Servant leaders may not establish their authority and dominance. They may retreat into the comfort of serving their employees, not wanting to engage as much with the chain (which can be the opposite of comforting) and therefore not establish as strong a presence with their leaders. One of the most obvious limitations of servant leadership is that leaders must be willing to relinquish absolute authority. This runs counter to the traditional workplace structure, in which CEOs make all decisions, communicate them to subordinates, and receive credit when those decisions are implemented by the rank and file.
One of the problems with servant leadership is that leaders must sublimate their egos. Servant leadership is about giving credit to employees for helping them exceed performance standards. It is difficult to find business owners willing to act selflessly in their quest for success, which is one of the disadvantages of servant leadership. To create the teams that can solve the big, thorny problems, leaders will need to empower their people to learn, grow and innovate.
Organisations with a servant leadership approach are more reliable and tend to attract more long-term stakeholders. Selflessness The field of servant leadership asserts that effective leaders are not ego-centred or selfish. They do not put their needs before higher goals. But it is possible to be selfless without serving the needs of followers.
In fact, it can be argued that true leadership demands the sacrifice of followers. The call by environmental leaders for people to give up their gas-guzzling cars asks followers to make sacrifices for the sake of the environment. In addition to undermining authority, servant leadership can cultivate diminished motivation. When leadership lends a hand, workers are tempted to lower their current level.
If the leader is going to carry some of the burden, the followers do not have to carry as much. Servant leadership can open the door to bullying. A servant leader becomes so vulnerable that, unfortunately, unscrupulous people can take advantage of him or her. When a leader is so dedicated to serving his or her employees, he or she can become a target for manipulators.
An employee, for example, may pretend not to know how to perform work tasks and ask the manager to repeatedly demonstrate the duty while he watches. On the other hand, the servant leader could be the manipulative figure, although this goes against the core rationale of this leadership style. Regent University's School of Business and Leadership argues that a servant leader might use the argument that since he has helped the employee, the employee should respond by serving him. This is an unethical practice, as servant leadership should encourage employees to reciprocate not by serving him, but by paying others, such as customers.
Ironically, servant leadership theory attempts to advocate a fair and inclusive approach to leadership, while underpinning privileged masculinity. In servant leadership, direction is constantly provided, otherwise reality is often a mere wandering in search of fires to put out. Therefore, any religious motivation for applying servant leadership to the company may come from personal values rather than what is best for the company. Serving means serving someone who performs some task for the benefit of a person, usually of higher status or rank.
This approach is more empowering and shows more respect for employees than the paternalistic stance of the servant leader. The truth is that while managers fire employees who do not perform, no servant can fire his master. As I see it, the servant part of servant leadership extends in two directions, and the first is subordinate to the second. Servant leadership, being a slippery concept, has other meanings, such as the desire to be of service.
Traditional leaders have nothing to fear and everything to gain by adopting a servant leadership approach based on value creation and trust. Within the framework set by these leadership decisions, the servant leader puts himself at the service of his people. For servant leadership to be distinctive, it is not enough to compare it to an outdated industrial-era leadership model. Although servant leadership seems to be a better alternative to traditional leadership, it has its problems just like traditional leadership.
Another problem with servant leadership is that it can make employees less motivated and, over time, produce worse results.
