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The purpose of this study was to measure the relationship between followers’ perceptions of the servant leadership of their immediate supervisor and followers’ sense of empowerment in the context of small businesses. A quantitative survey was completed by 116 employees of small businesses, including measures of supervisors’ servant leadership behaviors and followers’ self- perceived empowerment. Followers’ perceptions of being empowered were found to correlate positively with their ratings of the servant leadership behaviors of immediate supervisors. The findings support the researchers’ assertions that followers’ perceptions of being empowered will increase as supervisors’ servant leadership behaviors increase.

The power of servant leadership lies in the leader’s ability to unleash the potential and thus the power in those around them. Greenleaf (1977) ascribed greatness to the leader’s attention to followers, “When it is genuine, the interest in and affection for one’s followers that a leader has is a mark of true greatness” (p. 34). In the foreword to the Anniversary edition of Greenleaf’s Servant Leadership, Covey (2002) related empowerment to servant leadership. He acclaimed the importance of empowerment to the sustainable success of organizations in the 21st century. Organizations structured to support and encourage the empowerment of their employees will thrive as market leaders (Covey, 2002). While other leadership styles have been found to empower followers, it is agreed across current literature, that the focus on developing and empowering the follower as their primary concern is specific to servant leaders (Greenleaf, 1977; Parolini, Patterson, & Winston, 2009; Parris & Peachey, 2012; Stone, Russell, & Patterson, 2004; van Dierendonck, 2011).

The context chosen for the study was small business because of the crucial role it plays regarding job growth in the United States (Howard, 2006) and in “enriching the lives of men and women of the whole world” (Kayemuddin, 2012, p. 27). Servant leadership enables small business leaders to fully discover, develop, and employ follower potential through empowering behaviors.

This study sought to contribute to the empirical research of servant leadership by measuring the relationship between supervisors’ servant leadership behaviors and followers’ perceptions of empowerment within the context of small business.

We implement an inductive, case study approach to explore the motivations and methods of five successful social entrepreneurs. Our findings show that founders noticed, felt, and responded to someone else's pain, demonstrating compassion as the genesis of the business venture. Successful social innovation, however, was the result of the creation of an organization structured to include diverse stakeholder input and participation in the decision-making process. Thus, compassion motivates entrepreneurs to pursue broad gains as opposed to singular interests and enhances a willingness to incorporate others' ideas through an open-strategy process. Our study suggests that interaction with stakeholders can impact the structure of the firm, the business model it employs, and intended and unintended business consequences.

This paper analyzes two external costs often associated with port development, cost to fisheries from marine dredge disposal and damages from air pollution, using estimates of development and operation for a proposed (but since cancelled) container port as a case study. For dredge disposal, a bio-economic model was used to assess short- and long-term and indirect (joodweb) damages to fisheries from marine disposal of clean sediments. In the case of air pollution, estimates of annual activity levels and emission coefficients are used to estimate incremental annual emissions of three key pollutants (NOx, HC and CO) for trucks, trains, yard vehicles, and vessels. These estimates allow for phasing in of strict new air pollution regulations. For both external costs, sensitivity analyses are used to reflect uncertainty. Estimates of shadow values in year 2002 dollars amount from $0.094 per cubic yard to $0.169 per cubic yard of clean dredged material for the selected disposal site and from $0.0584 per mile (jor current control standards) to $ 0. 0023 per mile (after phasing in of new regulations) for air pollution from heavy trucks.