In 1997, I worked as a contract Software Developer for a Fortune 200 company. As part of the Program Management Office (PMO), I was asked to write a software application to balance human resource capacity with program/project demand. Barb Schrage was my new manager. I didn't know her well since I had only worked under her leadership for a few weeks.

 

One day, as I sat in my cubicle cranking out code, something happened that not only startled me but changed the entire trajectory of my career. It was simple and seemingly innocuous, but it rocked my world.

 

Barb pulled up a chair to sit next to me. As she sat down, she held a notepad and said, “Hi, Joe.”

 

I thought, “Oh no, what did I do wrong?” Fifteen years as a software developer across multiple companies trained me to smell trouble whenever a manager stopped over without warning and sat down. After all, they managed by exception and only engaged with team members when something was behind schedule or over budget. 

 

Without much thinking, I immediately anticipated a litany of likely questions from Barb:

 

• “How are you doing against that deadline?”

• “Why aren’t you done with that yet?”

• “Have you reached out to anyone on the team who can help get things done faster?”

 

But Barb had something else in mind.

 

“Well, Joe, I was just wondering how you are doing,” Barb said as she made eye contact with a curious and friendly look.

 

“I guess I’m doing well, Barb. Thanks for asking.” 

 

“Great!” came her response. Then she added, “Is there any way I can serve or support you in your work? Do you need anything from me to help you succeed?”

 

Her simple and highly unusual question deeply and immediately impacted me. Here’s why:

 

My childhood was horrific…filled with every kind of abuse. I cannot even count the number of times I was convinced I would be killed by my mother or stepfather … all before the age of 15. I was on a first-name basis with local police officers, and to this day, I am bewildered as to why I wasn’t rescued and placed into a foster home. 

 

As a result, by the age of sixteen, I knew the following things about myself because they were hammered into me so consistently during my formative years that they became my mantra:
 

1. I am a worthless piece of trash.

2. Nobody cares what I think or feel.

3. I will never amount to anything.

 

At that tender age, finding the motivation to get out of bed each morning to go to school became a daunting struggle. I had no friends and was hopeless … beyond depressed. This world would be better off without me.

 

To make a long story short, divine intervention put me on a different path that continues to this day.

 

Yet, as transformative as that spiritual journey was, there were still scars that weren’t healed … and beliefs about myself that needed severe overhauling.

 

When I started my career in Information Technology in 1984, the leaders I worked for only seemed to care about getting work done. They didn’t care about me and rarely asked personal questions about how I was doing. I saw that as usual, and until Barb, there were no exceptions.

 

Even early in my career, my new faith taught me to care for others and see them as more important than their work. I began to see a compelling relationship between genuinely caring for others in the workplace and productivity.

 

However, I felt like an anomaly because most leaders and managers I had worked with or for were focused on the work. People were mere tools to get the job done. I didn’t know then that I was practicing servant leadership as much as possible from my “lowly” positions in the organizational charts, while most of the managers and leaders around me were not.

 

So, I plugged in and kept my expectations low. I didn’t expect managers to treat me like I was trying to treat others. I certainly didn’t expect my passion for people to impact those around me in the workplace because I was not in a formal position of leadership, which, at the time, I believed to be a prerequisite for impact.

 

Then along came Barb.

 

Her questions completely stunned me because, despite all the times I wished for the contrary, no manager had ever spoken to me like that before. A strange wave of hope and encouragement came over me. For the very first time at work, I felt genuinely valued.

 

“Well, Barb, I can’t think of anything you can help with right now, but as soon as that changes, I will let you know.” My response did not expose my strong emotions, but I didn’t fully understand.

 

“Thanks, Joe,” Barb smiled as she stood up, rolled the chair back to a nearby table, and walked away.

 

The conversation lasted less than a minute, yet I remember being so grateful that I worked for Barb. At the same time, I had a strange sense that she thought she worked for me. This was a revolutionary and energizing thought. Right there, I determined to do my best work for her and exceed her expectations. There was just no way I was going to let her down.

 

That conversation with Barb motivated me to aspire to be a Project Manager like her, and a few short years later, my vision became a reality. Her example inspired me to lead others by building on how she had treated me during the brief time I worked with her.

 

Over the last twenty-five years since then, I have had the opportunity to learn countless frameworks for getting work done, have learned many team and work management software systems, and have worked at many companies … mostly in the Fortune 200 domain. I have also been a Business Transformation Leader, Trainer, and Enterprise Agile Coach for a Fortune 4 company.

 

I have steadfastly committed to empiricism, the GSD methodology (Get S**t Done), and a passion for serving people. As a result, I have observed and can quantify Servant Leadership's compelling value and power.

 

However, I have also observed something alarming for me: 

 

In conversations I’ve had with executives about Servant Leadership, most say they are challenged, requested, or expected to learn it yet are not provided practical tools and methods to support this part of their leadership journeys.      

 

If it is true that Servant Leadership creates remarkably engaged teams and yields outstanding business results, they wouldn’t know it because they have not been empowered to put it into practice in their daily work. 

     

Over the last several years, executives have told me they tried attending internal and external training sessions on Servant Leadership. For them, the content was ambiguous, theoretical, ethereal, and sorely lacking practical application. The sessions sometimes start with the facilitator asking them to take deep breaths and get centered. Yet, executives have scarce time for anything not directly supporting their multiple concurrent burning platforms. 

 

Indeed, we can support them more effectively!

 

This book provides a framework to organize our thinking around Practical Servant Leadership, but it doesn't stop there. Stories and methods are shared to encourage and accelerate experiential learning so we might simultaneously be transformed from the inside (our mindsets and convictions) and outside (our choices and behaviors).  

   

With this, I’m excited to be partnering with Dr. Michael Moss.   

   

Since 1991, Mike has been partnering with business leaders to apply what he has learned from his Doctorate in Industrial and Organizational Psychology and his vast business experience to maximize employee experience and productivity by analyzing employee data. He has a deep knowledge of human motivation and organizational culture. He is highly skilled at Measurement, Surveys, People Analytics, and other tools that deliver actionable workforce intelligence to improve organizational effectiveness. With this book, Mike and I are combining and distilling over 75 years of synergistic experience to share what we believe are the manifestations and methods that yield the best business outcomes for the burgeoning Servant Leader.   

   

Additionally, our approach is founded on neuroscience, which informs us that humans learn by experience and then move to principles and theory. In other words, we didn’t get a master’s degree in physics before riding our bicycles for the first time! We scrape our knees, wipe our eyes, return to our bikes, and repeat. Soon, our minds are transformed because of empirical data from experience and discoveries. That is how we become expert bicycle operators…and Practical Servant Leaders.

 

After reading and applying what is introduced in this book, you will…

• Understand what Servant Leadership is … and isn’t

• Know how to deal with Culture Vultures (a.k.a. corporate bullies)

• Learn instantly applicable power tools that have been proven to elevate team performance and reduce attrition

• Understand the transactional nature of Practical Servant Leadership: how specifically team members can support the new behaviors and practices their leaders are growing into

• Leverage practical methods that strengthen virtual teams' and remote telecommuters' performance and engagement in an increasingly digital business climate.

 

Becoming a Practical Servant Leader might be a radical change for you that will likely require courage. The Dilbert comic character once said, “Change is good…you go first!” 

 

Many executives I have worked with are still committed to dictatorial leadership styles and refuse to learn or practice Servant Leadership. “After all,” they contend, “my leadership style has got me this far in my career, so why should I change now?”

 

My answer is simple: These leaders usually have little idea how much waste their leadership behaviors generate. They don’t see the direct relationship between their practices and their time spent on damage control. 

 

It’s a little like the refrigerator magnet I purchased in a Costa Rican store in 2007: “If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?”

     

Moreover, many leaders think that everything is fine when, in reality, things are not fine. Their team doesn’t feel invited or safe to tell them the truth.

 

In contrast, true Servant Leaders focus on caring for their team, which results in better teams and higher-quality production. These leaders spend far less time on damage control because their leadership results in committed, loyal, productive, and highly engaged teams.

     

The bottom line is that you can keep throwing buckets of water on the fire or call the fire department.

 

The choice is ours.

 

And to make sure this is not a mere “throw it over the wall” endeavor, this book comes with a code so you can join a private online forum on our website. Collaborating with other readers helps you share your discoveries with others who “get it” and learn from others who are learning and growing just like you. This will be a great way to start a conversation and keep it going because, like any skill, iterative application with adjustments is essential to develop the best version of ourselves. My role is facilitating and equipping readers while not being a bottleneck or encumbrance to progress. With great enthusiasm and expectations, I look forward to learning from your perspective and experience in these conversations!

 

Finally, please don’t feel overwhelmed by the journey before you. Instead, remember that sometimes, even the smallest pivots you choose to make in your journey can have a powerful impact on your team members. After all, we often have little idea how powerful our words and choices can be and how they might alter the course of our lives…just as Barb Schrage’s transformed mine for the better so long ago.

 

Grace and courage,

 

Joe Palm

joe@PracticalSL.com

Asheville, North Carolina

March 2024