Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction: leaders and organizations in search of treatment
- 1 Hubris and narcissism: the dark underbelly of leadership
- 2 The enigma of an unintentionally toxic leader: an emotionally turbulent, destructive and impulsive workplace
- 3 The narcissistic leader: world-renowned and quite arrogant
- 4 Leader sabotage and the dysfunctional organization: the fish rots from the head down
- 5 The obsessive compulsive leader: a manager's mandate for perfection or destruction
- 6 The borderline leader: when brilliance and psychopathology coexist
- 7 Trouble at the top: high-toxicity implications of a leader with antisocial personality disorder
- 8 Histrionic leadership: the allure of the toxic leader in a volatile industry
- 9 The outer limits of toxic organizational behavior: corporate trauma in the form of disturbed leadership
- 10 Destructive leaders and dysfunctional organizations: tearing downs the walls of professional greed, hubris, toxic genius and psychopathology
- References
- Index
4 - Leader sabotage and the dysfunctional organization: the fish rots from the head down
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 January 2011
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction: leaders and organizations in search of treatment
- 1 Hubris and narcissism: the dark underbelly of leadership
- 2 The enigma of an unintentionally toxic leader: an emotionally turbulent, destructive and impulsive workplace
- 3 The narcissistic leader: world-renowned and quite arrogant
- 4 Leader sabotage and the dysfunctional organization: the fish rots from the head down
- 5 The obsessive compulsive leader: a manager's mandate for perfection or destruction
- 6 The borderline leader: when brilliance and psychopathology coexist
- 7 Trouble at the top: high-toxicity implications of a leader with antisocial personality disorder
- 8 Histrionic leadership: the allure of the toxic leader in a volatile industry
- 9 The outer limits of toxic organizational behavior: corporate trauma in the form of disturbed leadership
- 10 Destructive leaders and dysfunctional organizations: tearing downs the walls of professional greed, hubris, toxic genius and psychopathology
- References
- Index
Summary
Destructive interaction, in which individuals move either toward self-destruction or towards breaking down the system in which they participate, may be due to … incomplete information about the self, the other person, or the system … in special cases, the self-destruction of the smaller entity is instrumental to the survival of the larger system … For such delineation an observer is necessary.
(Ruesch & Bateson, 1968, pp. 288–289).ERATIC AND DEFIANT CEO BEHAVIOR
Leadership sets the tone and the agenda. Erratic, defiant and reckless behavior of a CEO or vice president reverberates throughout organizational culture (e.g., see Kellerman, 2004). Sterling, exemplary decision making from the top emanates throughout the organizational chart (e.g., see Cameron & Lavine, 2006; Whetten & Cameron, 2007), but the hubris, flippant and condescending demagoguery of a corporate or political president metastasizes at every level of company existence (Gabriel, 1991, 1999; Kets de Vries and Associates, 1991; Kets de Vries & Miller, 1984a,b; Levinson, 1976).
Inundated with variables and overwhelmed by stimuli it can be quite challenging for the external consultant to make serious sense out of the misbehavior, misconstruals and misrepresentation of leadership. When the corporate client and the mouth of leadership mislead, problem solving becomes increasingly complex.
FAILURES OF A DEEPLY TOXIC CULTURE
A staggering 100 percent failure rate in Black Valley's recruitment and hiring (thirty-two hires and thirty-two failures over a sixteen-month period) signaled a looming crisis in human resources.
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- Information
- Destructive Leaders and Dysfunctional OrganizationsA Therapeutic Approach, pp. 55 - 85Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2009