The Hidden Pitfalls Of Servant Leadership

“One of the signs of someone who was wise is that they disseminate responsibility,” the late actor Chadwick Bosman told Trevor Noah on The Daily Show:

“They use everybody’s skills, they don’t try to do everything. You can’t be everywhere at one time.”

He was speaking about his role in Black Panther, playing T’Challa, king of the fictional African nation of Wakanda — but he could easily have been giving a lecture on modern-day leadership.

As the world become increasingly complex and volatile, the leaders with the most influence understand something important.

It’s not about having power and control.

It’s not about efficiency and using employees as a means to drive performance.

It’s not about the leader as the hero(ine) at the center of it all.

To build the teams that can solve big, thorny problems, leaders will have to empower their people to learn, grow and innovate.

This approach is often called “servant leadership” because the leader sees themself as serving, rather than commanding, the people around them.

But there’s nothing servile or weak about it.

In fact, the “servant leader” approach requires a great deal of confidence and courage — you can’t just stick with the conventional style of “command and control” leadership.