The Leader Servant

Many authors,[1] speak of the leader-servant who judges his or her success not only according to the achievement of the result, but also on the basis of the effects of that result in those who materially collaborated to that end. That is, action produces two types of results: objective and subjective. The objective result might be considered the quantifiable benefit of an excellent publicity campaign, where on account of the measures taken one succeeds in increasing sales by twenty-five percent. Beyond this direct, objective and quantifiable effect, there is also the subjective effect: the people who carried out the project have changed. They have acquired new experience, and become better at what they do because they have had to tackle a new situation, in all the of the minor successes and upsets, before obtaining the final result. The next time they have to study up on how to increase the commercial quota of a certain product they will not be starting from zero, as perhaps was the case before. Now, one can count on this acquired experience. The results, then, cannot be quantifiable merely as a twenty-five percent increase.
It is the task of the leader to make those persons responsible for the sales increase better, to expand their capacity to make themselves useful in the future. I agree that the leader had the intuition to act in a certain way, understood what he or she would have had to do when no one else, perhaps, believed it possible. I agree that he or she succeeded in moving his or her collaborators toward a certain vision. But it is equally true that in order to manage this one needs to believe in his or her collaborators, trust in them, and encourage them during those periods where upsets are more visible than the desired success. A true leader must concern himself or herself with the others, be altruistic, believe in people, serve others and give of himself or herself for others. By definition, it is about being a leader-servant.