The latest volume of the Turner College's servant leadership journal, Servant Leadership: Theory & Practice, recently released and it includes three traditional academic papers and one case study. This journal is edited by Turner College management professor Kevin Hurt, an expert in servant leadership. The editorial board includes Turner College management professor Phil Bryant, Steve Brown of Georgia Gwinnett College, Victor Claar of Henderson State University, Kathleen Patterson of Regent University, and Turner College management professor Neal Thomson. The journal seeks contributions from various disciplinary perspectives, including psychology, management (i.e., organizational behavior, strategy, organizational theory), political science, sociology, economics (i.e., personnel, behavioral, labor), history, and methodology. The aim of the journal is to publish scholarly research, theory, and developmental application from diverse fields of inquiry about servant leadership. The journal will consider studies of servant leaders from all walks of social life, including formal or informal servant leaders of any type of group or organization.
The first study in the latest volume, by Noah Currie of the United States Military Academy and a graduate of the Turner College's MSOL program, aims to improve the definition of servant leadership for application to the business and non-profit sector contexts and to provide a conceptual model describing how servant leadership, mediated by intrinsic motivation and perceived organizational support, is positively related to team performance. Currie explains that relating servant leadership to motivation, perceived organizational support and team performance provides leadership practitioners with more tangible concepts that are perhaps more easily assessed by a leader’s observation of his organization compared to a mere academic understanding of servant leadership.
The third article by James Elliker of Alvernia University applies a servant leader developmental model to the efficacy of a leader as servant approach to modern leadership. Elliker's model highlights how anyone, should they choose, can step up towards a larger purpose, and then step aside to serve others in attaining that purpose. It is based on a leader-follower dyad that has been used by Elliker in organizational development settings, and emphasizes a path of learning, partnering and leading towards a larger goal, and then reflectively teaching, partnering and coaching the next generation towards that same goal.
The final article in the volume is a case study provided Laura Holland and Deirdre Dixon, both affiliated with the University of Tampa. These authors explain that when the COVID-19 pandemic hit the United States in March 2020, many supply chain companies found themselves facing increased demand, labor shortages, and low capacity. Due to complex relationships in the supply chain industry, it was difficult for ports to manage these challenges and continue to operate efficiently. For ports to successfully navigate these challenges, they needed to implement leadership across all levels. Holland and Dixon examine the leadership of Port Tampa Bay to see if servant leadership was present. Port Tampa Bay was Florida’s largest port that handled major cargo. Through 2020–2022, the port had not seen any of the congestion and back-up that other ports around the country experienced. Through 20 interviews, this case study shows how servant leadership was displayed by leaders throughout Port Tampa Bay, which contributed to their success. Furthermore, the study discusses various ways in which employees also displayed servant leadership within their roles.
Before closing this post, we should point out that the second article in this year's volume of the journal is discussed in yesterday's post. That article is authored by Turner College finance professor Brett Cotten, Douglas Schneider, the Edwin Jones Endowed Professor of Accounting at East Carolina University, and Danielle Navarrete, an adjunct professor of business in the Turner College. Their study examines a number of profitability and efficiency ratios of servant leadership firms, comparing them to those of their non-servant leadership peers.
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