Cultural Intelligence and Servant Leadership Among Leaders Within a Venezuelan Migrant Working Community in Trinidad and Tobago: A Correlational Study

Abstract

While servant leadership has become a widely adopted leadership style by many great leaders throughout history, there is limited empirical evidence to support the true organizational relationship between servant leader factors and cultural intelligence. The research was conducted using a cross-sectional survey that gathered observer perceptions about leaders from a sample of 139 Venezuelan migrants working at a Trinidad and Tobago organization. The survey was designed using two established instruments, the Cultural Intelligence Scale or CQS (Ang et al., 2007) and the Servant Leadership Survey or SLS (van Dierendonck & Nuijten, 2010). The conclusions of this study supported the research hypothesis that there is a statistically significant positive correlation between the cultural intelligence (CQ) of leaders and servant leadership, as perceived by Venezuelan migrant workers in a workplace setting in Trinidad and Tobago. In addition, this study revealed a similarly strong correlation between cultural intelligence and servant leadership across all demographic groups based on gender, age, and time living in Trinidad and Tobago. Based on this statistical finding, the leadership gaps defined in cultural intelligence literature and the development approaches examined in servant leadership literature are applied within the proposed solution to the business problem identified. The solution was designed in the form of a 16-week leadership development program that would focus on the positive development of cultural intelligence and servant leadership qualities of leaders. Keywords: cultural intelligence, servant leadership, cultural diversity, cultural adaptation, Venezuela, migrants, refugee challenges, Trinidad and Tobago