While watching the film “Darius Goes West” I identified several qualities that exemplified the idea of servant leadership. Servant leadership was also evident through many people. Although numerous characteristics were presented, the two that stood out to me from the beginning were “building community” and “awareness”. I saw these two qualities in mostly everyone involved in this film. The people that represented a true example of what a servant leader should be were all of Darius’ best friends and most importantly, Darius himself. One of the characteristics of a servant leader, “building community”, is shown throughout the film “Darius Goes West” from the beginning to the end. The sense of building community is shown through Darius’ crew …show more content…
Darius knew that his condition was not well known amongst his generation, but was more well known amongst the generations before him. DMD was more widely recognized in past decades because of the awareness raised by Jerry Lewis, a well-known comedian with Muscular Dystrophy. In Darius’ mind he strived to be his generation’s Jerry Lewis. He knew that nothing could be done about this awful, fatal disease if no one was aware of it and how much of our population it …show more content…
Darius Weems had never traveled from his hometown of Athens and was shocked to find that the pit stops along the way were not always hospitable to his wheelchair handicap. The first time Darius witnessed the lack of handicap accessibility was at a gas station they had stopped at while traveling. None of the sidewalks leading into the store had a ramp area for his wheelchair to move along and because of this Darius ended up having to use the restroom on their RV instead. This instance opened the eyes of Darius to the handicap accessibility problem that was visible at many other stops throughout the west coast, along with all over the United States. Darius felt that if these places were accessible to those who could walk, then why should they not be accessible to those who cannot. The people I believe who exemplified a servant leader throughout this journey were easily recognizable. Those that I felt portrayed a true servant leader were Darius’ buddies, along with Darius
Servant leadership, as defined by Kretiner and Kinkicki (2015, p.486), is putting the needs of others, including employees, customers, and community ahead of one’s own needs. This management style requires selflessness and humility from management so the organization can focus on serving key stakeholders. There are ten characteristics of a servant-leader as identified in the text
There has been a bit of research done on the nature of servant leadership. The belief is that many organizations are moving from the traditional style of leadership to a more servant based style. Larry C. Spears (2010) and Kent Keith (2016) note a few characteristics of one who is a servant leader. The characteristics proposed by Spears (2010) are listening, empathy, healing, awareness, persuasion, conceptualization, foresight, stewardship, commitment to others growth, and community building. These traits will often manifest naturally becoming more enriched as time goes by through experience. Keith (2016) references only four elements of servant leadership. He begins with an element of morality, then of the servant focus, concern for others’
Servant leadership is a philosophy and set of practices that augments the lives of individuals, builds better organizations, and creates a more just and caring world, they put the team first, and themselves second (MindTools, 2015). Servant leaders are able to demonstrate their traits through interaction with followers and other leaders within the organization. The characteristics of servant leaders include their commitment to the growth of people, stewardship, and building community, and provide leaders with the opportunity to experience change and to invite followers to change (Savage-Austin & Honeycutt 2011). Servant leadership encourages leaders and followers to ‘raise one another to higher levels of motivation and morality’, and set their leadership focus: follower’s first, organizations second, their own needs last (Sendjaya, Sarros, & Santora, 2008). The servant leader focuses on the needs of others to include team members. They acknowledge people’s perspectives, and give them the support needed to meet their goals. Servant leaders involve members when decisions are appropriate helping build a stronger commitment within the team. Strong qualities of servant leadership are trust, appreciation for others, and empowerment. Honesty and integrity form the moral foundation of effective leadership through the four values of truth telling, promise
The importance of servant leadership should not be underestimated and it can be simplified and embodied in one timeless phrase: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. When applied to leadership the result can be phenomenal. Those who wish to serve do so with their hearts, it is not forced nor is it with resentment. The servant leader serves out of acceptance and ownership of their ability and duty.
Toward the end of his book, Hunter shares a phrase with a similar intent of the four domains of Blanchard and Hodges. He writes: “Thoughts become actions, actions become habits, habits become our character, and our character becomes our destiny.” (Hunter, 1998, p. 167). With this quote in mind, Hunter affirms Blanchard and Hodges’s perspective of servant leadership. Both authors concur that by centering one’s life on the love of Jesus Christ, servant leadership will come naturally. When a leader puts their own selfish needs aside and places their trust in God, they will be empowered to spread Christ’s light to all those they meet. Leading in this way mirrors the way Jesus led because it calls for service as a way of
3). Through the service of others, servants as leaders create positive changes in the lives of others that lead those served to act more autonomously (Block, Blanchard, Wheatley & Autry, 2006). The goal of a service leader is to help others achieve their highest level of functioning. Those served are then motivated to become service leaders as well (Block, Blanchard, Wheatley & Autry, 2006). Thus, servant leadership focuses on commitment to helping the individual served grow in their abilities. In turn this gives the served individual confidence in their work and personal abilities which then transforms into a desire to help others do the
Leading by example is the main idea. Servant leaders do not want to be in the first line and they prefer to guide their employees from a distance. They distinguish because of their personality, their behavior and their values. The only disadvantage is that in a competitive financial environment it is difficult from them to be recognized.
After watching the movie Darius Goes West, I have gained some extremely beneficial knowledge that will help me throughout my life. Darius Goes West is about a young boy who was born with a genetic disease that over time attacks muscles in the human body, which is called Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Darius is fifteen years old in the movie and wants to “pimp his ride”. With help from his community and friends, throughout the movie they travel across the country to go and see if the show Pimp My Ride would actually customize his wheelchair. As they travel across the country, many problems arise, but nothing stops the friends in their pursuit to get Darius to Pimp My Ride’s location.
This tone is also used to establish an appeal to pathos which he hopes to convince the audience of the fact that handicapped people are still people and not less than anyone else. A very prominent example of Peace’s emotion is displayed when he says, “Like many disabled people, I embrace an identity that is tied to my body. I have been made to feel different, inferior, since I began using a wheelchair thirty years ago and by claiming that I am disabled and proud, I am empowered,” (para. 15). This declaration demonstrates to his audience that Peace is honored by who he is and what disabled people can do and that he is tired of being oppressed by the media. Peace also makes this claim to support his thesis in the first paragraph that states, “The negative portrayal of disabled people is not only oppressive but also confirms that nondisabled people set the terms of the debate about the meaning of disability,” (para. 1). This is Peace’s central argument for the whole article and explains his frustration with society’s generalization of handicapped people and the preconceived limitations set on them. Peace’s appeal to pathos and tone throughout are extremely effective in displaying to his audience (society) that those who have disabilities are fed up with the limits that have been placed in the
Servant leadership consists of leaders helping their followers become leaders themselves. The use personal skills such as empathy, compassion and listening to help their followers succeed. It is not necessarily the most popular form of leadership but, it has been proven successful b those leaders who implement it in their work practices. Servant leaders typically have a strong bond with their team. They are the base and the foundation of their teams.
Introduction Through identification and ongoing assessment of her leadership style and ability, this leader is able to develop and understand her own strengths and limitations in order to grow and develop into a more effective leader. The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of servant leadership, contingency, and path-goal styles of leadership to gain an understanding of current leadership models, identify this author’s style of leadership, and explore why leadership is important to organizations, society, and this author. A Personal Model of Leadership Servant leadership was a term that was first used by Keifner Greenleaf (1970) in his first essay, The Servant as Leader (as cited by Crippen, C., 2005). Greenleaf based his essay on his belief that a servant leader is a servant first, and explained that it would begin with the natural urge to serve and then the leader would make a conscious choice to become a leader, in doing so he makes the choice to ensure that others needs are met first (2005 ). As a servant leader develops he should always keep aware of those who he serves and strive to ensure that they are becoming healthier, wiser, freer, have an increase in autonomy, and become more like servants themselves (2005).
To start off, Mr. Duncan does not cover the past suffering of the handicap and society’s injustice behavior towards them. Instead of pushing the painful past under the rug, his directness towards their history is
There are many servant leaders in this world , but there were only two that really stuck out to
Shakespeare, T (2013) “The Social Model of Disability” in The Disabilty Studies Reader Ed Davis, L D. Routledge: New York
The essay will firstly review the early depictions of disability. It will continue by examining the historic records of disability from a Western Civilization perspective and will finally conclude with evaluating the recent disability history. Early Historic Depictions of Disability Early accounts of impaired