Are women business owners authentic servant leaders?

Abstract

Purpose -The study of women business founders provides an opportunity to determine their unique leadership characteristics. Starting a business may be a way for women business owners to be authentic and create more people-centered businesses. Servant leadership's gender integrative attributes where both agentic and communal behaviors are valued may be more congruent and reflective of the leadership behaviors of women entrepreneurs. Recently, the motivation of compassionate love was theorized to be an antecedent to servant leadership and, it is argued, exists in conjunction with authenticity. Thus, the purpose of this study is to investigate compassionate love, authenticity and servant leadership and determine whether they exist in the behaviors of founding female business owners.Design/methodology/approach -This qualitative research study used summative content analysis of telephone interviews conducted with 12 women business owners of professional service firms in four US states to determine whether these women's motivations, traits and behaviors were consistent with the compassionate love servant leadership model and whether authenticity was the cornerstone of servant leadership.Findings -The analyses found that these women revealed a strong authenticity orientation as they enacted a compassionate love servant leadership style within their businesses. Themes that emerged from the study were agency, calling, humility, trust and respect, self-development, stewardship, authenticity and providing direction. The study revealed support for some of the characteristics associated with compassionate love servant leadership and two characteristics which were unique to this study.Research limitations/implications -As a qualitative study of 12 individuals, these findings may not be generalizable beyond the four US states of professional service enterprises of women business founders. Future research should test the full servant leadership model of women business owners on a larger group of business founders and the sub-themes where little support exists.Practical implications -The more gender integrative style of compassionate love servant leadership may be beneficial for women owners to employ as business leaders.Originality/value -This research revealed support for a variation of compassionate love servant leadership model. The resulting servant leadership model herein was a mixture of agentic and communal leadership motivations, traits and behaviors useful to women business founders. Behaviors of authenticity were found to complement compassionate love. These women were able to extend the boundaries of what it means to be a leader and incorporate behaviors associated with both their gender and leadership roles, thus expanding their ability to successfully empower and equip themselves to navigate barriers unique to women leaders.

Do servant, transformational, transactional, and passive avoidant leadership styles influence mentoring competencies for faculty? A study of a gender equity leadership development program

“…Both servant leadership and transformational leadership “emphasize the importance of appreciating and valuing people, listening, mentoring or teaching and empowering followers”; yet these leadership styles are distinct (Barbuto Jr. & Wheeler, 2006; Stone, Russell, & Patterson, 2004, p. 354). Servant leaders concentrate on serving followers' needs, cultivating their relationship with others, and trusting their followers to act in the best interest of the organization (Sims & Morris, 2018; Stone et al, 2004). As compared to transformational leaders who motivate followers to meet organizational goals (Barbuto Jr. & Wheeler, 2006).…”

“…Hogue (2016) suggested women benefit from the communal aspects of servant leadership because there is more congruency between being a woman and a servant leader than a woman and other types of non‐communal leadership styles. Servant leadership may be unique among leadership styles because it enables “leaders to step out of gender role norms and provide the most appropriate leadership for followers” (Barbuto & Gifford, 2010, p. 16; Sims & Morris, 2018). Relative to gender and servant leadership, no support was found that women and men display different levels of servant leadership, which affirms the notion servant leadership is a gender‐neutral set of leader behaviors (Barbuto & Gifford, 2010; Sims & Morris, 2018).…”

Role Of Women In International Business, Management And Trade

“…A considerable review of the extant base of literature discovered that female managers were cooperative and willing to involve in consensus-development (Sims and Morris, 2018). Females' leaders are likely to involve successful in challenging situations and social matters that challenge modern businesses.…”

“…Progressive managers should bring in innovation to successfully target a fast-growing sustainable marketplace and deal with the direst issues across the globe. A current study of McKinsey discovered that 44% of business managers who followed sustainability mentioned growth and new business options as rationales to deal with issues relating to sustainability (Sims and Morris, 2018). An increment in the number of females on leadership squads has revealed to improve the innovation capability of their firms, particularly when dealing with sensitive matters.…”

Unpacking a servant leadership style in women business owners

“…A research paper by Sims and Morris (2018) delves into an investigation of the extent to which female small business owners bring a servant leadership style imbued with the behaviors of compassionate love to the teams they employ. Specifically the traits characterizing this leadership model are analyzed to reveal the underlying success factors for building engaged, committed and more productive working environments.…”