Situational Leadership, for example, asserts that different situations/people require different leadership styles. In some situations a leader needs to take an inclusive, consensus building approach, while at other times a critical situation may require an unambiguous, dictatorial response from even the most benign leader. Similarly, when managing staff, some of your experts may require very little advice or attention, while other less experienced staff may require closer oversight and direction, not because they can't be trusted, but because they don't yet know what they are doing.
Situational Leadership is a subject close to my heart, so here is my slant on Servant Leadership and how it can be synthesised with Situational Leadership.
Although popularised by Agile evangelists, Servant Leadership is not a new concept - Lao-Tzu wrote about servant leadership in the fifth-century BC: “The highest type of ruler is one of whose existence the people are barely aware…. The Sage is self-effacing and scanty of words. When his task is accomplished and things have been completed, all the people say, ‘We ourselves have achieved it!’”
The "Servant Leader" concept is relatively straight forward: It asserts that the role of a leader is to define the team's goals, and then remove the impediments that the team encounters. Since the team (not the leader) is best placed to define what the impediments are, the leader spends most effort on being a "servant" to the team - removing the obstacles as they define them. In Agile, the concept is pushed a little further, in that the Development Team is Self-Organising and Self-Managing. Thus, the role of a Scrum Master is to:
- Remove impediments that the team identifies
- Facilitate meetings and processes that the team requires
- Shield the team from diversions and distractions
- Coach, encourage and support the team
- Help the team improve, collaborate, self-manage and self-direct
However Gint Grabauskas in his discussion on Servant Leadership (http://www.agilealliance.org/files/1913/5525/5359/ServantLeadershipAgileTeams.pdf) says:-
There is a time and place for autocratic behavior. If a building is burning and I am inside, I don’t want a servant leader guiding me to the door. I want an autocratic manager telling me exactly where to go and what to do to escape. Inevitably those times will come on a project. But a servant leader will have gained the trust and respect of her team so that when the occasional autocratic slant is needed, the team will willingly accept this “anomaly.”
The leader is the person that the team looks to for these things - which is not necessarily the person that the Org Chart says it should be.
Responding to the Team's needs gives the Leader a difficult problem. How do you fulfil the more conventional requirement of Leadership - that of keeping the team moving, and moving in the right direction, if you are simply responding to the team's needs? This comes down to the first part of a Servant Leader's role - "Define the Team's Goals". But for a Servant Leader, it is not enough to simply define the goal in terms of outcome - you need to define the goal in terms of motivation. The Team needs to be motivated enough to be pulling you, rather than you pushing them. So you need to describe why the team should want to do this. The goal should normally be intrinsic - the joy of doing something unique is usually enough (though some extrinsic recognition of achievement never hurts). Maintaining this vision is important, it keeps a team motivated.
The Servant Leader's task is further complicated by the fact that your team is not really a discrete entity that can be treated as a uniform whole - it is a series of individuals with different needs. The Leader that your senior programmer needs may be a laissez faire Servant Leader, while the Leader your inexperienced BA needs may be a more dictatorial leader who provides a great deal of direction and oversight. So you won't be treating people the same - which hardly seems fair.
How do you ensure that this unfairness doesn't lead to resentment? The answer is that you need to be Dictatorial in a Servant Leader way - don't thrust direction and oversight onto your junior BA. Instead make sure that the BA is aware of need, and requests it. Your BA will forgive you if you make a misjudgement and are overzealous in fulfilling that request, but you won't be forgiven if the oversight and direction was not requested.
Summary An Agile Leader must understand that Leadership is not assigned to you by virtue of your job title, leadership is assigned to you by your team - earned as a result of showing that you can remove impediments, facilitate meetings and fulfil the other leader roles needed by your team. Once this trust is earned, teams will forgive errors - even forgiving moments of autocratic behavior, where a wrong call was made.
The key is this: In Servant Leadership, your leadership is guided by requests. Your team pushes you - you do not push them. This seems a fragile thread to hang your leadership on, but the thread is surprisingly robust - because people forgive your mistakes if they are directing the action. This works at both the team and individual level:
- If teams are kept in the loop and understands the need for an autocratic decision, they will request one from you. Consequently they will forgive occasional wrong decisions and bad calls when they are made.
- If individuals are led to understand the need to be treated differently, they will request it from you. Consequently they will forgive mistakes or missteps in the oversight process, In this way, you can adapt your leadership style according to the situation (Situational Leadership) using the techniques associated with Servant Leadership.
It is thus possible to synthesize Situational Leadership with Servant Leadership. This is not easy. It requires honesty, openness, and direct communication at both the team and individual level. Above all, it requires you to have the courage needed to trust your team.
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