Promoting Leadership Effectiveness in Organizations: A Case Study on the Involved Factors of Servant Leadership

Abstract

The world is crying out for ethical and effective leadership that serves others, invests in their development and fulfills a shared vision. Among the many leadership styles (i.e., authoritarian, benevolent dictatorship, participatory, etc.) the one that best represents the ideals embodied in the human factor is servant-leadership. Servant-leadership incorporates the ideals of empowerment, total quality, team building, and participatory management, and the service ethic into a leadership philosophy. This model of leadership emphasizes increased service to others; a holistic approach to work; promoting a sense of community; and the sharing of power in decision making. Servant-leaders must be value- and character-driven people who are performance and process oriented. The aim of this paper is determining the drivers of servant leadership in order to put servanthood behaviors activities into practice among leaders. So at first we developed literature on servant leadership. Then Thirty-three measurement items were developed on the basis of opinions from leaders and the literature. Then Data collection occurred via a questionnaire. To validate the measurement scales for servant leadership, we performed a factor analysis. The results show that a six-factor measurement model (including emotional dimension, commitment to community, egalitarianism, altruism, managerial skills and human skills) fits the data acceptably. All of the measurement items significantly loaded on the constructs on which they were hypothesized to load. These results gave us confidence that the measures are indeed valid and reliable.