Friday, June 26, 2015

Servant Leadership Revisited

For a number of years I've subscribed to the servant leadership model of education.

As a servant leader I consider myself a servant to my students and families.

In the past year, I've learned that's not enough. To truly be a servant leader you also have to be a servant to your colleagues, leaders, and community members--you have to serve the whole team.

To serve well, I've often put aside my own opinion and thoughts, and simply responded to the learning team with trust by saying yes and following through with student, family, or collegial requests. However, if a request is in direct opposition to my work and intent, I share my thoughts and sometimes have to say no. This is a rare occurrence.

As I grow this work, I want to reach out more to serve better with an open, positive, helpful attitude with students, families, colleagues, leaders, and community members because servant leadership truly builds team, and with team the work we do increases with depth and effect ten-fold.

Servant leadership is a powerful teaching model. One that I explain with detail in this interview. If you subscribe to this model, I'd be interested in reading your related posts, stories, and links. Thanks in advance for the share.