Servant Leadership Theory

This Servant Leadership Theory was first exposed by Robert Greenleaf in his essay “The Servant as a Leader” during the 70’s. In his essay, Greenleaf defends that servant leaders are servants first, and leaders later. There are ten major characteristics of this leadership theory:
• Listening;
• Empathy;
• Healing Relationships;
• Awareness;
• Persuasion;
• Conceptualization;
• Foresight;
• Stewarsdship;
• Comiitment to Human Resource Development;
• Commitment to building community.

Organizational development has had a major contribution to this theory as the servant leader stays away from demanding from his/ her subordinates. Instead, the servant leader acts as a leader who empowers his/ her subordinates, therefore inspiring them to succeed at their duties.
The structure of the servant leadership greatly emphasizes teamwork in which each of the members plays different roles based on their level of expertise rather than the team members’ title. This way, each one of the members has the opportunity to perform a significant duty, generating a contagious force, passing on to the organization, helping to achieve the desired mission and goals.
To better describe what the Servant Leadership Theory seeks, I added a quote from W. Edwards Deming, an American professor and consultant, "The most valuable currency of any organization is the initiative and creativity of its members. Every leader has the solemn moral responsibility to develop these to the maximum in all his people. This is the leader's highest priority.”

The standout strength of the servant leadership style is the contribution to the overall development of the employee. During the process, instead of forcing employees with organizational goals and deadlines, this leadership theory suggests a process of employee-self-teaching in which the employee learns about his capabilities – strengths, weaknesses, beliefs, values – engaging in a self learning process about their potential.
Because of their ability of seeing the big picture, the Servant Leader always seeks to look at the good qualities in others, showing empathy and forgiveness. This helps to create strong ties between both parts.

The Servant Leadership focuses on ethical and social issues, developing a value-based management. During this leadership process, employees play an important role in decision-making processes while being empowered to act, which is translated in a form of democratic leadership. This value-based leadership helps businesses succeed in environments where these values are emphasized.
On the other hand, the theory also presents weaknesses. The Servant Leadership Theory has often been accused of not being suitable to a competitive environment. This happens mostly due to the theory being inappropriate to certain situations.

One of the main aspects of the leadership is to align an individuals’ goals with those of the organization. The Servant Leadership Theory is characterized by focusing primarily on the individual’s needs, with organizational goals performed through inspiration. This way can result in conflict because issues related to individual-organization goals are not met.

Further analysis of the Servant Leadership Theory suggest that individual goals and values conflict with organizational goals and values, resulting in unfulfilled organizational goals due to the lack of urgency and attention those goals require. Therefore this leadership style is best applied when the whole organization is committed to the same concept and possesses the same core skills and behaviors


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