BUSI 502 Week 5 Servant Leadership Journal: Module/Week 5 Entries Example

Servant Leadership Journal, Module/Week 5: Vision, Coaching and the Leader I Am Becoming

Entry 1: What Vision Does My Team Serve?

This week's chapters claim that one way a servant leader serves is by making the destination and the reason for the trip unmistakably clear. Blanchard et al. (2016) describe a compelling vision as answering three questions: what business we are in, where we are going and which values will steer the decisions made on the way there. As I tried to answer those for the hospital billing office I supervise, I realized my team of nine has never heard me state any of them.

My draft: Our purpose is to make sure patients receive accurate bills they can understand, so the hospital can keep serving the community. That sentence surprised me as I wrote it, because it connects a back-office job to the people in the hospital beds upstairs. Our picture of the future is a billing office where no patient calls confused and every claim is paid on first submission. Our values, in order, are accuracy, kindness to patients and teamwork. Ranking them matters: when speed and accuracy conflict, accuracy wins.

Proverbs 29:18 warns that where there is no prophetic vision the people cast off restraint (English Standard Version Bible, 2001/2016). My team does not lack discipline, but it lacks a reason to care about the patient behind each account.

Action: share the draft at Monday's meeting and ask the team to improve it. I expect them to change the values, and I want them to, because a vision the team helps write is one the team is more likely to serve.

Entry 2: Directing or Coaching?

This week I noticed that I lead everyone the same way, mostly by checking their work. In The Servant Leader, Blanchard and Hodges (2003) cast the leader's hands-on role as coaching people toward performance, matched to how far along each person is, giving direction to beginners and support and freedom to those who are capable. Two of my employees show the difference. Kendra started three weeks ago and needs clear steps and frequent feedback. Luis has done this work for eight years and needs me to stay out of his way and remove obstacles, such as the outdated software that slows his appeals.

Research suggests why this matters. Detert and Burris (2007) found that employees spoke up more when their managers were open to their ideas and acted on them, an effect that worked through employees' sense of safety. Luis has ideas about our appeals process that he has never shared, perhaps because I have never asked.

Action: give Kendra a written checklist; ask Luis to lead a fifteen-minute session on appeals. If his ideas are good, I will take them to my manager with his name on them, not mine.

Entry 3: Where Do I Edge God Out?

This week's question asks where I edge God out. My answer is impatience. When a claim is denied or a report is late, I take over the task, which tells my team that my schedule matters more than their growth. Blanchard et al. (2016) describe fear as one of the main ways leaders put themselves in God's place, and my impatience is a form of fear: fear that my supervisor will see a problem and think less of me.

James 1:19-20 tells believers to listen readily, speak sparingly and anger slowly, because human anger does not produce the righteousness of God. Listening first would also give my team the chance to solve the problem themselves, which is exactly the growth I keep preventing. Impatience is anger in small doses, and my team feels it even when I say nothing; they can tell from how I take a folder off someone's desk.

Looking Back at Last Week

Last week's action was to thank one team member each day for something specific. I managed it on four of five days. The day I missed was the day our denial rate spiked, which confirms this week's third entry: when pressure rises, I stop seeing people and start seeing problems. Writing these entries weekly, rather than at the end of the course, is helping me notice that pattern while it is still happening.

Action: when something goes wrong this week, ask "What happened?" before saying anything else.

References

Blanchard, K., & Hodges, P. (2003). The servant leader: Transforming your heart, head, hands, & habits. Thomas Nelson.

Blanchard, K., Hodges, P., & Hendry, P. (2016). Lead like Jesus revisited: Lessons from the greatest leadership role model of all time. W Publishing Group.

Detert, J. R., & Burris, E. R. (2007). Leadership behavior and employee voice: Is the door really open? Academy of Management Journal, 50(4), 869-884. https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2007.26279183

English Standard Version Bible. (2016). Crossway. (Original work published 2001)