Why are the relationships so important in servant leadership and how does this fit in with new leadership trends?

Something that I’ve experience and witnessed over time has been a deterioration of real relationships between leaders and the groups they are leading. When I first entered the business world after attending The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State), people in leadership seemed to be much more genuinely concerned about their teams of people than they are today. Yes, this is a generalization, and I am not saying that all leaders today are absolutely not concerned. But, there has been a trend developing – and we are exploring trends.

One of the most important aspects of servant, possibly the most important, is that the relationships need to be personal. It is important that the leader really get to know their teams of people, and know them in depth. The relationship is so important because everything else stems from there.

What makes a good, strong personal relationship? It’s developing a deep understanding of the individuals on your team. Remember, with servant leadership, the focus is on the team and individuals, not the leader. You’ve got to get inside their head and understand not only what they are telling you, but why. What are their emotional drivers, their family issues, and their career and growth interests? What are their ambitions, their fears and concerns?  

In order to get the biggest gains from servant leadership, there has to be a great deal of trust established between the leader and the other people both individually and as a team. And we have lost a lot of that trust in most business situations.  

One of the most amazing individuals I ever work for, Larry S., who was truly a leader and mentor, seemed to know everything about me – what motivated me, what my interests were, what my personal ambitions and desires were, what my wife was interested in, if there was a significant family crisis going on, what I needed for career advancement, what my personal interests were beyond work. As I talked with other people on the team, I found that he knew this information about ALL the others, not just a select few.

How did he acquire all this information? He did not get in overnight or in one conversation! It took time, but simply through personal conversations and interaction, easy discussions and dialogue, all this information become available.  

How was he able to do this? Over a fairly short period of time, a sense of trust developed between us and all the other people on the team. We all felt that we could have very open and honest dialogue and communications with him because we all had a great deal of faith and trust.

What did he do with this information? He used it to help and guide me to success. There was never any manipulation or Machiavellian tactics employed. Did we all work hard for Larry? You bet we did, and the team and business thrived. What’s more amazing is that he never asked us to do anything beyond what was expected; but we all did much more than required because of how we were treated and because we all trusted Larry’s intent, judgment and character.

We were all individuals on a fairly large team, but yet we functioned as a very strong and cohesive unit because we all had developed a personal and trusting relationship with each other and our leader. It’s interesting and important to understand, that the spirit of trust was inspired and initiated by our leader.

A troubling, negative trend I see developing is that these personal and trusting relationships in business are vanishing. There is less importance and significance being placed on establishing and developing relationship between leaders and their people they lead. I’ve even witnessed situations where there has been an absolute attempt to block and prevent any kind of trusting and personal relationship from developing.

In the next issue, we’ll look at some reasons why this trend toward the impersonal has developed and some ways to turn it around. We’ll take a quick look at the work of Abraham Maslow to understand why servant leadership works.

I’d like to invite you to leave a comment below. 

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