Category: LDRS 500

I completely agree with some of your comments in your post. Like you, I was surprised to discover that Northouse views leadership as a process that can be learned, rather than a set of special characteristics or a particular manner of behaviour. In fact, I avoided pursuing post-graduate studies in leadership for many years because I do not have the stereotypical personality that one associates with leaders: extroverted, highly-opinionated, and stong-willed, for example. Northouse’s view of leadership opens the door for many different types of people to embrace the idea that they can function as effective leaders.

You also made a very good point that when the distance between the leader and the followers increases, the leadership tends to move more and more towards position power vs personal power. I wonder if there is an optimal organizational size for servant leadership to work effectively? Given the emphasis that Northouse places upon the need for a relationship between the leader and follower, is it possible for a servant leader to serve effectively as his or her organization multiplies in size?

Thank you for raising the interesting question at the end of your post:

Do you think it’s rare for someone in an assigned leadership role to take both a management and leadership approach? Which approach do you think more assigned leaders tend to practice?

In small organizations where people where many hats I do think its entirely possible for someone in an assigned leadership role to take on a management role as well, simply out of necessity. In fact, I worked under an assigned leader who held both roles. Unfortunately the management role captured most of his attention. He spent a lot of his time managing people and running around putting out ‘fires’ so to speak. Out of necessity, he delegated some of his leadership responsibilities to others on staff. There were many individuals who were new to the field and itching for leadership roles, and they jumped at the opportunities. However, their inexperience and developing professional skills resulted in more problems for our leader to deal with. It was my first object lesson in the difference between leadership and management. Although he was a wonderful man to work with, his approach to leadership inadvertently made a challenging job all the more difficult for himself and the rest of the team.

Thank you for sharing your example of how you demonstrated the servant leader characteristic of healing in your post. Although Greenleaf argued that the when servant leaders help their followers walk through the process of healing, they themselves become healed (Northouse, 2016, p. 228), it was only after reading your post that I began to understand exactly what he was trying to communicate. It gave me a new appreciation for being open and transparent with others. I felt that this would be a risky undertaking for a leader. However now I see how powerful it could be. It also reinforces for me the vital importance that ‘relationship’ plays in the leader-follower dynamic. One would have to believe that the follower would appreciate and value such a degree of vulnerability on the part of the leader.

 

Northouse, P. G. (2016). Leadership: theory and practice (7th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

The three Servant Leader characteristics which I would like to personally develop are: awareness, persuasion and conceptualization. Awareness refers to “a quality within servant
leaders that makes them acutely attuned and receptive to their physical, social, and political environments. It includes understanding oneself and the impact one has on others. With awareness, servant leaders are able to step aside and view themselves and their own perspectives in the greater context
of the situation” (Northouse, 2016, p. 228). Over the years I have developed my ability to be acutely aware of the needs of my students and colleagues, however this characteristic presents a significant level of self-awareness that I have not developed to this point: the ability to step back, view and assess myself and my perspectives objectively and understand the impact that I am having upon others.

Persuasion “is clear and persistent communication that
convinces others to change. As opposed to coercion, which utilizes positional authority to force compliance, persuasion creates change through the use of gentle nonjudgmental argument.”  (p. 228). Persuasion implies speaking the truth while at the same time demonstrating respect, patience, acceptance, and, ultimately, love. Again, relationship is key. Without trust, mutual respect and a belief that the leader has the best interests of the followers at heart, persuasion will be difficult to accomplish without the use of coercion and punishment. As a teacher, I have learned that persuasion can ONLY take place when I have won my students’ trust and they believe that I really care about them. Without this foundation, teachers must enforce compliance through rules, coercion or punishment, but it is a lot easier to persuade students to comply when you have built a relationship with them.

Conceptualization is “an individual’s ability to be a visionary for an organization, providing a clear sense of its goals and direction.” (p. 228). Conceptualization also allows servant leaders to respond to complex problems in creative ways. I don’t really exhibit this characteristic now, but I would like to learn how to begin to do this. I find that I am not a very “outside the box” kind of thinker. For example, my teaching goals are laid out for me, and it is just up to me to plan how, when, and in what manner I will accomplish them.  Developing my ability to be a visionary, outside-the-box thinker will be a significant area of growth for me. I see this area of growth being closely related to Foresight – the ability to predict what is coming based on what is occurring in the present and what has happened in the past. These four characteristics will be the most challenging for me to consistently realize in my practice. The 10 characteristics are attributed to Spears, but I am left wondering if there are other scholars that further expand upon these characteristics, most importantly, providing specific examples of each?

According to Northouse (p. 8), assigned leadership refers to individuals who are leaders by virtue of their position or status. The types of power that these leaders possess can be further categorized as legitimate, reward, coercive or information power.  In contrast,  emergent leaders do not hold official positions of leadership, but are able to influence their peers. Their peers ascribe leadership to them because they are held in high esteem in their eyes. Such individuals possess personal power. It seems reasonable that an individual may become an emergent leader for a number of reasons: they are very knowledgeable, have a likable personality, a certain amount of charisma, are good public speakers, etc. One incident when I ’emerged’ as a leader occurred when I was in the sixth grade. My two younger siblings and most of the primary-aged children would surround me outside on the playground each recess. I would organize the play activities and play with them. They came to see me as their collective older sister and they followed me everywhere I went. Looking back, I see how the gift of teaching was manifesting itself before I had any notion of what I wanted to be when I grew up. According to Northouse, leadership is a process which can be learned, but it appears that  some aspects of leadership can occur innately. I am left wondering if certain personality types tend to become emergent leaders more so than others……..?

I found it interesting that according to Northouse (2016), Leadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal. To me, ‘process’ implies two things: that this thing called leadership happens over time, and that it involves relationship.  I believe that it is impossible to influence someone’s behaviour over a period of time without punishment except through having some type of relationship with the individual. The fact that Northouse defines leadership as a process appeals to me for 3 reasons: it is not dependent upon personal characteristics such as extraversion or personality type, it can be learned and, as mentioned above, it involves relationship.

In chapter one Northouse emphasized that leaders and followers must always be spoken of in relation to one another, like two sides of a coin. Since the relationship between the leader and the followers is key, the power differential must be used in a manner to attain the common goals held by both the leader and the follower. This results in everyone benefitting, and there are no ‘winners’ and ‘losers’.

According to Northouse, ‘influence’ goes both ways in a leader-follower relationship. The leader is influenced by the followers and vice versa. This was a new concept for me. I had previously thought of it as being unidirectional from leader to follower. However since, according to Northouse, the goal of leadership is to achieve a common goal, then the goal is really the chief focus and there is no room for a ‘winner vs loser’ mentality.

I found it interesting that emergent leaders are chosen by their peers because the leader most closely matches the group’s self-identity. I found this interesting because it goes against my previously-held notion that leaders must distinguish themselves from the group in order to be perceived as a leader. Could this positive association with the group’s perceived self-identity also apply to other types of leaders?