Servant leadership
Awareness in servant leadership as described by Spears (2002) , based on Greenleaf’s writings, is “being attuned and receptive to one’s physical , social and political environments” , “understanding oneself and the impact one has on others” . I understand it as having an objective view of one’s own perspective on a situation.
Emotional intelligence is described by Mayer, Caruso & Salovey (2000) as “the ability to perceive and express emotions, to use emotions to facilitate thinking , to understand and reason with emotion, and to effectively manage emotions within oneself and in relationship with others”. Simply put it is the ability to manage emotions .
Self awareness, as per the psychodynamic approach, focuses on the theory that individuals behave or react in a certain way because of their past experiences, which they might or might or not be aware of . As per Northouse (2016, p. 307) personal and collective insight by leader and follower can create reflective practitioners.
The above mentioned approaches have been theorized in different models of leadership , though I don’t think they are mutually exclusive . In my opinion an effective leader would do well to incorporate all three in their personal leadership approach.
After watching John Maxwell’s video (Maxwell, 2013) , I agree with his statement towards the end that we are at different leadership levels with different people. I see many of the servant leadership characteristics in my immediate boss. He is very invested in the well being of our team, and makes every effort to address their concerns. He also believes in empowering his team members to make decisions. Unfortunately there are way more leaders who are at a level one on Maxwells scale, than the higher levels.
References
John Maxwell: The five levels of leadership. (2013, Sep 10). Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPwXeg8ThWI
Mayer, J.D., Caruso, D.R. & Salovey, P. (2002). Selecting a measure of emotional intelligence: The case for ability scales, In R. Bar-On & J.D.A. Parker (Eds), The handbook of emotional intelligence ) pp.320-342). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass
Northouse, P.G. (2016). Leadership theory and practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE
Spears, L.C. (2002). Tracing the past, present and future of servant-leadership. In L.C. Spears & M. Lawrence (Eds), Focus on leadership: Servant-leadership for the 21st century ( pp1-16). New York: Wiley
Simarjit,
I do think that Maxwell’s description of the “Five levels of leadership” provides an interesting framework through which to view our relationships with others (whether we are in a leader or follow role).
I do wonder about his assertion that those who leave the office at 5:00 are working for positional leaders; perhaps they are passionately committed to their work, working at a high level, but also equally committed to family. Certainly doing “just the minimum” would connote poor leadership — but leaving at 5:00 doesn’t necessarily equate to “just the minimum.” (Enough of my soap box :-))
— Leadership Prof
Dr Penfold Navarro
I appreciate your bringing up the 5.00 pm conundrum. I agree with you that leaving at 5 does not necessarily mean that you are working for a positional leader . My work is never done at 5.00 pm, as is true for most other professionals. Herein lies the dilemma -call it quits at 5 , and go home to spend time with family ? Or slog on till work is ‘done’? My organization has been focusing on physician burnout recently, and have been discussing strategies to help people leave work on time. There are also numerous studies out there showing that productivity goes down after a certain number of hours.
I wonder if this is also more prevalent in professions dedicated to the well-being of their client, i.e. Doctors, Pastors, Teachers. Any profession thats duty is to help their client grow, succeed, etc has a higher duty of responsibility and it is harder to leave your work at the job. When I worked in sales I could leave at the end of the day, or even stay late to finish my job, but I did not take my work home with me, nor did I worry about its success. While working in a profession that has the well being of other humans as my utmost goal, it is very difficult to not take the work home with us (even if that ‘work’ is just worrying about my students and staff). I think the 5:00pm comment needs to be viewed relation to the profession as well as the leadership styles. That being said, I agree with both of you, that we as leaders need to prioritize other aspects of our life as well. We need to leave our work at work, when we can, to prevent burnouts. Thanks for the great discussion, interesting points to ponder.