The three basic assumptions of servant
leadership
are the leader is: Responsible for followers, responsive towards society and
those who are disadvantaged, and seeks to help others best by effectively leading
them. Listening, empathizing, healing, and
the ability to demonstrate awareness, persuasion, conceptualization, foresight,
stewardship, commitment to the growth of people, and building community are the
essential attributes of a servant leader (Spear, 2010). By focusing on the less privileged, invitational and servant
leaders exhibit service to their followers but also to society overall. When leading with love we invite others to reach their human
potential.
These attributes and assumptions make invitational
and servant leadership natural models for working in the public sector but more
problematic in the private sector. In
the private sector the needs of shareholders, customers, and market competition
can skew the mission. However, such potential
conflicts can be mitigated with a clearly explicated vision. Another challenge to servant leadership is in
the leader’s belief that his followers want change. The question of defining 'better' and who
decides this level is a challenge to the implementation of Greenleaf’s theory advocating for a serving society.
Diversity is too often the basis for
contention rather than community-building.
Gross (1999) posits the
monotheistic religions usually are the worst offenders because of the tendency
to display hostility toward different religious positions, thereby exhibiting a
strong tendency toward xenophobia and ethnocentrism. Therefore, diversity management is essential
for developing an invitational or servant leader's personal attributes and
roles.
Diversity
Management
is concerned with how we make decisions in situations where there are critical
differences, similarities, and tensions (Thomas, 2005). To help an organization in its journey
towards diversity, Thomas posited the need to begin by considering three
critical questions:
“What is a quality
decision?”
“What constitutes
significant differences, similarities, and tensions?”
“Where could we
use “strategic diversity management?” (p. 103)
A
quality decision, Thomas (2019) contended, helps to accomplish three important
goals: mission, vision, and strategy.
Understanding significant differences, similarities, and tensions
requires the leader to willingly understand what mixture creates true diversity. The leader must be concerned with race,
gender, ethnicity, geographic origin, and religions to ascertain the level of organizational
diversity that would promote fairness in equity, social justice, and cultural
responsiveness while promoting sustained organizational growth and open-minded
learning.
Thomas cautioned we can’t tell just by
looking at people. We must first specify which dimensions we consider
significant. For every significant dimension, the first core question should be
how different or similar are the members of the group? Leaders must know the diversity they
currently have and identify which dimensions are important. Thereafter, servant leaders can utilize
strategic diversity management to identify the potential gaps and then begin
recruiting to fill them.
One reality of living in a flatter world
is the requirement for leaders to have the ability to understand the global
cultures and communities. The Global
Leadership and Organizational Effectiveness (GLOBE) Research Program was a “network of 170
social scientists and management scholars from 61 cultures throughout the
world, working in a coordinated long-term effort to examine the
interrelationships between societal culture, organizational culture and
practices, and organizational leadership.
The meta-goal of the GLOBE project was to develop an empirical theory to
describe, understand, and predict the impact of cultural variables on
leadership and organizational processes and the effectiveness of these
processes” (House et al., 1998, p. 2).
When critiquing organizational behavior,
leaders must account for the effects of social culture and diversity. Given globalization of industrial
organizations and increased inter-dependencies among nations, the need for
better understanding of cultural influences on leadership and organizational
practices is more important than ever.
"Situations that leaders and prospective-leaders must face are
highly complex, constantly changing, and difficult to interpret. More than ever before, managers of
international firms face fierce and rapidly changing international competition”
(House et al., 1998, p.5).
Previous empirical research (House, Wright, & Aditya, 1997) was cited by the
GLOBE project as demonstrating variance in the expectations, roles, and status
for leadership and being highly dependent upon the cultural forces in the
countries in which the leaders are expected to function. For instance, “Americans, Arabs, Asians,
English, Eastern Europeans, French, Germans, Latin Americans, and Russians tend
to glorify the concept of leadership and consider it reasonable to discuss
leadership in the context of both the political and the organizational
arenas. People of the Netherlands and
Scandinavia often have distinctly different views of leadership” (House et al.,
1998, p. 4).
Both public and private organizations need
to adjust to the implication of living in a flatter world resulting from a global economy.
Appreciation for cultural differences needs to move beyond cursory training in
tolerance. True culturally
responsive education
would embrace diverse languages, customs, religions, ethical perspectives, and
historical truths; thereby allowing the tenets of servant and invitational leadership to take root
within organizations dedicated to creating systemic behaviors that ensure fairness
in equity, social justice, and cultural responsiveness while promoting sustained
organizational growth and open-minded learning.
To cite:
Anderson,
C.J. (June 30, 2020) Intentionally inviting diversity when implementing
servant
leadership. [Web log post] Retrieved from http://www.ucan-cja.blogspot.com/
References:
Greenleaf,
R. K. (2002). Servant-leadership: A journey into the nature of legitimate
power
and greatness.
Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press.
Gross, R.M. (1999). Religious diversity: Some implications for
monotheism. Cross Currents,
Fall 49(3). Retrieved from http://www.crosscurrents.org/gross.htm
House, R.J., et al (1998). Cultural influences on leadership and organizations: Project Globe
Spears,
L. C. (2010). Character and servant leadership: Ten characteristics of
effective, caring
leaders.
The Journal of Virtues and Leadership v1:1, pp. 25-30. Retrieved from
Thomas, R. R. Jr. (2005). Building
on the promise of diversity: How we can move to the
next level in our
workplaces, our communities, and our society. Saranac Lake, NY:
AMACOM. Retrieved from http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=111449886
Thomas, R. R. Jr. (2019). How to practice strategic diversity
management [Web log post]
Retrieved from
Waldman
D.A., de Luque, M.S., Washburn N., House, R.J., Adetoun, B., Barrasa, A.,
Bobina,
M., Bodur, M., Chen, Y.J., Debbarma, S., Dorfman, P., Dzuvichu,
R.R.,
Evcimen, I., Fu, P., & Grachev, M. (2006). Cultural
and leadership predictors
of
corporate social responsibility values of top management: a GLOBE study of 15
countries. Journal of International
Business Studies, 37(6), 823-837.
Retrieved
from ABI/INFORM Global. (Document ID: 1157834571).
