Nurturing students to be caring service leaders

Caring behavior is very important for an effective service leader. To help students recognize the importance of caring behavior and become caring service leaders, one lecture on caring behavior was designed for the subject "Service Leadership" at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. This article consists of two parts. The first part is on the concepts and theories of the topic, and the second part is on the detailed content of this lecture. In the first part, three primary elements of care (i.e. love, listening, and empathy) and the relevant skills of improving caring behavior in practice are firstly discussed. Next, the relationships between caring behavior of service leaders and positive outcomes of care for different stakeholders including leaders, followers, and organizations are examined. Finally, discussion and reflection on caring service leaders are summarized. In the second part, the corresponding lecture contents are presented, including two activities which are designed to facilitate students' active learning and deep understanding concerning caring behavior.