Abstract
While we already know a lot about the outcomes and boundary conditions of servant leadership, there is still a need for research on its antecedents. Building on the theory of purposeful work behavior and further theorizing by van Dierendonck and Patterson (2015), we examine if leaders’ propensity for compassionate love will evoke servant leadership behavior. At the same time, we contrast compassionate love to leaders’ narcissism as psychological counterpart to compassionate love, because narcissism is not associated with leader effectiveness, but with leader emergence instead. We collected data from 170 leader-follower-dyads in a field study in Germany, while measuring leaders’ compassionate love and narcissism, and followers’ perceptions of servant leadership. We found a positive association between leaders’ compassionate love and servant leadership behavior, while narcissism was negatively associated with servant leadership. Theoretical and practical implications, as well as pathways for future research are discussed.
Highlights
Inspired by Greenleaf’s seminal essays, empirical research using psychometrically sound measures has profoundly advanced our view on servant leadership
Compassionate love and narcissism were rated by the leader and servant leadership was rated by an employee of the leader
A confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) for the Servant Leadership Survey (SLS) construct was performed to check whether the data fit into the measurement model
Summary
Inspired by Greenleaf’s seminal essays, empirical research using psychometrically sound measures has profoundly advanced our view on servant leadership. Eva et al (2019) reviewed the state-of-the-art in servant leadership research. Ample research on the measurement, mediators, moderators and outcomes of servant leadership has been carried out. As far as its antecedents and role in stimulating servant leadership are concerned, there is still great potential for further research. They analyzed a total of 11 empirical studies which focused on leaders’ traits as precursor of servant leadership: high agreeable, low extraverted individuals (Hunter et al 2013), who are self-confident (Flynn et al 2016) and mindful (Verdorfer 2016), tend to act as servant leaders
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