🧠 Journal Summary: SERVANT LEADERSHIP AND ITS RELATION TO WORK PERFORMANCE

🧠 Journal Summary: SERVANT LEADERSHIP AND ITS RELATION TO WORK PERFORMANCE

Authors: Gašková, J.

Published In: Central European Business Review, Volume 9 | Issue 3 | 2020

🔍 Study Summary

This study investigated the connection between servant leadership and work performance, specifically examining how a supervisor’s servant leadership behaviors influence both the formal job duties (in-role performance) and voluntary helpful behaviors (extra-role performance) of their subordinates.

The research aimed to address a gap in studies on servant leadership within the Central European region. Data was collected through self-report questionnaires from Master’s students at the University of Economics, Prague, who were also working at least 20 hours per week.

💡 Key Concepts

• Servant Leadership: A leadership philosophy where the leader’s main goal is to serve their team members, focusing on their growth, well-being, and success. Key behaviors include empowering, helping subordinates develop, prioritizing their needs, ethical conduct, fostering emotional healing, and building community value.
• Work Performance: This concept covers two main areas:
  • In-role Performance: The specific tasks and responsibilities that are formally part of an employee’s job description.
  • Extra-role Performance: Voluntary actions that go beyond an employee’s official duties but still benefit the organization, such as helping colleagues or showing initiative.
• Empowering (as a dimension of Servant Leadership): A specific aspect of servant leadership where leaders provide their team members with significant responsibility, autonomy, and the necessary resources to effectively carry out their tasks.
• Regression Analysis: A statistical technique used in the study to determine and quantify the relationships between a leader’s servant leadership behaviors and their subordinates’ work performance.

📊 Key Insights

• The study found a clear and statistically significant positive relationship between a supervisor’s practice of servant leadership and an increase in both their subordinates’ in-role (formal duties) and extra-role (voluntary) work performance.
• Among the various characteristics of servant leadership, “empowering” was identified as the only individual dimension that showed a positive and significant link to overall work performance.
• The findings suggest that employees, especially working business students in the sample, highly value supervisors who grant them responsibility and autonomy in their work.
• This research confirms the relevance and positive impact of servant leadership within the Central European context, despite the specific nature of the study’s sample group.

📘 Example Application

In a tech startup, a team lead wants to boost productivity and innovation. Applying the principles from this study, the lead could adopt a more servant-oriented approach by focusing on empowering their developers. Instead of dictating every step, the lead might define the project’s goals but allow team members significant autonomy in choosing their development tools, methodologies, and even schedules, provided deadlines are met.

The lead would also ensure they have access to necessary resources and training. This empowerment would likely lead to better code quality (in-role performance) and encourage developers to proactively suggest new features or help debug colleagues’ issues (extra-role performance), ultimately benefiting the entire company’s growth.

💬 Comment from Dr. Dwi Suryanto

This research offers a powerful insight for leaders, particularly highlighting that effective leadership isn’t just about giving orders, but about enabling and empowering your team. The finding that ’empowering’ is a statistically significant dimension of servant leadership directly tied to better performance is crucial.

It suggests that by trusting employees with responsibility and autonomy, leaders can unlock their full potential, leading to improved execution of core tasks and a greater willingness to contribute beyond expectations. This is a vital lesson for fostering a proactive and high-performing workforce.

📌 Takeaway

Servant leadership, especially through empowering subordinates with responsibility and autonomy, significantly enhances both required job performance and voluntary helpful behaviors, proving its value in creating a more effective and engaged workforce.