Development and Validation of a Spanish Short Servant Leadership Survey (SSLS6-3F) among Spanish Workers in Religious Non-Profit Organizations

Mar Ortiz-Gómez,Horacio Molina-Sánchez,Gabriele Giorgi,Antonio Ariza-Montes

doi:10.3390/su12093766

Mar Ortiz-Gómez, Horacio Molina-Sánchez + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/su12093766

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Abstract

Religious non-profit organizations are becoming increasingly important in the third sector in a wide range of countries, where they are currently leading players in different areas, such as education, healthcare, and social work. These organizations have the peculiarity of providing a service to their users while transmitting them the values of their mission statement. An usually employed and effective management strategy for these institutions is a servant leadership style. This article seeks to introduce a theoretical discussion of this leadership approach by providing a Spanish version of an instrument for measuring servant leadership in Spanish religious non-profit institutions. To this end, workers of different Spanish faith-based non-profit organizations of the third sector, a relatively unexplored context, were analyzed after obtaining 463 valid questionnaires. This study used the Spanish translation of a seven-item and three-factor servant leadership scale. An exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was performed. The results confirm that the six-item and three-factor servant leadership scale was the most effective scale to measure this construct. In conclusion, this research covers a notable research gap by providing a reliable and valid Spanish short version of the servant leadership scale for workers of Spanish religious non-profit organizations.

Highlights

Recent literature has focused on achieving a consensual definition of the concept of servant leadership and finding an instrument to measure it [1,2,3]
The results revealed that the data were adequate for the principal components factor analysis (PCFA) (determinant = 0.14; Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) = 0.871; Bartletts sphericity test showed statistical significance: χ2 (21) = 1902.7 with p-value = 0.000)
After analyzing the relationship with authenticity, work engagement, and subjective wellbeing, the results showed that high scores of authenticity (5 or more) and work engagement (5 or more) were associated with higher levels of SSLS6-3F

Summary

Introduction

Recent literature has focused on achieving a consensual definition of the concept of servant leadership and finding an instrument to measure it [1,2,3]. Due to the importance of analyzing servant leadership in religious organizations, and the lack of a Spanish short scale for measuring servant leadership in these institutions, the main aim of this research was to develop and validate this instrument. Religious organizations are significant players in the global economy They represent a considerable part of the third sector in areas such as education, social services, and health. They contribute toward maintaining the welfare state, representing an essential part of the European economic and social context [5,6] These organizations have some peculiarities that distinguish them from for-profit organizations. In a challenging and mutable environment, these entities need to implement a management model that guarantees their future viability and sustainability

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