Service (Not Servant) Leadership

Servant Leadership is a term that is used by a lot of people to describe their self-proclaimed style. The term originated in a 1970 essay titled The Servant as Leader by Robert Greenleaf. In that essay, Greenleaf said:

        “The servant-leader is servant first… It begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to             serve first. Then conscious choice brings one to aspire to lead. That person is sharply different from one      who is leader first, perhaps because of the need to assuage an unusual power drive or to acquire                 material possessions…The leader-first and the servant-first are two extreme types. Between them there      are shadings and blends that are part of the infinite variety of human nature.
        The difference manifests itself in the care taken by the servant-first to make sure that other people’s         highest priority needs are being served. The best test, and difficult to administer, is: Do those served         grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more      likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will         they benefit or at least not be further deprived?"

I agree with what Robert said, and I wholeheartedly try to be of service to others. I am most successful as a leader when I have adequately provided enough resources to meet needs beyond the basics so my staff can make choices that best serve their students. I will give them my time, energy, attention, presence, ideas, and knowledge. Nothing is more fulfilling as a leader than seeing those I serve thrive.

I have been fortunate to work alongside other great educational leaders who share the idea of serving others over ego and power. I have noticed a line between being of service to others and being a servant to others. In a service role, I am alongside the person and assisting them as needed. In a servant role, I am doing the work for them. There are times when doing their work is absolutely necessary. They woke up with a sick child and needed copies run off for them. They are in an IEP meeting, and a student forgot something in their room and needs it unlocked. But, I act as their servant when I do tasks they can and should do for them in a supposed act of service rather than sit beside them and teach them so they are self-competent.

Acting as their servant undermines the growth of those I lead and creates a dependency on me that does not serve them well over time. If, in my acts of service, I do not guide the other person to be able to do this on their own later, I have not led them anywhere. I have done their work, and it may lead to success in that moment. But what happens when they need that skill later and I am unavailable. My supposed act of kindness has now caused them to fail in the present moment. The intent of servant leadership comes from a great place of kindness, but the impact can be as far from kind as possible.

A leader must discern when someone needs to have something done for them and when someone needs to be led to their own competency. If I know someone has the skill and knowledge but not the capacity due to outside constraints, I am happy to be a servant leader to lighten their load. Service leadership is needed when someone has not learned an essential skill yet. By doing so, the leader empowers the other person so that the person has grown and can assist others, thereby leveraging their impact. This also frees up the leader's time to help others or work on strategies and plans for continuous organizational improvements.

Sources: https://www.greenleaf.org/what-is-servant-leadership/