The importance of effective leadership has increased substantially because companies strive to generate a competitive advantage in their respective industry which they can achieve through an effective leadership approach (Kaynak & Darling, 2013). Modern leadership approaches are focused on understanding the needs and demands of employees so that companies can reduce employee attrition rate while enhancing their productivity (Kaynak & Darling, 2013). In this regards, two of the most common leadership styles include Servant Leadership and Authentic Leadership. The objective of this essay is to compare and contrast between Servant leadership and Authentic leadership style to evaluate the key similarities and differences between these two leadership styles. The structure of this essay will include an analysis of the definitions and key characteristics of both approaches before comparing and contrasting between them. This report will analyse how these leadership approaches affects follower job satisfaction and follower organisational commitment a company. Lastly, this report will evaluate the example of different contemporary business leaders in order to support the arguments.
Servant leadership approach is referred to philosophy and set of practices which are focused on enriching people’s lives to create a more just and caring world (Spears & Lawrence, 2016). This concept was first introduced by Robert K. Greenleaf in 1970 which shows that it is a timeless concept. The servant leadership approach provides that this leadership approach begins with the natural feeling that one wants to serve, to serve first (Spears & Lawrence, 2016). The essence of this leadership approach is that leaders who adopt this approach place the interests of their followers first despite the fact that they contradict with the profit generation abilities of the corporation. There are specific key characteristics of servant leaders which make them different from other leaders such as empowerment, accountability, enabling, humility and self-awareness, courage, empathy and healing, authenticity and stewardship (Parris & Peachey, 2013). Studies have shown that this leadership approach assists in increasing follower loyalty and trust in their leader which motivates them to achieve organisational goals (Spears & Lawrence, 2016).
Authentic leadership is another popular leadership approach which is adopted by modern leaders to maintain transparency in the operations of companies and creating an honest relationship with followers (Shamir & Eilam-Shamir, 2018). This leadership approach is defined as a leadership approach that emphasises on building leader’s legitimacy through honest relationships with followers and by building an ethical foundation (Shamir & Eilam-Shamir, 2018). The roots of this leadership go back to the writings of the ancient Greek philosophers that emphasis on longstanding interest in authenticity in human behaviour. In this leadership approach, leaders have to demonstrate traits such as honesty, transparency and authenticity in their operations and they are typically individuals with high self-awareness who knew about their values and actions (Rego, Sousa, Marques & e Cunha, 2012). Followers tend to see them as genuine and legitimate leaders because they create an open and frank relationship with others. Walumbwa’s Dimensional Hypothesised model of authentic leadership provides four key dimensions of an authentic leader which include self-awareness, balanced processing, relational transparency and internalised moral perspective (Rego, Sousa, Marques & e Cunha, 2012).
While comparing these two leadership approaches, various similarities can be found. Both Servant and Authentic leadership style provides that the leaders must have the ‘genuine’ desire for serving their followers by fulfilling their interests. These approaches give importance to moral values and the decisions of leaders are guided by qualities on passion and compassion (Hoch, Bommer, Dulebohn & Wu, 2018). The leaders that adopt these leadership styles refuse to compromise on their principles even in adverse conditions and they guide their actions based on their values. Both of these leadership approaches give high importance to establishing strong relationship with people rather than just giving them orders to take actions. While leading the team, leaders that adopt either of these leadership approaches rely on their personal charisma in order to get things done to make sure that their followers trust their judgement (Ling, Liu & Wu, 2017). These leaders did not have a desire for status or rewards, and they lead from personal conviction to benefit their followers and the company as a whole (van Dierendonck & Patterson, 2015). The actions of these leaders focus on building strengths of people rather than focus on their weaknesses.
However, there are many differences between these two leadership theories as well which affects the processes and outcomes of a company. The fundamental difference that separate Servant and Authentic leadership approach are that servant leaders strive for “right” whereas the authentic leaders strive to be “real” (Focht & Ponton, 2015). Authentic leaders did not necessarily share the strong altruistic devotion of serving their followers as compared to servant leaders, and they have a high self-awareness and balanced processing capabilities which enable them to prioritise the interest of other stakeholders above employees as well to achieve higher goals (Kiersch & Peters, 2017). The servant leaders approach is based on normative leadership style in which the given characteristics set of leaders is supposed to emulate in order to ensure that the leaders attain success in the company. This leadership approach tries to shape the character and personality of the leaders based on specific value.
On the contrary, authentic leadership is character driven rather than traits driven and it does not recognise any fixed set of characteristics which leaders are expected to emulate in order to adopt this leadership approach (Kiersch & Peters, 2017). This leadership approach provides that each leader has its own unique style when it comes to leading followers. This leadership style is developed by them through study, introspection, experience and consultation which resulted in being consistent with their character and personality and it affects their leadership decisions as well. Another major difference between the two leadership approaches is related to serving others’ needs. In the case of servant leadership approach, the core principle that guides the actions of the leaders is the priority which is given to the interest of followers. In this style, the primary duty of the leader is to ensure that appropriate actions are taken to fulfil the needs, desires and aspirations of others. On the other hand, the authentic leadership theory did not encourage the leaders to ensure that they become too responsive to the desires of followers because it leads to creating problems such as suffering of organisational goals due to competing interests, decisions taken by leaders that offend others and danger of deviating from course of action (Ling, Liu & Wu, 2017). Therefore, there are many differences between the servant and authentic leadership approach which affects the actions taken by leaders and their outcomes.
When it comes to the application of these theories, the ultimate objectives of the leaders is to achieve follower job satisfaction and organisational commitment. Both of these factors affect the motivation and dedication level of employees which ultimately reflects on the performance of the company. Job satisfaction of employees is referred to the workers’ contentedness with their job and whether they are like their job or its aspects such as supervision or nature of work (Card, Mas, Moretti & Saez, 2012). Organisational commitment is referred to the level of an individual’s psychological attachment to an organisation (Geldenhuys, Laba & Venter, 2014). The job satisfaction and organisational commitment of an employee are closely related to each other which affect the productivity and outcomes of individuals. When it comes to servant leadership, it directly focuses on promoting the job satisfaction level of employees because the leaders prioritised their interests above everything else. Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs theory provides that in order to motivate employees, it is important that the leaders focus on fulfilling their needs which are divided into five categories which include physiological, safety, belongingness, esteem and self-actualisation needs. These needs are categorised in hierarchical order based on which fulfilment of lower lever needs is necessary before fulfilling upper-level needs (Jerome, 2013).
Since the servant leaders focus on fulfilling the needs and desires of employees, they are more likely to create a positive work environment where employees are comfortable to work, and they are happy with organisational policies which catered to their demands (Jerome, 2013). This structure is suitable for companies where the demand for talented workforce is considerable high such as the technology industry. For example, Google is a software company that offers a wide range of services to its customers across the globe and the company offers various services to its employees to keep them in the organisation such as free launch, parking, haircut, unlimited sick leaves, long maternity leaves, and others (D’Onfro & England, 2015). These facilities are focused on the needs of employees based on which the company retains a large number of talented employees. Similarly, employees are also likely to be committed towards the achievement of organisational goals since they believe that the company prioritises their interest and take actions for their benefits. However, experts argue that this approach can lead to reducing the performance of employees if they realised that they could exploit their leader to gain unfair advantages in the workplace (Hoch, Bommer, Dulebohn & Wu, 2018). Therefore, this approach is suitable in specific industries where the demand for retention of employees is high. In the case of authentic leadership, the leaders focus on creating an open relationship with employees and allowing them development opportunities rather than catering to all their needs.
Generally, this approach is suitable for corporations with a large number of employees and where the turnover rate is high such as manufacturing and production sector (Nichols & Erakovich, 2013). These leaders enable the employees to discuss their issues with them, and they implement policies to resolve these issues to create a win-win situation for everyone. Employees believe that the leader is honest and they are likely to follow the leaders that lead to organisational commitment. The satisfaction level of employees is achieved because they become a part of the decision making in the workplace since the leader considers their opinion while developing organisational policies. These leaders adopt a balanced process between the interest of employees and organisational goals and take their decisions based on moral and ethics which increases the commitment of employees. They are more likely to be satisfied due to transparency in their relations. In times when the leader has to take decisions in favour of organisational goals, then employees could become dissatisfaction (Black, 2013). However, the leaders can use their authenticity to explain their actions which motivate employees to accept their decisions and encourage them to achieve common organisational goals.
Since both servant and authentic leadership approaches lead to increased job satisfaction and organisational commitment of employees, there are examples of many leaders that have adopted these approaches. For example, Howard Schultz, former CEO of Starbucks, is known for adopting servant leadership in which he prioritised the interest of employees of the company. The employees are called partners in the company, and they receive perks such as free stuff, stocks of the company, bonuses, retirement plans, higher education facilities by the company (Leavy, 2016). Due to these policies, the company attacks a large number of talented barristers and employees that dedicatedly work towards satisfying customers’ needs which generates profits in the company. Another example is the CEO of Marriott International, Arne M Sorenson, who inspires loyalty among employees by understanding their needs and going above and beyond to fulfil them. Employees receive healthcare benefits, retirement plans, life insurance, paid holidays and sick leaves, hotel discounts, education and training facilities which lead to job satisfaction and organisational commitment which are the key to success of Marriott International (Lalonde, 2016).
Steve Jobs, the former CEO of Apple, was a good example of authentic leader who was known for being strict with his employees and encouraging them to think outside the box. Steve Jobs pushed his employees hard, but he had a strong vision about the future due to which people follow him. Apple becomes the first ever technology company to touch market capitalisation of $1 trillion which is a major milestone that has happened because the company is still guided on Steve’s principles (Nicas, 2018). Employees are highly committed to the organisation, and its facilities keep them satisfaction which shows that the leadership approach of Steve Jobs was highly effective. Another example of authentic leader is Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, who is known for his upfront attitude and honesty. He is genuine towards his work, and he admits in public to let others learn from them. He provides personal growth and development opportunities to employees along with many benefits to promote job satisfaction (Bagg, 2017). Employees are also involved in decision making and transparency in maintained through the workplace by Buffett which achieve job satisfaction that is a key factor for the success of the company.
In conclusion, servant and authentic leadership styles have some similarities and differences, and the objective of these leadership approaches is to ensure job satisfaction among employees and increasing organisational commitment. Servant leadership approach prioritises the interest of employee above anything else, and authentic leaders focus on taking a balanced decision based on moral values while maintaining transparency. Both these leadership approaches achieve job satisfaction and organisational commitment among employees due to which they are adopted by leaders such as Howard Schultz, Arne M Sorenson, Steve Jobs and Warren Buffett. It shows that companies can sustain their growth in the market by adopting these leadership approaches by retaining a highly talented and motivated workforce.
References
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D’Onfro, J. and England, L. (2015). An Inside Look at Google’s Best Employee Perks. Retrieved from https://www.inc.com/business-insider/best-google-benefits.html
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Ling, Q., Liu, F., & Wu, X. (2017). Servant versus authentic leadership: Assessing effectiveness in China’s hospitality industry. Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, 58(1), 53-68.
Nicas, J. (2018). Apple Is Worth $1,000,000,000,000. Two Decades Ago, It Was Almost Bankrupt. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/02/technology/apple-stock-1-trillion-market-cap.html
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