morale will improve (Patton, 2014). These practices will carry over when I am a nurse. Now and in my nursing practice I will do my best to model servant leadership in order to provide the best quality of care for patients and my team

Servant leadership begins when a leader is selfless and understands the nature of being a servant. The term servant leadership was coined by Robert K. Greenleaf in “The Servant as Leader” essay which was published in 1970. The mindset of a servant leader is one who wants to give back to others first and believes in selfless service. The ability to lead and aspire to be selfless is a skill every leader does not have. Over time, servant leaders like Nelson Mandela and Angela Merkel have been seen in their perspective countries. From childhood to young adults, both Mandela and Merkel has should servant leader qualities in their demographics.

From the group Biblical Integration Paper, it was understood that servant-leadership is not only a gift of purpose that God places in the hearts of His people, but it is also a calling in one’s life to truly touch the lives of others in need. Living a successful life, as a servant-leader is not one that focuses on self-fulfillment, rather it is in seeking a fulfillment that comes from Christ when one pours him/herself out for the sake of others. It is through servant-leadership that one is able to bring hope into hopeless situations (Group Integration Paper,

Introduction Servant leadership is an emerging leadership principle that was developed by Robert K. Greenleaf in 1970 (Keith, 2015). The main idea behind this principle is based on the assumption that in order to become an effective leader, one must first become an able servant. In his essay ‘The Servant as Leader,’ Greenleaf posits that man, in nature, is a servant (Greenleaf, n.d.). And being a servant, man will also follow leaders that are servant, themselves.

Through identification and ongoing assessment of her leadership style and ability this leader is able to develop and understand her own strengths and limitations in order to grow and develop into a more effective leader. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of servant leadership, contingency, path-goal styles leadership to gain an understanding of current leadership models, identify this author’s style of leadership and explore why leadership is important to organizations, society and this author.

As written in the lines above, employee engagement has a significant impact on an employee and their engagement. Although there has been many articles and research written about leadership and servant leadership, in this study, it will provide and overview, key traits and influences that servant leaders use in collaboration to address significant problems with strategy and other individuals. Therefore, how do managers and leaders facilitate the engagement of their employees? Leaders do this through their leadership style. In 1970, Robert K. Greenleaf identified servant-leadership, which was different from the traditional views of leadership. According to Greenleaf, “The servant-leader is a servant first. Servant

Servant Leadership is a specific leadership style that focuses on the servant, rather than the leader. In this paper, I will discuss how Servant Leadership can be applied to the nursing practice. This will be explored through definitions, history, and major concepts. I will also integrate Servant Leadership’s function into the nursing practice. Lastly, I will examine my own personal growth on the application of leadership in nursing.

Since this article was a systematic literature review, the authors did not provide their own definition of servant leadership and thus the theory remains under-defined. Parris and Peachey note that most researchers quote Greenleaf’s definition of servant leadership verbatim.