Servant leadership style: meaning, characteristics, advantages and disadvantages

Servant leadership is a leadership approach in which leaders acts as servants to the followers. The servant leaders pay attention to employees needs, aspirations and interests than their own.

The idea of servant leadership was first coined by Robert K. Greenleaf in 1970. 

According to havard.ed, .....Greenleaf came up with this theory after reading the novel "Journey to the East" by Hermann Hesse, which describes a group of men on a mythical journey whose servant, Leo, “sustains them with spirit and song. Leo turns out to be a “great and noble leader” who only posed as a servant. ....

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Image source: What is Servant leadership? I Leadership style - GrowActo Consultancy Pvt Ltd (YouTube)

What is servant leadership?

Servant leadership is a type of leadership in which leaders prioritize employees needs and interests than their own. The leaders who use this approach usually don't like to criticize or give their employees extra works. They prefer creating good relationship and protect happiness of their team members. The employees under this style usually feel valued and cared, this can lead to high working morale and increase in performance.

The term was fist discussed in the article called "The Servant as Leader", which was written by a management expert Robert K. Greenleaf and first published in 1970. Greenleaf proposed a leadership style (servant leadership) in which leaders prioritize the needs, aspirations, and interests of their followers over their own. He indicated that servant leaders in organizations provide support to their employees, allowing them to learn and grow through inclusive leadership, which employs their expertise and strategies to the fore.

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Traits of servant leader [Characteristics of servant leadership]

Below are 10 traits (characteristics) of servant leadership based on Lary C article published in 1992.

1. Listen: A servant leader is willing to listen his or her followers, and build good relationship with them. 
2. Empathy: He or she strives to understand his or her followers and emphasize with.
3. Healing: He or she focuses on helping the team members to heal from previous undesirable experiences by creating good environment that foster healthy work-life balance. 
4. Awareness: A servant leader has general awareness and self-awareness, he or she is able to know his or her strengths and weaknesses. 
5. Persuasive: A servant leader has a convincing power that enables him or her to unify members in a team and influence them to work hard to achieve the team goals. 
6. Conceptualization: He or she is able to think beyond day-to-day realities to come up with new ideas. 
7. Foresight: He or she is able to make decision for the future events basing on past experiences and present realities. 
8. Stewardship: A servant leader is responsible to run organization for the greater good of society. 
9. Commitment to the growth of people: He or she strives to help personal and professional growth of team members.
10. Building community: he or she strives to foster relationships between team members and create true community in an organization and other institutions.

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Advantages and disadvantages of servant leadership

Every leadership style can bring positive impacts to a team when used in right situation or context and vice versa, below are the pros and cons of servant leadership.

Pros/Advantages 

• Leaders earn respect from their followers
• Employees feel valued 
• Builds trust between leaders and followers 
• Creates environment that encourages creativity and innovations in a team 
• Increases collaboration in a team 
• Raises employees motivation 
• Lowers employees turnover and absenteeism 
• The employees feel trusted and engaged this can raise up their working morale

Cons/Disadvantages

• It can be hard to balance employees' needs with company's objectives 
• Leaders may perform more responsibilities than they are able to carry 
• It can minimize the authority of leaders

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