The Importance of Building Communities as the 10th Characteristic of Servant Leadership and Organizational Performance

Abstract

Notwithstanding the proliferation of articles that have been written on servant leadership, the majority of these articles have been on developing and/or testing measurements. Very little research has been done on the 10 characteristics of servant leadership and no research has been done on the tenth characteristic which is building communities, especially within organizations. Also, no single definition of building organizational communities can be found in the literature. This chapter reviews what literature exists on building organizational communities and establishes that building organizational communities as servant leaders does have an impact on organizational performance. A definition of building organizational communities is proffered. Future research proposed includes the testing of the applicability of the definition of building organizational communities across various types of organizations. Future research should also explore other characteristics of servant leadership and how they relate to organizational performance.