Chinese servant leadership: A comparative study between Public and business sector organisations

This paper aims to examine whether the Western concept of servant leadership could be applied to the non-Western context of the People´s Republic of China (PRC) and whether there are differences and similarities between Chinese public and business sector organisations. We employed a qualitative, open-ended survey approach to the collection of data across a sample of Chinese organisations. We found that when asked to characterise Chinese servant leadership, the study respondents consider six types of servant leadership similar to the West but also three types of Chinese extended servant leadership, highlighting research gaps for future studies within the context of comparison between the PRC and the West. Finally, a comparison on servant leadership between Chinese public and business sector organisations was made.