Servant leadership in the People's Republic of China: a case study of the public sector
Abstract
Purpose
This paper seeks to explore whether the Western concept of servant leadership holds the same meaning in the public sector of the cross‐cultural context of China and to identify whether there is an alternative term in the Chinese language that closely relates to the concept of servant leadership
Design/methodology/approach
An inductive approach is adopted based on critical incident technique, using an open‐ended survey to collect the data.
Findings
It was found that the concept of servant leadership holds parallel meaning in China to that of the West and that the Chinese concept of servant leadership can be described precisely as public servant leadership in the public sector and servant leadership in the non‐public sector. When asked to characterize Chinese servant leadership in the public sector, the study respondents consider six types of servant leadership similar to the West but also three types of Chinese extended servant leadership.
Originality/value
The paper is a first attempt to examine servant leadership in the public sector in China. It not only reports various forms of Chinese servant leadership orientation, but also compares and contrasts various servant leadership forms between China and the West, highlighting research gaps for future research within the context of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the West.
Keywords
Citation
Han, Y., Kakabadse, N.K. and Kakabadse, A. (2010), "Servant leadership in the People's Republic of China: a case study of the public sector", Journal of Management Development, Vol. 29 No. 3, pp. 265-281. https://doi.org/10.1108/02621711011025786
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2010, Emerald Group Publishing Limited