Service before Self: Towards a Theory of Servant-Leadership

Abstract This article explores the relationship between perceptions of leadership and the level of trust between employees and supervisors. More specifically, this article seeks to begin a theoretical discussion of a particular leadership approach, servant leadership, introduces an instrument for measuring servant leadership, and presents the result of its initial use in a survey of 651 employees in a suburban Georgia county. While the results are preliminary, they show that one component of servant leadership, stewardship, is a determinant of trust level, indicating that "service before self" is not just a slogan, but a powerful reality that builds trust between employees and supervisors. Introduction Beset by scandal, faced with an apathetic and distrustful public, struggling to cope with and respond to a rapidly changing environment, and forced to provide more with less, the public service has tried it all. From the private sector, government has adopted down-sizing, reengineering, total quality management, and reinvention to become more efficient and effective. In response to scandal, government has employed ethics commissions and laws to enforce virtue. Change, however, is difficult and complex. The challenges facing the public sector suggest the need to transcend traditional rationality and move towards recognizing the pivotal role leadership plays, particularly leadership based on moral values, in fostering organizational performance. Because it is an approach to leadership that is firmly grounded in ethical principles, servant leadership has grown greatly in popularity in the private and public sector among consultants and practitioners (Spears, 1998); however, it is a leadership concept that has not attracted scholarly attention. The vision of principled, open, caring leadership that servant leadership creates is deeply appealing to an apathetic, cynical public tired of scandal and poorly performing bureaucracies and stands in sharp contrast to the "ethics of compliance" so popular with governments today (Gawthrop, 1998). But, servant leadership as currently articulated is an idealistic vision. Since Greenleaf wrote for the general reader, his writing on servant leadership does not clearly define the concept, distinguish it from other leadership theories, connect the concept with on-going research into leadership and performance, or explain how it might improve organizational performance. This paper will open a theoretical discussion on servant leadership by seeking to define the term, and examining theory and research on leadership, trust and performance. A model will be presented and tested that links servant leadership to an organizational culture of trust and the results of a preliminary study presented. Servant Leadership Defined Greenleaf developed the concept of servant leadership from an intuitive insight gained while reading Herman Hesse's book, Journey to the East. In the book, a band of men undertakes a long journey. The main character, Leo, a servant, does the menial chores for the group. Along the way, Leo sustains them with his spirit and his song. When Leo disappears, the group falls apart and abandons the journey; the group cannot function without him. Years later, the narrator finds Leo and discovers that he is in fact the head of the Order that sponsored the original journey. Leo, who is first encountered as a "servant," is in fact, a great leader (Greenleaf, 1977). From this story, Greenleaf drew many lessons about the role of the leader, and over time these lessons evolved into his concept of "servant leadership. " However, he provided no empirically grounded definition for the term. Instead, he merely proposes that the "servant-leader is servant first. " This open-ended definition leaves researchers with many unanswered questions. To help clarify the concept, Spears (Spears, 1998) draws upon Green leaf s writing and proposes ten key elements of servant leadership: listening, empathy, healing (of oneself and others), awareness of others, situations and oneself, persuasion, conceptualization, foresight, stewardship, commitment to the growth of people, and building community. …