Leadership is a journey, or as I describe in the "Personal Leadership Pilgrimage" workshop, an actual pilgrimage! One of the participants in a recent discussion in which I have participated about this process, shared a great example of his own leadership pilgrimage.  I would like to share this with you as a great example of the process of becoming a "servant leader:"

"In my first 12 years of managing people, I used a form of the top-down command and control approach taught to me from birth. I learned more top-down in my four years at the US Naval Academy.

"Though considered one of the best young officers, I was disappointed with not being able to get better performance from those in the middle and lower parts of the spectrum. My top guys loved me, because I left them alone and only helped when I could. They outperformed the middle by more than 2:1, the bottom by 4:1. However, the bottom performers feared me greatly. I routinely told them they existed only to support me in achieving my goals.

"I read lots but learned little until after my 12 year on sea duty I attended a Master's course where... I read... a group of case studies by Harvard professors. My conclusion:  Employees are the sun, the boss is the earth. Without the sun's heat, the boss dies; so the employees are far more important to success than the boss!   

I pondered this, and had to admit my ship would only be as good as the sum of what the sailors did and I was not part of that sum! They operated/maintained the propulsion plant, radars, sonars, guns, missiles, stoves, laundry, etc. These were all things I did not do. I realized that my responsibility was to provide support to them; including, training, tools, material, parts, discipline, direction, peace of mind, etc. I  also had to admit that I really did not listen to them because I was always far too busy figuring out what my next orders would be. But if they were so important, why shouldn't I try to listen to them more?

Soon thereafter, I went back to sea duty as the Commanding Officer of a Destroyer Escort. In that position, I could try out this new idea. The ship was in terrible shape.  It was as if the crew was trying to wreck it! I immediately started conducting one-on-one and group meetings in order to listen to their complaints, suggestions and questions; and to respond to them as best I could. I soon learned that it was far better for me not to give an immediate answer or response to their questions and complaints. Rather, it was more effective to elicit further input from others to learn what more individuals had to say about the same issue, giving everyone a chance to add their "two cents." I learned that "shooting from the hip" was a very big negative to my crew, while going away and coming back with a proposed fix that utilized much of their opinions and input earned a lot of points.

"As I improved the quality of my support, their performance improved in lockstep. I was only in command of that ship for 18 months, but we went from one of the worst to one of the best.   

This is a great example of servant leadership. He was able to achieve true organization effectiveness through listening to and meeting the needs of his crew. By putting their needs and ideas in front of his own, as a servant leader, he was able to help them all become far more effective than he had experienced before.