5. Persuasion
| The servant-leader seeks to convince others, rather than coerce compliance. This particular element offers one of the clearest distinctions between the traditional authoritarian model and that of servant-leadership. The servant-leader is effective at building consensus within groups. |
| Larry Spears |
I like the following definitions of persuasion, first from Webster:
The act of persuading; the act of influencing the mind by arguments or reasons offered, or by any thing that moves the mind or passions, or inclines the will to a determination.
and then from the Encyclopędia Britannica:
The process by which a person's attitudes or behaviour are, without duress, influenced by communications from other people.
It is clear from these definitions that persuading and convincing are quite the opposite of pressuring of coercing. Persuasion contains elements of enticing and motivating the recipient that are absent from a forceful and commanding approach. Few could really argue against the fact that a persuaded worker would, at least in the long run, be more motivated and productive than the one who is just following orders. Yet the traditional, top-down management approach is driven by command and control. Perhaps the fear of the consequences of disobedience is a primary motivating factor in that model, but that is not genuine persuasion.
Perhaps all of us could easily recount experiences where persuasion opened inroads that were completely closed off to a more forceful approach. Santa Claus recently made my wife's lifelong dream of having voice lessons come through. Talented as my wife is in many areas (including singing), she is at the same time both quite shy and a bit of a perfectionist. That, of course, easily sets her up for episodes of self-doubt that question whether she's good enough to deserve her lessons. When that happens, my knee jerk reaction might be one of "come on, you know better than that", but needless to say, any kind of forceful reply is bound to get me nowhere. Instead, gentle persuasion is far more successful in convincing her that she indeed has come a long way since just a few months ago, that her teacher just paid her this or that compliment, and so forth.
The powers of persuasion were already well known to the authors of Proverbs about 3000 years ago when they wrote (Pro 25:15):
Patience can persuade a prince, and soft speech can crush strong opposition.
So, how did Biblical leaders use persuasion? A number of references to persuasion in the New Testament are in the context of preaching and teaching. For example, Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, was foretold this by an angel (Luk 1:16):
And he will persuade many Israelites to turn to the Lord their God.
About Paul, Luke writes in Act 18:4:
Every Sabbath he reasoned in the synagogue, trying to persuade Jews and Greeks. (NIV)
Paul himself wrote in his second letter to Timothy (2Ti 4:2):
Preach the word of God. Be persistent, whether the time is favorable or not. Patiently correct, rebuke, and encourage your people with good teaching.
Jesus was an extremely persuasive speaker. After the sermon on the mount, Matthew recorded (Mat 7:28-29):
28After Jesus finished speaking, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, 29for he taught as one who had real authority--quite unlike the teachers of religious law.
Many examples of how Jesus persuaded and often convicted others in nearly impossible situations are truly astonishing. One of my favorite examples is the story of the woman caught in the act of adultery (Joh 8:3-11). The scribes and Pharisees, as on many other occasions, were trying to trap Jesus into saying something they could use against him, either because it would violate the law of Moses (which commanded that the woman be stoned), or Jesus' teachings about love. When they kept pressing Jesus for an answer, he said (Joh 8:7):
"All right, stone her. But let those who have never sinned throw the first stones!"
After all the accusers went away quietly, Jesus turned to the woman in Joh 8:10-11:
10..."Where are your accusers? Didn't even one of them condemn you?" 11"No, Lord," she said. And Jesus said, "Neither do I. Go and sin no more."
We do not know what became of the woman after this encounter, but I suspect that she was as strongly persuaded and convicted of her wrongdoings as her accusers, the scribes and Pharisees, were of theirs.
If this essay so far has made rather few references to women in the Bible, it certainly is not because I think any less of them as leaders than I do of men. To the contrary, I believe many of the servant leadership principles probably come more naturally to women than they come to men. Unfortunately, women are quite underrepresented in the Bible as leaders. Ruth, however, is one of the more prominent women of the Old Testament (she has a whole book named after her!), and she offers us a good example of persuasion. After an exile forced by famine, Naomi was returning to Judah. Both of her sons had gotten married in the foreign country, and she wanted her daughters-in-law to stay with their people. Ruth, however, persuaded Naomi to let her come along (Ruth 1:15-18):
15"See," Naomi said to her, "your sister-in-law has gone back to her people and to her gods. You should do the same." 16But Ruth replied, "Don't ask me to leave you and turn back. I will go wherever you go and live wherever you live. Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. 17I will die where you die and will be buried there. May the LORD punish me severely if I allow anything but death to separate us!" 18So when Naomi saw that Ruth had made up her mind to go with her, she stopped urging her.
Another example, although it turned out to be less successful, is that of Pilate's wife trying to persuade Pilate not to condemn Jesus (Mat 27:19):
Just then, as Pilate was sitting on the judgment seat, his wife sent him this message: "Leave that innocent man alone, because I had a terrible nightmare about him last night."
Without patting myself on the back for high marks on persuasion, I do not think of myself as a dominating or commanding person. Perhaps it is because I didn't resort to bullying others in return for being bullied myself a lot as a child. Perhaps it is because I have learned the lessons of gentleness through eight years of marriage to a sensitive wife, whom I love more than anything in the world. Perhaps it is because I am not even in a formal position of "power" at my place of work, since I don't have supervisory responsibilities for any of my colleagues, even though I have the lead technical responsibility for a project that involves the work of several team members. Perhaps it is because I have spent the majority of my professional life in academia, which emphasizes intellectual reasoning with others regardless of their rank, rather than following a chain of command.
Let me finish this chapter then with two thoughts. Firstly, even if I am not presently in a formal supervisory position, there are many other circumstances in which I might choose either power or persuasion. Such choices might manifest themselves in more subtle ways than giving orders versus trying to convince others. For example, body language or tone of voice might make a big difference whether someone might feel genuinely persuaded or somewhat coerced after all. My hope is that I will always be aware, or if necessary be made aware, whether or not I am using persuasion to the best of my abilities.
Secondly, the time will almost certainly come when I will have more formal personnel management responsibilities. May the principles of servant leadership be ingrained enough in me by then that I would never even be tempted by the inappropriate use of power instead of proper persuasion.
For Thought and Discussion
- Can you recall an example where you failed to achieve your goal through a pressured approach, but succeeded when you switched to persuasion? How about the opposite, i.e. you first tried to convince, but found you had to command to obtain the objective? Can the latter ever be justified for a servant leader? Under what circumstances?
- In your experience, what are the most successful techniques of persuasion? By what methods are you most easily persuaded? What are your most proven ways of persuading others? Your co-workers? Your spouse?
- Read the Scripture passages where Jesus asked his disciples to follow him (e.g. Mat 4:18-22, Mat 9:9, Mar 2:14). How do you think the disciples felt? Pressured or persuaded? Coerced or convinced? What made them follow Jesus? Can you back up your views with other Bible passages? What about Joh 1:36-37?
