Pan-Pacific Conference XXXIV. Designing New Business Models in Developing Economies

Attitudes Towards Servant Leadership in MBA Students
Pino, Ricardo M.
CENTRUM Católica Graduate Business School
Jr. Daniel Alomía Robles 125, Urb. Los Álamos de Monterrico, Santiago de Surco, Lima 33, Perú, (0051)
983287169
ABSTRACT
A servant leader has been defined as the leader who
acts as a server for their subordinates, who has a
holistic approach at the job, community sense, and
who shares the power for decision making [2].
Liden, Wayne, Zhao and Henderson [6] proposed an
instrument to measure servant leadership regarding
28 attributes. It is argued that the presence of a
servant leader improves employee performance,
commitment with the organization and service
attitudes. Nevertheless, business schools seem to
dedicate little attention to the formation of this kind
of leaders, favoring two widely recognized
leadership styles, transformational leadership and
transactional leadership. Regardless of this lack of
attention, it is argued in this study that current
students are more sensible to sharing value with
communities and not only to increase profits.
Students nowadays seem to be more sensitive to
their environment than before, and this could mean
that they expect to be a different kind of leader, one
that fits actual society needs. The purpose of this
quantitative study is to gain insight on MBA
students’ attitudes, likely favorable, towards servant
leadership. This would signal business schools on
what topics include in the curricula.
INTRODUCTION
Leadership is one of the most studied concepts ever.
There is little doubt on the influence that leadership
styles can exert in subordinates as a leader’s role is
to encourage them to achieve organizational goals.
Two of the main leadership styles dominating the
literature are transformational leadership and
transactional leadership. However, there is little
research regarding how other leadership styles are
perceived by young executives, particularly, those
related to sharing mutual benefits for leaders and
employees, as it is the case of servant leadership
style.
Students attending MBA schools search for
competencies such as goal settings, information
gathering, leadership and technology skills [11].
MBA schools have always tried to educate
tomorrow leaders according to society needs.
Nowadays, it is not enough for an executive to think
only in terms of profits, but in ways to succeed
achieving shared value objectives with customers
and society in general. This is because scarce
resources and global threats, as global warming and
migration, can only be managed by leaders that are
aware of the negative consequences that arrive when
short-term success is obtained by consuming no
renewable resources. Long-term success implies
wise use of technology and people, the most
valuable assets a company has.
In an effort to prepare this needed kind of leaders,
business schools adapt their curricula from time to
time in order to adapt it to modern challenges. More
attention is given to teaching soft skills, as
teamwork, ethics, long-term orientation, empathy,
etc. Those characteristics are according to the
profile of a servant leader [5]. Business schools
consider positive to teach MBA students how to
succeed through employee empowerment. However,
no many studies have measured the point of view of
MBA students regarding servant leadership style.
This study intends to fill this gap measuring the
relationship between the level of identification of
MBA students with servant leadership style and its
relationship to job satisfaction.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Servant leadership style is defined as the style
practiced by leaders who put employees’ interests
before their own interests [2]. Mittal and Dorfman
showed the importance that a servant leader has to
practice effective leadership, through humility and
integrity. This leadership style promotes
performance, but the authors warned of the
effectiveness of this leadership style in high power
distance cultures [7]. Peru is a high power distance
country, according to Hofstede culture dimensions
model [4].
Liden, Wayne, Liao, and Meusser [5] found that
servant leaders try to promote the same behavior in
their employees, creating a servant culture in their
followers and promoting performance throughout
the organization and the result is that employees
identify better with the organization.
There are conditions through which employees are
related to extra-role behavior of subordinates.
Panaccio, Henderson, Liden, Wayne and Cao
suggested that there may be factors through which
the relation between servant leader and extroverted
and collective employees can be exacerbated [9].
Servant leadership is a different leadership style
from transformational leadership or transactional
leadership styles. A servant leader is one that seeks
their subordinates’ wellbeing. There are studies that
show that a servant leadership style promotes the
achievement of organizational goals, as servant
leadership affects productivity through satisfaction
of basic psychological needs [1].
Stone, Russell, & Patterson [14] found that the most
significant difference between transformational
leadership style and servant leadership style is that
the focus for a transformational leader is the
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