Servant Leadership and Follower Commitment （仆人领导和追随者的承诺）.pdfVIP

R E G E N T U N I V E R S I T Y Servant Leadership and Follower Commitment Servant Leadership Research Roundtable – August 2006 Gilbert A. Jacobs Regent University Building upon Patterson-Winston’s servant leadership theory, this paper presents a research proposal to empirically test the influence servant leadership has on follower commitment, because empirical research indicates that follower commitment to the leader is positively related to follower performance. The proposed research utilizes three established instruments, LEAD-Other, the Servant Leader Assessment, and Supervisor-Related Commitment, to test the relationship between five servant leadership constructs (identified as agapao love, humility, vision, trust, and empowerment) and follower commitment to the leader across four distinct styles of leadership described in the Hersey and Blanchard Situational Leadership Model from the perspective of the follower. This proposed research aims to fill a gap in empirical research regarding servant leadership and its influence on followers Servant Leadership is an area of research that is in its early stage of development and, therefore, lacks a strong body of traditional research findings to substantiate it and its effectiveness (Northouse, 2004; Yukl, 2002). However, there is an on-going effort in the field of organizational leadership to obtain a deeper understanding and application of the phenomena known as servant leadership (Bryant, 2003; Contee-Borders, 2003; Dennis Bocarnea, 2005; Dennis, 2004; Drury, 2004; Farling, Stone, Winston, 1999; Greenleaf, 1977; Irving, 2005; Joseph Winston, 2005; Laub, 1999; Patterson, 2003; Russell, 2001; Russell Stone, 2002; Sendjaya Sarros, 2002; Smith, Montagno, Kuzmenko, 2004; Spears, 1996; Spears, 2000; Wilkes, 1998; Winston, 2003; Winston Patterson,