Servant Leadership

For growing leaders, most people associate leadership with title, rank, or position. By vested authority, leadership automatically flows. This is easy to assume because your leadership selection validates that you have the wisdom, knowledge, and skills to be a successful leader. However, an anonymous writer in a piece titled "A Leader" in the Speaker's Sourcebook II by Glenn Van Ekeren points out the fallacy of assuming leadership is anything but automatic. The anonymous writer gives several examples where the leader falls short. Examples include, "I spoke with authority. People listened. But alas, there was one who was wiser than I, and they followed that individual." Or "I sought to inspire confidence, but the crowd responded, "Why should we trust you?'" Last, "I ran ahead of others and pointed the way to new heights. I demonstrated that I knew the route to greatness. And then I looked back, and I was alone." What the leader in the anonymous writer's article finds is that leadership success is best achieved by forgetting about yourself as a leader and serving those on your team. Servant leadership is needed more than ever today. Virtual technology, remote work, and the speed of change have diluted the personal engagement necessary to achieve success. Arriving at the best solutions through the creative ideas of your team is often lost by the lack of in-person connection. The purpose of this book is to provide growing leaders with the solutions that help enhance their leadership skills by applying some of the principles of servant leadership. Many of these principles were learned in my career by success but also by my own failure. It is my sincere hope that these solutions will help you as a growing leader become even more successful leading the next generation.

-- Jim Manzelmann