Essay Sample on Servant Leadership: Enriching Lives, Creating Meaningful Environments

Introduction

Servant leadership refers to the set of practices or a philosophy that empowers one to enrich the lives of others, establish and sustain better organizations, and contribute to the creation of a more caring and just world. When servant leaders make decisions, they prioritize the contribution of others. Hence, it creates a healthy, caring, and meaningful environment where the ethical practice is safeguarded. Ethical behavior is defined as moral conduct which upholds what is acceptable and avoids what is shunned. Ethics supports the servant leader's actions, which serve to support personal and professional growth for the entire team that is led. There are at least ten recognized principles that guide servant leadership. Therefore, a servant leader is one that listens, persuades, conceptualizes, is aware, has empathy, possesses the gift of foresight, and is committed to the advancement of individuals, and developing teams that create communities. To demonstrate these principles, a servant leader must be kind, patient, humble, selfless, respectful, honest, forgiving, and committed.

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Based on the case study, Sassaman had been a rising star in the U.S. Army and was in charge of soldiers in Iraq. His position required that they show ethics in the professional conduct of himself and the soldiers under him. He was also supposed to be empathetic in his discharge of duties. Most importantly, he was supposed to demonstrate foresight, which required that he becomes truthful in his reporting of the happenings during his discharge of responsibilities. His soldiers arrested two Iraqi civilians for violating a curfew. The soldiers pushed the two into the Tigris River. One of the Iraqis survived. However, the other either escaped or drowned. Upon learning of this incident and the impending investigations, Sassaman instructed his subordinates to tell the investigators of the whole story of how the soldiers had detained the Iraqis, but to leave out the part where the soldiers pushed the two Iraqis into the Tigris River. However, the investigations uncovered the truth, leading to the punishing of many soldiers and Sassaman's resignation.

As a squad leader, Sgt. Carl Ironeyes demonstrated empathy when he allowed a carload of Iraqis through when he saw that they had a pregnant woman. However, as the platoon leader, Lt. Jack Saville was not a humble leader. He ordered a reversal of Sgt. Ironeyes' pardon, which led to the tragic death of the Iraqi. Lt. Saville failed to conceptualize the situation. Whereas the curfew rules had to be strict, decisions made were supposed to be rational. Hence, when the two Iraqis were detained, they were supposed to be taken to the camp. Leaving the soldiers without proper instructions when the instructions of the squad leader had been bypassed, he acted unethically. On his part, Sassaman was not honest in his instructing the soldiers to edit out the part where the two Iraqis had been pushed into the Tigris River from their statements. Both Sassaman and Saville lacked the stewardship required for their titles, which would have enabled them to have foresight on the potential risks posed by their decisions and instructions. There was no demonstration of kindness or selflessness as the two leaders could not consider the plight of the two civilian Iraqis. The fate of the two Iraqis also demonstrated that the leaders were not forgiving. They were also not respectful to the right to life of the two civilians. As military men, they were to be guided by the ethical code that bars them from attacking civilians.

Leading Organizational Change

Individual and team growth define chance and should aim to bring about holistic improvement in organizational operations. However, realizing change is a tasking process because not all individuals align with the expectations of the leadership. The application of the guiding coalition avails Kotter's 8-step process that is essential for leading organizations in the change process. However, Sassaman failed to develop a vision and strategy framework that would be beneficial for communicating truthfully and promptly. If the troops situated in Iraq intended to support the legitimate forces against the militia and to establish a safe, and stable government for the country, Sassaman needed to maintain a highly professional troop that would be respectful of the civilians and protect their lives. It is equally important that Sassaman needed to establish a sense of urgency whenever an emergency arose, and that there were appropriate mechanisms to clear civilians when the need arose. He had to determine if how civilians that are locked out by the curfew were going to be identified as genuinely deserving to be allowed to pass through the barriers. Sassaman also needed to determine if he needed to create a structure that allows the leadership to be properly delegated, and the troops to be disciplined.

Sassaman also needed to acknowledge that the mission was all about registering short-term gains and that a balance between attacking the enemy and protecting the civilians was paramount. Sassaman needed to empower broad-based action by allowing Saville and the other low-rank officers to take full charge whenever he was not on-site. However, despite delegating certain duties, he went on to revert the decisions made by the lower leaderships, creating room for truancy among the troops.

Building Organizational Teams

Sassaman's team consisted of squad leader, Sgt. Carl Ironeyes, and platoon leader, Lt. Jack Saville. The objective of the team had been laid out, and Sassaman was a master strategist. Sassaman was in charge of the overall troop. At the same time, Ironeyes and Saville were located in the field, where they provided the offensive and defensive operations geared towards tackling the challenge of anti-coalition separatists and building a legitimate, credible, self-governing self-government in Iraq. During the operation, soldiers were expected to be able to adjust to any uncertainty occurring within any spectrum of the conflict zone, to address any fears, and to cope with injury or death. All of these scenarios played out during the successive stages of the team building. For instance, when a team of insurgents fired a volley of rocket-propelled grenades, the RPG sailed directly into Sgt. Dale Panchot's chest and killed him. This scenario presented both uncertainties and resulted in the death of one of them.

The soldiers were not prepared for the operation, and the ambush leads to a life-ending mistake. It was expected that the team would safeguard its members during the enrichment phase of the team-building process for the military. However, this was not evident when this ambush occurred. The conduct of the soldiers, which could be interpreted as an expression of paranoia, which led to their mistreatment of civilians, showed that the soldiers had not adjusted appropriately to continuous combat operations. They had also not coped properly with the experience of their one casualty, nor with the enemy action and controlled anger, panic, and despair. The decision to allow the Iraqis, then detain them back was a show of indecision, which led to a blunder that cost Sassaman his job eventually. However, had there been a proper plan that prevented the initial attack, the other instances of ineffective leadership would have been avoided.

Developing Learning Organizations

The first step towards improving an organization is to learn, as one strives to realize the mission of the organization. It is a necessary step that requires followers and leaders to understand their responsibility in the decision-making process. The entire team must exhibit adaptiveness and be receptive to innovation and creativity. Most importantly, there must be a continuous process of dynamism and embracing improved ways of operation. Education, training, and critical thinking programs must be integrated into the leadership program to encourage a proper feedback process. The application of innovative techniques must be embraced so that great results are realized. A well-established command climate should be established and sustained when the soldiers are deployed. One of the major milestones of the team was its reclamation of cities lost to anti-coalition groups.

By allowing a higher authority to reverse his decision to allow the civilians to proceed after curfew hours, Saville exhibited the quality of a passive follower. Therefore, he dissociated himself with the events that led to the throwing of the Iraqis into the Tigris River. On his part, Sassaman did not establish an environment for valued learning. The soldiers failed to conduct themselves ethically and were neither kind nor reasonable in their treatment of them civilians. The decision made, and the lack of follow up once the Iraqis were detained did not allow the soldiers to think critically and innovatively about how to handle the situation. Therefore, the results were negative. Sassaman's team was not successful because their actions did not contribute to the ultimate value addition. The events exhibited to demonstrate the intricacies that require learning organization, demonstration of critical thinking and innovativeness, adaptability, and a culture of learning.

In the course of the operation, several things were worth improving, and the resulting problem could have been mitigated. Some of the challenges experienced during the operation included lack of proper command structure and poor communication frameworks. The ineffective communication was evident in the conflicting instructions that led to confusion about where to take the Iraqis. Since the soldiers had had a traumatic experience that they were ill-prepared for, and which led to the death of their colleague, there was no proper foundation for the soldiers to reflect from. Failure built on failure. The team did not provide improvements for the combat checks and how to address emergencies and unprecedented genuine cases that needed to be let through the check. The analysis of the case study reveals that Sassaman and the rest of the leadership would have applied their professionalism and experience to create an environment of reflection, to apply their experience to act from experience, and to establish an environment for continuous learning for its members. Better leadership, improved coordination and communication, and a risk-management plan would have helped the team to demonstrate the leadership that was anticipated.