It's not often that I look to military commanders for leadership inspiration.  I find that most military leadership takes the form of traditional command and control.  It's even less often that I'd consider military examples to illustrate effective leadership models for ScrumMasters and agile "leaders".  However, I was reading about General Matthew Ridgway today, and it occurred to me that he could be viewed as the military equivalent of a servant leader.  Ridgway is widely regarded as the man responsible for salvaging any hope for United Nations troops in the Korean War in 1950. 

What was so interesting about Ridgway was his vision of leadership.  At the time, the model of military leadership in Korea was General Douglas MacArthur.  MacArthur believed that great commanders could impose their will on their troops, and because of the greatness of the commander, the troops would be victorious.  But, by 1950, the troops had lost morale and were losing the war under MacArthur's command.  When Ridgway arrived, his leadership model was far more egalitarian.  He wanted his men to find something special within themselves that made them effective as soldiers.  He felt that it would be the ability of the troops to find ways to be better soldiers that would make them effective, not their faith in him.  He truly believed that it was his job to help his men find that something within to make them the best that they can be.

So, how does any of this relate to Scrum and agile?  While I personally find Ridgway's end goal distasteful, his leadership model as mentor and teacher, not commander, is a good model for agile leaders.  As ScrumMasters and agile leaders, it is not our job to mandate or command our teams to perform work.  It's been demonstrated time and again that this is not effective, and can even be detrimental to otherwise productive teams.  Instead, it is our job to help our teams become the best that they can be.  We are there to help them find the qualities and practices that suit them best as a team.  We are not responsible for solving our team's problems.  But we are responsible for teaching them how to solve their problems.  We're responsible for giving them whatever they need to become self-managing, effective teams.  We need to become true servant leaders.