There are many attributes of great leadership, such as integrity, possessing high emotional intelligence, helping others to become leaders, and the ability to communicate effectively – to name just a few. Yet, there is one thing, one common attribute that every employee the world over hates in a boss.
It's their lack of love of others.
The ancient Greeks defined four classifications or types of love. They are:
- Storge – a bond or love based on family
- Philia – a bond based in friendship or a brotherly love.
- Eros – romantic love.
- Agape – unconditional God-like love
In this case the love we’re talking about is agape. Aristotle said “To love is to want someone’s good.” Agape is not based on good feelings that might result from a physical attraction (eros) or of affection that is based on friendship (philia), or even the love from a familial bond (storge). This kind of love, agape, according to Aquinas, is willing the good of another.
Author and speaker Chris Lowney published a recent article in Forbes magazine entitled Love Those You Manage: A Leader’s Three Commitments. The three commitments are to win your team’s respect and confidence, to put your team members’ needs ahead of your own and to develop the potential of every person entrusted to your management.
Likewise, in the book, The Motive, Patrick Lencioni suggests that there are two primary reasons for one to assume a leadership position. The first motive is “to serve others, to do whatever is necessary to bring about something good for the people they lead.” This is what would be considered servant leadership. The second reason people want to lead is that they seek status in whatever form that takes (money, power, dominance over others, etc.) to satisfy the self which of course can never be truly satisfied.
Agape-based leadership chooses to act based on self-sacrifice, to serve the other before the self. This type of leadership, as you might imagine, impacts the culture and each employee in a positive and powerful way through a lived (and watched) witness to a selfless commitment of a leader who puts another’s wellbeing first. Peter Drucker said that culture each strategy for lunch. What better culture could there be than one that is based in agape-based leadership?
1 Corinthians 13:4-8 outlines the attributes of the self-less leader. A servant leader is patient, kind, is not boastful or jealous. The servant leader doesn’t insist on their own way, is not irritable or resentful. The servant leader does not rejoice at wrong but does rejoice in the right. These attributes form the foundation of a servant leader, a virtuous leader, an authentic leader.
Agape love is not based on feelings, but a determined act of the will. It is a joyful resolution to put other’s interests before their own. Their actions are proof to others that they know, love and serve God, not themselves.
Conclusion
Servant leadership is other-centered which requires agape love, while status-based leadership is self-centered and requires only the love of self. Agape leadership, servant leadership adjusts the “why” of leaders which makes them more effective leaders of people providing them with the environment in which they can thrive in an organization.
A question
What is the one thing, a single word that describes the business leader you follow? Post below!
