Service-Learning and Servant Leadership Development in Students

Introduction

Leadership can be found in many forms. Some leaders are self-serving, seeing everything in their possession as a tool to be used for personal gain. Other leaders seem to have a special spark that inspires people — a strong desire to give something back to their community and a sense of moral responsibility toward their positions. These leaders are what researchers refer to as servant leaders. Cultivating this type of leadership is the goal of most institutions of higher education around the world. This research study examines the effects of the service-learning experience at two major universities on students' ability to develop the characteristics of the servant leader, using an experimental design to investigate this area of interest.

The servant leader embodies the concept that the only true leader is one who recognizes the needs of those they lead as the top priority. The servant leader differs from the self-serving leader in attitude and philosophy, prioritizing the good of the many over personal power and financial gain. Leadership goes beyond simple management of resources; it is represented by the ability to inspire others and to elicit their cooperation through a desire to emulate strong leadership. Development of the servant leader is therefore a primary goal of universities, which seek to produce the kind of servant leader that will be needed in the future.

Research Question

The central research question asked by this study is: "Does a service-learning experience help students develop the characteristics of servant leadership?" Although this question centers on two specific university settings, the findings obtained will be useful in other university settings as well.

Background and Significance of the Study

The development of servant leaders has received considerable attention in academic literature. This research trend is driven by the need to find ways to instill servant-leader attitudes in future CEOs and upper managers. Servant virtues include love, humility, trust, vision, and empowerment (Waddell, 2006). These values are reflected in the manner in which a leader interacts with the world around them.

Research into servant leaders has found that they tend to be introverts rather than extroverts (Waddell, 2006). They require less recognition and positive feedback from the outside world than extroverts do. They are motivated by their own internal drives, attitudes, and ambitions rather than by which actions are likely to earn recognition from others (Waddell, 2006). They are self-motivated and more likely to prefer being the "giver" rather than the "receiver" in a relationship. They possess an inner solitude that stems from placing others first, experiencing a certain detachment from their own needs.

Robert Greenleaf helped to define what is meant by the servant leader. His definition includes the following question: "Do those around the servant-leader become wiser, freer, more autonomous, healthier, and better able themselves to become servants? Will the least privileged in society be benefited, or at least not further deprived?" (Greenleaf, Spears, & Covey, 2002, p. 27). This question embodies the spirit of servant leadership and sets the standard for its practice. It is the driving concept behind efforts to develop servant leaders.

For the purposes of this study, servant leadership will be defined using the subscales contained within the survey instrument. A servant leader is defined as someone who scores high on the positive traits of servant leadership and low on the negative traits contained within the scale. These scales are discussed further in the methodology section.

Developing Servant Leaders

The development of servant leaders is important to the future of business and society. To meet this need, many universities require a service-learning experience for students enrolled in programs that lead to leadership positions. The service-learning experience is an integral part of this educational process; it cannot be separated from the concept of the servant leader. Until students experience the world from someone else's perspective, they cannot fully recognize themselves as part of a broader whole.

Much of the previous research in this area focused on defining and categorizing the servant leader. The constructs and concepts of the theory are well established, and instruments have been developed to assess the degree of servant leadership within a person. Research highlights the importance of becoming a servant leader and the need to develop these qualities in future business leaders. However, few studies investigate a specific method for developing these qualities.

This study plays a significant role in advancing the ability to develop servant leaders by investigating a specific component of the educational experience — the service-learning requirement. It will help determine the value of the service experience in developing servant-leader qualities in university students. One of the key questions, and biggest controversies, in this field is whether servant leaders can be created or whether these qualities are innate. This study will help answer the question of whether servant leaders are made or born, and will aid universities in validating the use of service experiences in their leadership development curricula.

Hypotheses

The research question leads directly to the following hypothesis, which will serve as the guiding statement for this study:

H1: University students who have completed a service-learning experience will score significantly higher on a servant leadership characteristics scale than students who have not completed a service-learning experience.

The alternative (null) hypothesis states that no difference will be found on servant leadership scales between those who have completed service-learning experiences and those who have not.

These hypotheses have significant ramifications for future studies in servant leadership. If the primary hypothesis holds true, it supports the position that experiences during the learning process can lead to the development of servant leadership traits — suggesting that servant leaders can be made, not merely born. If the null hypothesis holds true, it may suggest that these traits cannot be taught. While many variables can affect the outcome and limit the ability to establish direct causality, the results are expected to support one position or the other regarding the learnability of servant leadership traits.

Variable Definitions

The conceptual variables for this study are derived from the existing body of theoretical research on servant leadership. The central research construct is the idea that servant leadership traits can be developed through the service-learning experience of university students. This study approaches that development from the theoretical position that the service-learning experience will have a significant emotional impact on students and may change the attitudes and perceptions of those not already oriented toward servant leadership.

The conceptual variables will be operationalized through a pretest-treatment-posttest design. Variables for the pretest will be identical to those on the posttest. The dependent variable will be the change in attitude or servant leadership orientation as compared between two research groups. The service-learning experience will serve as the independent variable. It is expected that this independent variable will affect changes in the servant leadership trait scores of the two groups. Differences between the groups on posttest scores will reflect the degree of change the independent variable produced in the dependent variable.