Servant Leadership and Leadership

Management and Leadership

Job Position Analysis

Management Position: Practice Manager

Mount Sinai Health System's is currently seeking a practice manager for a non-clinical staff position in one of their locations (Mount Sinai, N.d.). The job description uses the terms management and leadership almost interchangeably, however it also

"Our leadership team is driven to provide exceptional service by cultivating a workforce that is dedicated to upholding Mount Sinai's mission of delivering innovative, breakthrough medicine with compassion and integrity."

Although the position is for a practice manager, the job description notates several leadership requirements for the position. Despite many people conflating the terms, leadership is discipline that stands on its own and is complex in nature; there have been no less than six to eight major approaches that have emerged within academia and countless more from outside that have produced (Turner & Muller, 2005) (Kilburg & Donohue, 2011).

Mount Sinai Health requires that management maintains the highly-motivated employees to continuously improve the business operations. The job requirements further state that they are committed to delivering innovative and breakthrough medical capabilities with compassion and integrity. Such characteristics in leadership are included in several of the various leadership models that have been produced, but arguable most closely resemble the transformational and servant leadership models. The motivational aspects of leadership are fundamental to the transformational model, while the compassionate aspects of providing care are closely associated with the servant leadership model.

Transformational leadership is often contrasted with the characteristics and attributes of a transactional leadership (Judge & Bono, 2000). A transactional leader can be viewed as manager without the motivational aspects and focuses more on the administrative functions of their job requirement. By contrast, a transformational leader is defined as someone who is able to transform the self-interested personal goals that employees may have into the more of a vision that represents the collective organizational goals. For such reasons, the transformational leader has also been known to manage effective organizational changes and are also good during times of uncertainty. Given that the position listed requires that the manager be adept at continuous improvement in a dynamic environment, this model seems to be a good fit.

Servant leadership is another model that also can provide many insights into how compassion can be incorporated into successful leadership, not only towards the patients in need of healthcare services, but also to the employees who are serving these patients. A servant leader is constantly scanning for opportunities to provide employees what they need in order to be successful; which is in direct opposition to leadership styles that command their orders to subordinates (Vinod & Sudhakar, 2011). This model would be consistent with the organizations dedication to continuous improvement, both in its processes, as well as its human resources. This model places the employee as the focus of attention and the leader serves a support role to them, which then also improves quality and patient outcomes as a result.