Leadership is the ability to have other people follow of and your actions without force. A leader is visionary and knows the direction to take. The term “servant leadership” was introduced by Robert Greenleaf as a type of leadership styles that the leader is the servant to the followers but not the other way round. The followers are motivated and developed to achieve the organizational goals. A servant is responsible for his or her followers and does things for their interest.
Traditional Leadership
Traditional leadership is characterized by the power and control being implied by traditions of the position of power that were previously held; the power defined by the position established therefore the followers virtually respect the position rather than the individuals in that position; and that the promotions are not done on merits but rather based on office politics and favoritism. However, Traditional leadership is in contrast to servant leadership which is mostly influenced by Christian faith. People are called to serve even in the position of leadership. The powers and control of the leaders are guided by the Christian faith. In servant leadership, power and control are bestowed on the followers.
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Benefits of Servant Leadership over Traditional Leadership in a Healthcare Organization
Healthcare organization has a complex management and therefore need a leader who has a personal sacrifice to serve the people. Therefore, the healthcare organization is the ideal for the use of servant leadership mindset of serving the followers. The healthcare organization requires caring for the patients and being ethical and application of professional core values. The values of healthcare organizations align well with the values of servant leadership. Traditional leadership style may fail to care for the followers but require the followers to care for the leader by the virtue of the positional authority, thus not applicable in the healthcare organization.
Servant leadership encourages relationship building and personal development among service providers within the healthcare organizations (Boomer, 2010). These help the service providers to practice care and support for others a virtue that lacks in traditional leadership. The servant leadership is strongly related to the job satisfaction especially in health organizations (Gunnarsdottir, 2014). When a patient is well cared for, there is trust, cohesion, teamwork and shared goals, healthcare service provision is improved. On the contrary, traditional leadership fails to build relationships among the service leaders and leaders personal development, therefore, lack the practice of care and support to the patient.
Servant leadership is greatly associated with the patient-centered care. The service provider exhibits listening, empathy, and healing to achieve patient-centered care and improve patient satisfaction. Traditional leadership is self-centered mainly for those in power and control and therefore not applicable in the healthcare organization. Servant leadership also benefits the wider workforce by building better teamwork, good communication, and increase workers morale and personal development (Tumerman, 2012). On another hand, traditional leadership is mostly suppressed by the efforts to build better communication, it is also characterized by low workers morale thus lacks wider workforce.
Higher leader confidence and application leadership skills: Good management and leadership behaviors are ideal for the better working environment (Saleh et al, 2004). It becomes inspiring to the workers and become proactive in the achievement of the organization objectives. Traditional leadership lacks good management and leadership behaviors which most are detrimental to the workforce.
Disadvantages of Traditional Leadership
Traditional leadership contradicts employees’ empowerment compared to servant leadership which encourages and create room for employees’ motivation. Traditional leadership, therefore, tends to limit the employee empowerment because it views employees to have low ambitions, hates working and lack capacity to make business decisions.
The employees’ motivation is limited by traditional leadership style which assumes that by paying a reasonable salary and other benefits will motivate employees. This view is a limiting tool in employee motivation and morale for putting more effort in their work. This leadership style also restricted communication between various levels in the organization. The organizational structure tends to be the limiting factor where ranks and levels restrict information flow from the senior managers to the line managers and supervisors.
Traditional management does not allow room for employees’ creativity by thinking outside the confines of the standards set by the organizational standards. This leadership style is based on a structured workplace where employees are controlled by strict standards of professionalism and performance indicators which restrict their thinking to new perspectives of seeing their work.
Pros of Positive Personal Traits in a Leader
Servant leadership show higher emotional intelligence which is the attachment and need to care for others people. These leaders exhibit this trait with provider-patient interaction and relationships which build patient and job satisfaction. The leaders are committed to providing their services unreservedly by taking care of their patients and remain focused to their responsibilities. This level of commitment is manifested through their willingness to serve rather than being served.
The ability to be a change maker of the servant leaders continue to make their style of leadership stand out among other leadership styles. For instance, doctors and nurses work hard to make a difference to the lives and health of their patients. They are capable and willing to make a difference contrary to the traditional leadership which sees it as the responsibility of the followers to make a difference.
Servant leaders are empathetic hence understand and share the feelings of their patients. They know when other people are suffering because they feel it too and are willing to help. This trait is important especially for the patient care where the service provider needs to empathetic to the patients.
The servant leaders are willing to care, help, and the concern for others which give them healing power. They don’t want to see other people suffer whereas they can do something about their suffering. Therefore, they do what is good for the people and for the people. This trait is critical especially in healthcare organization because the patient needs care and concern for their health.
Servant leaders are self-aware of the principles of ethics, values, and powers. They know their limits, responsibilities, and obligations when serving the patients. This is important to the organization core principles, vision and mission. Their power of persuasion makes them more appealing to the people. In management, the leader does not use their positional authority to coerce the followers, instead, they reason together for the course of action.
Cons of Positive Personal Traits in a Servant Leader
Servant leadership takes time to achieve significant results. Being a successful servant leader is not an easy task. It takes sacrifice, commitment and time to make a significant impact on the organizational culture. Critics have it that it is overrated style of leadership which idealy may not exist. Some of the traits that are attributed to the servant leader are considered to be unachievable in the real practice of leadership (Gunnarsdóttir, 2014). Critics say that a mix for other leadership styles is inevitable.
References
Boomer, C. B. (2010). Creating the conditions for growth: A collaborative practice development programme for clinical nurse leaders. Journal of Nursing Management , 18(6), 633-644
Gill, E. (2015). Servant leadership: Quotes and definition of the model. Concordia Online Education . Retrieved from http://www.concordiaonline.net/what-is-servant-leadership/
Gunnarsdóttir, S. (2014). Is servant leadership useful for sustainable Nordic healthcare? Nordic Journal of Nursing Research & Clinical Studies, 34 (2), 53-55.
Saleh, S. S. W., Dwight., Balougan., Modinat. (2004). Evaluating the effectiveness of public health leadership training: the NEPHLI experience. American Journal of Public Health, 94(7), 1245-1249.
Tumerman, M. C. (2012). Increasing medical team cohesion and leadership behaviors using a 360-degree evaluation process. WMJ: Official Publication of the State Medical Society of Wisconsin, 111(1), 33-37.
