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The Servant Leader

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The Servant Leader

Unleashing the Power of Your People

Kogan Page,

15 min read
10 take-aways
Audio & text

What's inside?

"Servant leaders" act with integrity, work on behalf of those they lead and empower people throughout the organization.

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Editorial Rating

6

Qualities

  • Overview
  • Concrete Examples
  • For Beginners

Recommendation

Leaders are made, not born, and author Robert P. Neuschel shows you how to grow your own leadership qualities. He identifies core values that inform the most inspired kind of managerial leadership, using examples from the playbooks of today’s top business executives. This compact introduction to the primary characteristics of leadership provides classic, basic information for those aspiring to top positions. Neuschel promotes the simple notion that leaders should benefit - and serve - those they are leading, thus becoming "servant leaders."getAbstract recommends this thoughtful overview to students and managers who want to advance by helping others, not climbing over them.

Summary

The Leadership Gap

Industry based in the United States may have dominated world markets 25 years ago, but today it is losing its competitive edge. Lagging worker productivity may be partly to blame, but the main responsibility for the long-term decline in U.S. competitiveness rests squarely on its business leaders, for the following reasons:

  • Business leaders’ focus on short-term deal-making and turnaround profits has diverted their attention from providing quality goods and services.
  • Superstar CEOs get press attention and unjustified excessive compensation that separates them from the people and organizations they lead.
  • Business leaders do not appreciate the work of their subordinates.
  • Leaders lack core values, resulting in scandal in almost every sector of public life.

A free-market society requires an atmosphere of trust. When the public loses faith, government reacts by introducing constricting legislation that inhibits business. The goals of a business must reach beyond the pursuit of profit and should include contributing to social well-being.

Thus, though leaders must have a certain level of intelligence and competence...

About the Author

Robert P. Neuschel was an executive with an international management firm for 30 years and also was a professor at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

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