WORLD SERVING LEADERS CAMPAIGNTM

Changing Lives, Communities, and Countries….

…One Serving Leader at a Time

Why This Work Is Important.

Center for Serving Leadership® (CSL) is wholly dedicated to the purpose of shifting the practice of leadership away from the self-seeking behaviors that ruin people and fortunes, and towards the practice of true serving. When a leader serves – an urgent cause, a valued customer, a high standard, a team of dedicated employees – the result is true value creation with benefits for all.

Our vision:

  • We envision a THRIVING world in which SERVING is the trademark of LEADERSHIP.

Our Mission:

  • Train 50,000 Serving Leaders by 2030.

Our Pledge:

  • $200 trains a Serving Leader

What are the opportunities before us?

We are in a unique position as a company. First, a brief history of what brings us to this point.

*2011: CSL was founded by John Stahl-Wert

*2015: CSL was sold to Newton Consulting

*2019: John and Milonica Stahl-Wert re-purchased CSL and its I.P. from Newton

*2019: CSL began investing to build a scalable, multi-generational business

*2020: Nelson Okanya was hired to lead our Global Office

*2020: Jon Byler was hired to build the infrastructure for scalability

*2021: CSL’s Asia Office was incorporated in Singapore

*2021: CSL completed the training of its 5,000th leader

“Africa`s greatest challenge is not poverty, conflict, or injustice. It is poor leadership.”

~ John Wambura, Tanzania

In the past ten years, CSL has proven its effectuality in developing fruitful, high character leaders through its simple, proven tools. CSL receives consistent, strongly positive endorsements from those served. The marketplace has confirmed CSL’s worth, demonstrated by the fact that most of our new clients are referred to us by prior clients who strongly urge their business friends to make this investment.

CSL views these first ten years as an investment in testing, sharpening, and validating the worth of this work. Multiple challenges were taken on over this first decade, including testing the training and the tools with thousands of leaders in hundreds of businesses in the United States, Singapore, and Hong Kong, building the robust online platform that delivers the training virtually, certifying a growing team of training partners who use these tools in their work, and establishing the operational team that is capable of scaling the business globally.

At the heart of our vision for expansion is our desire to share the leadership resources God has given us with those who need it most and who can least afford it. We are convinced that what God has placed in our hands is to be used to bless the world. We hear the voices of leaders around the globe who are desperate for training that will improve their leadership capacity.

Work is underway or developing in Brazil, Congo, Ethiopia, Grenada, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Liberia, Mexico, Nicaragua, Romania, Singapore, Tanzania, The Philippines, Burundi, Chad, Myanmar, South Africa, Malawi, Benin, China as well as the USA.

Challenges We Face:

Lying below the surface of the world’s visible problems, including poverty, injustice, violence, and human subjugation, is a singularly impactful root-cause – leaders who are ill-suited or ill-prepared to deliver good outcomes for the people and causes they serve.

Of the world’s 250 million leaders, managers, and supervisors, more than 200 million do not have affordable access to effective training resources that will help them measurably improve their leadership practice and the outcomes they produce.

Compassionate investors and donors scrutinize the ventures they fund. They are looking for:

(1) Good ideas

(2) Properly capitalized

(3) Excellently led

They look for all three. They know that many promising ventures fail or significantly underperform due to poor leadership.

Assets We Hold:

CSL has a ten-year, global track record of measurably improving leadership outcomes which is built upon a leading, globally best-selling book in the “servant leadership” space. The Serving Leader Model has been adopted by large and small industries in manufacturing, food, supply chain, retail, and health care. In addition, sizable impacts have been made in the social sector, churches, and with global NGOs. Over these ten years, CSL has worked primarily with high income nations1 namely the United States, Singapore, and Hong Kong.

CSL has produced a first-rate online delivery platform that allows worldwide access to a combination of self-paced learning or online cohorts guided by a certified training partner.

In 2020, two executive team members with decades of global leadership experience were brought onboard. Both new executives, as well as CSL’s founder, serve on international mission and development boards that work to strengthen leaders and enterprises in lower income and lower-middle income countries2. These strategic investments in key staff were made to equip CSL to address the challenge of delivering its resources to the rest of the world. 

CSL is building strategic alliances with seasoned training partners, and with blue-ribbon agencies dedicated to introducing socially conscientious donors and investors to worthy charitable and entrepreneurial initiatives in need of investment. For example, Project World Impact is the leading nonprofit hub providing innovative ways for people to connect with and support nonprofits. With allies like this, CSL will build a charitable funding base for its new Global Mission Office to support leadership development for leaders around the world.

What is the Campaign Goal?

Phase 1 (the quiet phase)

– We will raise $600,000, drawing entirely from our community of Serving Leaders whom we have served over the past decade. We are conducting this first fundraising phase with three objectives: (a.) personally speak with at least 100 prior clients in order to invite broad engagement in our mission, (b.) raise $600,000, and, (c.) learn about the global relationships and engagements this community already serves so as to increase the avenues of service CSL can support.

Phase 2 (the digital fund-raising phase)

– Center for Serving Leadership will launch its 501(c)(3) partner organization – World Serving Leaders – to carry on the work of funding the training of global leaders. Together, CSL and WSL will leverage the power of in-bound marketing to invite many new donors from around the world to fund the $400,000 balance of this campaign, and to fund the training of Serving Leaders for years to come.  

The Measurable Goals for Getting to 50,000.

Train 50,000 Serving Leaders Worldwide in 7 Years!

2023: Ramp Up Year: Deploy technology and in-country trainer network

Results: 700 – 1,000 leaders trained & 25 new CSL trainers added

  • 2024: 2,100 leaders and 75 total in-country trainers activated

  • 2025: 6,500 leaders and 150 total in-country trainers activated

  • 2026: 12,000 leaders and 250 total in-country trainers activated

  • 2027: 18,000 leaders and 375 total in-country trainers activated

  • 2028: 25,000 leaders and 750 total in-country trainers activated

  • 2030: 50,000 leaders and 1,000 total in-country trainers activated

World Serving Leaders Fundraising Goal of $5 Million in Two Phases.

Secure Gifts and Multi-Year Pledges totaling:

Phase 1: $3 million over Two Years.

Phase 2: $2 million, or more, over the final
Three Years.

The Public Campaign Phase is scheduled to
launch in 2025.

How can I be Involved?

(A) Make a financial contribution to this Campaign through our 501(c)(3) partner. 

Types of Gifts Sought in the Campaign

• Outright Gifts
• Multi-Year Pledges
• Gifts of Appreciated Stock
• Gifts Pledged in One’s Estate.

Online contributions, including echecks, may be made by clicking the button below.

Select “echeck” (preferred) for payment type, “Center for Serving Leadership” as designation. Enter relevant bank information.

Thank you!

Checks may be mailed to:

Sagamore Institute

PO Box 301076

Indianapolis, IN 46230

  • Please designate: World Serving Leaders

(B) Make a commitment of time, talent, or connections by sharing your interest in helping deliver Serving Leader training to places in the world where you are already involved.

World Serving Leaders Goal

$5,000,000 World Serving Leaders Goal! 41%

World Serving Leader Measures

People Trained as Serving Leaders:

People Trained as Serving Leader Trainers:

Amount of Donors to WSL Campaign:

  • 38 Donors as of January, 2024!

We will be more than happy to schedule a phone call to talk with you about this campaign.

Call: (412) 376-5131

or

Email: Info@CenterforServingLeadership.com


Endorsements

“When a friend asks me about the value of being part of the Serving Leader program, I tell them to just sign up, that it is worth every penny and has paid me dividends year after year.”

Ernie Hershberger, Homestead Furniture, Dutch Design, and Abner Henry

“Serving Leadership trained our board, executive team, and senior managers and we’re carrying it out to the front line. It was a big commitment, but the results have made it so worthwhile.” 

Angeline Wee, HCA Hospice Care Singapore

“I was a good leader. CSL made me much better. It is well worth it and will save years of work.” 

Mark Peterson, Lawley

“The world is in great need of The Serving Leader.”              

CHERYL BACHELDER, CEO, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen

“This has been the greatest investment of resources I have made in years, and I know it’s going to pay dividends in the future. It will make a difference in your life!”

Rev. Craig Bellis, Point View Church

“We recognize a tradition of leadership at Johns Hopkin. ‘We are here to add what we can to life, not to get what we can from it.’ The principles of Serving Leadership are strong reflections of this link between our tradition and future vision.”

Colleen Koch MD, MS, MBA, Clinical Director of Critical Care Medicine, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine

“I’m personally grateful for John Stahl-Wert’s Serving Leader training. It has made a lasting, positive impact on ProVia, and on many other leaders and businesses in our community.”                                                                                                               

BILL MULLET, Founder and Chairman of the Board, ProVia

“When I was looking for a teachable way to transform leadership and culture at the Cleveland Clinic, I chose The Serving Leader. It started a transformation that continues to this day.”                                                                                                        

JOE PATRNCHAK, Former Chief Human Resources Officer, Cleveland Clinic

“Embrace The Serving Leader! It will change the way you do business. Serving Leaders get obstacles out of the way, help employees do their jobs, help meet employees’ needs, and hold people accountable.”                                                                     

BILLY AINSWORTH, President and CEO, Progress Rail Services Corporation, A Caterpillar Company

“Bringing The Serving Leader into Industrial Scientific drove the core disciplines that fuel our success – growing people, raising high standards, and providing a compelling purpose for deeply worthy work.”                                                           

KENT MCELHATTAN, Chairman, National Safety Council; Co-Founder, Industrial Scientific Corporation

“The principles found in John’s best-selling book, The Serving Leader, lend exceptional support to leaders seeking transformation in their personal lives and in their organizations.”                                                                                         

FRANCES HESSELBEIN, CEO and Co-Founder, Peter F. Drucker Foundation

“The Serving Leader is the most practical guide available to implement servant leadership at work.”                                                                                         

KEN BLANCHARD, Author of Servant Leadership in Action and The New One Minute Manager

Footnotes.

1 As measured by GDP per capita. Rankings vary, but IMF’s classification puts Hong Kong in 11th place, among their ranking of 191 nations and principalities, the United States in 7th place, and Singapore in 2nd place.

2 There is no consensus on the best designation for nations in the bottom half of world ranking by GDP per capita. “Developing” is misleading, as there are many “Developing” communities in every nation, and Global South is too broad a brush. Here we use the World Bank’s language of Lower and Lower-Middle Income countries. The purpose of CSL’s Global Mission Agency may best be served by the language of “Developing Nations and Communities” in order to serve the growth of leaders in lower and lower-middle income countries as well as urban and rural poor communities located within the so-called “Developed” world.