Trust is a prerequisite for servant leaders, as leaders must have confidence that employees are worth serving and that they and the organization will benefit from their service. Practicing servant leadership creates trust in employees, who can be inspired by the competence and character of their manager and convinced by the practice of serving their manager first that he or she has their best interests at heart. “Trust is one of the ways to achieve service leadership, and it`s also an end achieved through servant leadership,” Covey says. This is a crucial prerequisite for effective leadership, Falotico says. She urges leaders to “go above and beyond” and realize that business goals, whatever they may be, cannot be achieved without sharing the burden and responsibility. “You`re no longer a single player, you`re a leader,” she says. “Leaders are facilitators. That`s your job. This article, based on several interviews with experts and practitioners and recent research in the field of leadership, explores the art and practice of servant leadership – its philosophy and goals, as well as advice on best practices for security leaders striving to become great leaders in service. We also look to the future and examine the impact of servant leadership on the future of leadership. In practice, Southwest Airlines, led by founder Herb Kelleher, is often seen as an exemplary servant leadership company.
Kelleher`s philosophy of putting employees first has resulted in a highly engaged, low-income workforce and more than 35 consecutive years of profitability, an unprecedented track record in the turbulent aviation industry, experts offer a range of best practice suggestions for senior executives who want to become successful servant leaders. However, most experts agree on a basic principle: successful service leadership begins with a leader`s desire to serve their employees, which in turn serves and benefits the organization as a whole. This service-first mindset can be put into practice early in an employee`s onboarding phase, says Michael Timmes, a leadership expert and consultant and coach at national recruitment agency Insperity. For Covey, it`s important to remember that serving leaders are both servants and leaders. “They serve, but it still requires the other dimensions of leadership – character and competence,” he says. Competence means that the leader has a track record of high skills and achieving results with relevant skills. Character means that results and achievements are achieved with integrity and ethics. Darryl Spivey, a senior faculty member at the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) who coaches leaders in servant leadership, says asking the right questions is the “secret sauce” of good coaching and is crucial for servant leaders. CCL is a leading development institute with offices around the world, including China, Ethiopia, India, Russia and several U.S. cities. If serving employees is the basic principle of servant leadership, two basic practices to achieve this goal are to listen carefully and look for questions.
This can be difficult for some leaders because they equate leadership with control and feel they should be responsible for everything. But therein lies a paradox: leaders who are able to let go often find that they actually have more control because they have used the resources and talents of their employees, who together can manage operations more effectively than one person, he explains. To reap these fruits, several things must happen, experts say. Servant leadership ultimately begins with a selfless mindset. “If you have selfish motivations, then you will not be a good leader in service. It has to be less about you,” Falotico says. In addition, the organization as a whole must maintain a corporate culture in which this type of leadership can thrive. Finally, there are behaviors that the leaders on duty themselves must practice regularly. “As leaders, we can say anything we want, but we are judged on our behavior,” Barter says. And for the leader in service, behavior is not only what is done, but also how it is done.
The fruits of this labor are abundant, say supporters of servant leadership. Qualified employees will work at a high and innovative level. Employees feel more engaged and goal-oriented, which increases company loyalty and reduces turnover costs. Well-trained and trustworthy employees evolve as future leaders, helping to ensure the long-term viability of the organization. Servant leadership can be considered a universal concept because it is rooted in Eastern and Western cultures, the researchers say. In the East, leading scholars refer to Chinese philosophers in the 5th century BC. like Laozi, who claimed that if the best leaders had finished their work, their people would say, “We did it ourselves.” Dr. Gerald (Jerry) R. Ledlow, a Board-certified healthcare executive and fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives, leads team members and manages resources in healthcare organizations for more than 29 years, including 15 years as a practitioner and more than 14 years as an academically strong teacher-researcher. He has successfully held various positions: (1) leadership positions in operational and military health systems in clinical operations, managed care, supply chain and logistics, information systems and facilities management; (2) management positions in healthcare, medical materials and supply chain; and (3) various academic leadership positions as Director of Doctoral Programs at two universities, Director of Academic Affairs, Director of Student Services, and Director of the Center for Survey Research and Health Information, as well as tenured faculty positions at two doctoral universities. Dr.
Ledlow holds a Ph.D. in Organizational Leadership from the University of Oklahoma, a Master of Health Administration from Baylor University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from the Virginia Military Institute. He has held numerous faculty positions at Central Michigan University and Georgia Southen University, and is currently Professor and Chair of the Department of Health Policy, Economics, and Management at the School of Community and Rural Health at the University of Texas Health Science Center Northeast in Tyler, Texas. Dr. Ledlow has taught 24 different courses at the graduate level, including graduate and master`s students in health leadership. “Dr. Jerry” (as his students call him) has given presentations on health-related topics and on models and applications of health leadership around the world; He has presented to a wide audience internationally, nationally and locally. He has published in many places (e.B journals, book chapters) and has been an author, collaborating author, editor and critic for several books. Dr. Ledlow is married to his beautiful wife Silke and has three fantastic daughters, Sarah, Rebecca and Miriam. He is a regional editor of the Journal of Global Business and Technology, a member of several publication review teams, and participates as a member of various working groups and committees at the international, national, and state levels.
Years ago, Dr. Jerry volunteered as a National Registry Certified Emergency Management Technician and was deployed as an officer in the U.S. Army Medical Services Corps in combat zones. He received the Federal Sector Managed Care Executive of the Year Award in 1998 and the Regent`s Award from the American College of Healthcare Executives in 1997 and 2003. His interests are focused on health economics and focus on leadership, management, decision-making, supply chain and logistics, community preparedness for terrorism and disasters, socio-economic constructions of community health and health, and any project that has the potential to improve community health through moral leadership and management practices, effective, efficient and efficient in the field of community health. Improve health care. Servant leaders are a revolutionary group – they take the traditional model of power leadership and completely upset it. .