Dear All

I find this an interesting discussion but may have missed some important aspects of it and I am happy to be corrected.

When I saw the title Servant Leadership I reacted on an instinctual level (ie without words -a value mismatch -at first I was uncertain why )  A more thoughtful response - there is something undemocratic in the notion.  I thought of the number of people in caring professions who are already 'pleasers' and like to do everything for other people for all the reasons that we 'pleasers' do.  It is not necessarily very educational for the receiver if it perpetuates inequality.  I like the implied impulse to reduce power relationships and in my own research named my intention to start where the other people are is and go with them to the places they wanted to go.  This works in that it builds co operation and motivation and progress happens when the others feel their power to influence; can recognise themselves as legitimate knowers of stuff with control over their future. 

What it doesn't do is encourage the others (or me) to think about me and what my my role is in this dynamic.  This is still the biggie for me - how do I take responsibility in response to things I see in the other's behaviour? Where do the boundaries (sorry Alan Rayner) lie for what is me and what is you?  As a professional I might know things useful to the situation or I may need to act on behalf of someone less powerful (a child) against the others.   For this reason I found enquirying into my own practising by asking 'how can I improve what I am doing here?' such a help.  I was able to consider the expressed needs of the others in their context and my own motivations (values) and question them.  Where do my values come from?, Why are they important to me? Do I actually do as I claim, or wish to?  Why not?  This latter is where new sometimes competing values come to light and the complexity of democratic being where I can work at holding true to all of my values and confront the inappropriateness of being a 'pleaser' in my search to do my best for the others. 

I try not to be a scoundrel deliberately but I like the idea that it is human, impossible, to get things right all of the time.  It is therefore useful and important to me that I foster relationships with the people where there is room to move and imperfections in each of us can be tolerated.   We are living an aspect of our lives together as we all try to do life nearer to the way we believe it should be.

I don't know how much sense this makes but it was usefuk for me to think about why I no longer wish to be a servant in my leadership role.

I too feel emotional when I read the words of Lilla Watson's on my wall.

She said it for me:        

                         "If you've come to help us, we dont need your help.

                      But if you've come because your liberation is bound up

                                    with ours, then let us work together."

Robyn