Running head: CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE ON SERVANT-LEADERSHIP

SERVANTLEADERSHIPDEVELOPMENTFROMACULTURALPERSPECTIVE
by
FirstRyanF.Sheehan

APaper
PresentedtotheGordonAlbrightSchoolofEducation
InPartialFulfillmentoftheRequirements
FortheDegreeofMasterofEducation
ECC515:LeadershipandCounsellingDiverseCulturesinEducation
November2015

Running head: CULTURAL SERVANT LEADERSHIP

Servant-Leadership Development From A Cultural Perspecive

Leadership has not come naturally for me, however I have intentionally taken advantage of
opportunities to observe, learn, and practice leadership skills over the past number of years.
During my 16 years in education, I have worked with many leaders who have utilized a variety
of leadership styles such as coaching/mentorship, authoritarian, and supportive. I have also
researched four major leadership styles identified by Boncana (2014) as 1. Managerial
Leadership, which emphasizes attention to detail and has a formal tone. 2. Distributed
Leadership, which is centered on shared decision making. 3. Transformational Leadership, which
focuses on innovation, change, empowerment, and team spirit, and 4. Transactional Leadership,
which focuses on guidance, high performance, and motivation through reward and punishment
for employees. I have witnessed and experienced strong leaders, struggling leaders, leaders who
have motivated me, and leaders who have differing viewpoints from me. As my journey in
leadership progresses, I have attempted to learn something from each of these people. After
much reflection on the matter, I have concluded that my leadership style is influenced not only
by the learning that I have gained through my experiences with other teachers, colleagues,
administrators, and fellow cohort members, but also my ethics and priorities that have been
developed as a result of my upbringing.
I was born the tenth child in a family of eleven, and grew up on a farm in rural Alberta. I
believe that I gained a strong work ethic and a sense of responsibility as a result of being raised
on a farm; I learned that I had a role in my family to help contribute to the workload of
completing tasks that required teamwork from all members of the family. Because of the fact
that I was one of the youngest children in the family, I was not in a natural role of making
decisions. Conversely, I was typically on the receiving end of instructions for the distribution of

Running head: CULTURAL SERVANT LEADERSHIP

tasks on the farm. With so many older siblings, I also witnessed and experienced varying
leadership styles that they used. My siblings and I were raised in the Catholic religion faith,
through which, the strongest lessons that were reinforced for me were acts of service, fair
treatment of people, and a sense of charity. The formation of my ethics and my perspectives on
leadership was greatly influenced by my family and my experiences while growing up, however
my views continued to evolve as my life experiences expanded.
I believe that my worldly viewpoints began to change as my exposure to different cultures
increased. From birth to grade nine, I was familiar with only Caucasian and First Nations
cultures because the rural area in which I grew up was very homogenous. The high school that I
attended had seven feeder schools, so I met people from a wider variety of socioeconomic
backgrounds, slightly more diverse ethnicities, and students who were transgender. When I
attended university, I met people from many different cultures who had a great deal of life
experience. It was also the first time in my life that I lived in an urban center and was able to
take part in different cultural experiences such as eating at ethnic restaurants, attending festivals
that celebrated different cultural groups from the city, and meeting friends who were from a
different religious faith. In my early twenties, I took two extended backpacking trips overseas in
which I met and became friends with people from many different counties. It was fascinating for
me to learn about different cultures at a more personal level. My worldviews expanded and
evolved through each of these stages in my life.
As I grew older, I was greatly influenced by one of my older siblings who taught English as
a Second Language (ESL) extensively overseas; conversations with him led me to explore
volunteer opportunities with various cultures. In 2007 I was able to travel to Peru during one of
my summer breaks from teaching in a public school in Canada. I volunteered as a teacher in a

Running head: CULTURAL SERVANT LEADERSHIP

poor area of Peru, and worked with young children who wanted to learn the English language. It
was the first time that I was fully immersed in a different culture; I lived in a Peruvian house, ate
their traditional foods with them daily, learned how to overcome language barriers, and grew
immensely as I participated in various cultural traditions and spent time in local sacred places.
My global mindset, which according to Javidan and Walker (2012) is the way in which
people see the world and use their skills and abilities to influence others, has changed as a result
of my life experiences. In 2010, I resigned from my job as a teacher in public education, and I
became trained and certified as an ESL teacher. For three years I had the opportunity to teach
ESL at an Immigrant Center, working with refugees and immigrants from many different
countries around the world. This was another opportunity for my viewpoints to expand, as I
began to understand the hardships of Newcomers to Canada. I learned that they experienced
challenging circumstances in their home country to the point that they were forced to leave for
safety reasons and persecution. After arriving in Canada, they attempted to overcome daily
obstacles as they struggled with language barriers and acceptance in a new country. I formed
relationships with my students that not only helped me to learn about their cultures and religions
more deeply, but also helped me to have a greater appreciation for the privileges and freedoms
that I am fortunate to have, simply because I was born as a white person in a rich country like
Canada. As my awareness of cultural differences grew, my sense of compassion grew; selfrealization about my fortunate birth circumstance and white privilege also became clearer.
I understand the term white privilege to mean that Caucasian people have certain implicit
advantages over people from other races or ethnicities. White privilege to me is not a racist
term; it is recognition of the fact that I have opportunities and comforts simply because of my
skin colour and that I was born in a wealthy country. These are circumstances that I can not

Running head: CULTURAL SERVANT LEADERSHIP

change, similar to any person born with their skin colour, demographic, and geographic
birthplace. However, having awareness about my white privilege allows me to appreciate the
concept of not fully understanding the hardships that other people endure. McIntosh (1990)
created a list of 50 conditions that help describe the daily effects of white privilege. After
applying the list to my life circumstances, I found that I self-identified with the vast majority of
the conditions on the list. While I understand that I benefit from white privilege, I try to not feel
guilt about this circumstance; rather, I try to focus on this in a positive way in which I use this
privilege advantageously to bring a sense of advocacy in my work with underprivileged people.
Manyfactorsandpeoplehaveinfluencedmyleadershipstyle,whichisapermutationof
variousstyles.However,theleadershipstylewithwhichImostcloselyidentifyistheservant
leadershipmodel.Greenleaf(1977)explainedthatagreatleaderisseenasaservantfirst.The
servantleadershipmodelisindirectoppositiontothehierarchicalleadershipmodel,inwhich
thepoweroftheleaderisvisibleandobeyedbysubordinates(Crippen,2005).Spears(1998)
developedalistoftencharacteristicsthatidentifyservantleadership,including:listening,
empathy,healing,awareness,persuasion,conceptualization,foresight,stewardship,commitment
tothegrowthofothers,andbuildingcommunities.Afterevaluatingthesecharacteristicsfor
myself,InoticedthatIeitherhaveorstrivetowardshavingeachofthesecharacteristics.Ieither
acknowledge,orhavebeentoldbycolleaguesthattheywitness,thefollowingspecific
characteristicsinme:activelistening,empathy,selfawareness,persuasion,conceptualization
throughrelationbuilding,stewardshipthroughinternalmotivation,andcommitmenttothe
growthofpeople.Ibelievethatmyareasofgrowthinclude:buildingcommunity,foresight,and
healing.TheempathycharacteristicisanareainwhichIcontinuetointentionallytryto
improve;accordingtoBlock(1993),leadersmisusetheirpowerwhentheytakeresponsibilityfor

Running head: CULTURAL SERVANT LEADERSHIP

solvingtheproblemsofothers.WhileIbelievethatIempathizeandunderstandtheproblemsof
otherpeople,Isometimestrytohelpsolvetheirproblemsasopposedtofullyacceptthemwith
theirflawsastheyworkonsolutionsthemselves.
Theservantleadershipstyleiscongruentwithmypersonality,ethics,andsenseof
advocacythatIpromote.Allofthesetraitsarearesultofmyupbringinginmyfamilyaswellas
mycontinuallyevolvingworldviewpointsasIage.IbelievethatIusetheservantleadership
modelinthealternativeeducationclassroominwhichIcurrentlywork.AsIpromotedtheidea
oftheprogramtwoyearsago,myfocuswasontheimportanceoftheworkthatIfeltneededto
bedonewithatriskstudents.ThenonjudgmentalapproachandthebeliefthatItrytoinstillin
studentshaveledtothesuccessofstudentsintheprogram.Iwillcontinuetolearnfromrole
modelswhomIbelieveembodytheservantleadershipcharacteristicsidentifiedbySpears
(1998)andattendprofessionaldevelopmentopportunitieswithexpertsinthefieldofalternative
education.Asmycareerpathcontinuestochange,IanticipatethatIwillmostlikelyreturnto
workwithpeoplefromvariouscultures,andmylearningaboutservantleadershipin
multiculturalsettingswillcontinuetogrow.

Running head: CULTURAL SERVANT LEADERSHIP

References

Block , P. (1993). Stewardship: Choosing service over self-interest. San Francisco, CA: BerrettKoehler Publishers.
Boncana, M., (2014). Transferring leadership from business to education: The case of Mr. Smith.
Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership, 17(2), 49-75.
Crippen (2005). Servant-leadership as an effective model for educational leadership and
management: first to serve, then to lead. Management In Education (Education Publishing
Worldwide Ltd), 18(5), 11-16.
Greenleaf, R. (1977). Servant Leadership. New York, NY. Paulist Press.
Javidan & Walker (2012). A whole new global mindset fro leadership. People and Strategy
35(2), 36-41.
McIntosh, P. (1990). White privilege: Unpacking the invisible knapsack. Retrieved from
https://www.deanza.edu/faculty/lewisjulie/White%20Priviledge%20Unpacking%20the
%20Invisible%20Knapsack.pdf
Spears, L. (1998). The power of servant-leadership. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler
Publishers.

Running head: CULTURAL SERVANT LEADERSHIP