Articulating what I have learned in this course is something I find difficult, as there has been so much. I recently had to have a difficult conversation with one of my staff and as I was having it I was noticed how different my approach was than what it would have been a few months ago. Instead of focusing on how she needed to improve in certain areas I focused on what could be done to help her improve in those areas. I realized that in the process of prioritizing what she needed in order to succeed I was also prioritizing the success of the organization. If she succeeds the organization succeeds, and if she does not, neither does the organization. This became a clear picture for me of what transformational servant leadership can look like in action. Servant leadership involves prioritizing followers’ needs and transformational leadership focuses on transforming people to improve their performance and unite them towards a shared vision (Northouse, 2016). I learned that these two leadership approaches contribute to one another. Serving followers needs transforms them so they are better able to move towards the shared organizational vision and as they move towards that vision their needs transform and leaders must start again with serving followers. The example above demonstrates how this has affected my practice, but beyond that example this has changed the attitude with which I will approach various situations, especially difficult situations.

This brings me to the second big thing that I will take away from this course, which is that leadership is complex, therefore, leaders will not always make the right decisions. Smith, Montagno and Kuzmenko (2004) suggest that transformational leadership will not be effective “in static environments or during certain organizational stages” (B121, 2018). This means that a different approach would need to be used. To further complicate leadership, leaders must be concerned with vision, goals, ethics, team building, followers’ needs and organizational values; and those are just a few of the things we have covered in this course. I would prefer leadership to be black and white, but this is not the case. “Management is about seeking order and stability; leadership is about seeking adaptive and constructive change” (Northouse, 2016, p. 13) and leaders have to be able to balance “conceptual thinking and a day-to-day operational approach” (Spears, 2010, p. 28). Leaders need to consider all possible perspectives in a situation and balance various values and approaches in their decision-making. This makes judgement central to leaders’ character because it is with judgement that leaders determine the best course of action (Gandz, Crossan, Seigts & Reno, 2013). In this process leaders will inevitably make mistakes, which they must handle well if they want to be successful (The Global Leadership Summit, 2018). This has affected my practice of leadership because it has made me realize that mistakes are inevitable and that when I make them I need to take responsibility for them, but I also need to have grace on myself. Leadership does not come with a rulebook. Rather it comes with people, who are all complex. This makes leadership a complicated privilege as we seek to serve and influence those we are leading towards common goals.

“The true price of leadership is the willingness to place the needs of others above your own. Great leaders truly care about those they are privileged to lead and understand that the true cost of the leadership privilege comes at the expense of self-interest.”*

– Simon Sinek

*(Sinek, n.d.)

References

B121. (2018, October 17). Learning activity 1: Transformational leadership [Blog post]. Retrieved from https://create.twu.ca/b121/2018/10/learning-activity-1-transformational-leadership/

Gandz, J., Crossan, M., Seigts, G., & Reno, M. (2013, May/June). Leadership character and corporate governance. Reprinted in Ivey Business Journal [online]. Retrieved from https://iveybusinessjournal.com/publication/leadership-character-and-corporate-governance/#_ftn1

Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: Theory and practice, Seventh Edition. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Sinek, S. (n.d.). Leaders eat last: Why some teams pull together and others don’t. Retrievd from https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/3158574.Simon_Sinek

Smith, B. N., Montagno, R. V., & Kuzmenko, T. N. (2004). Transformational and Servant Leadership: Content and Contextual Comparisons. Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, 10(4), 80–91. https://doi.org/10.1177/107179190401000406

Spears, L. C. (2010). Character and servant leadership: Ten characteristics of effective, caring leaders. The Journal of Virtues & Leadership, 1(1), 25-30. Retrieved from http://www.vizenllc.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/CharacherAndServantLeadership.pdf

The Global Leadership Summit. (Producer). (2018). Danny Meyer [DVD]. Available from https://store.growingleadership.com/collections/gls-2018-resources/products/2018-gls-team-edition-pre-order-dvd