Dark Side Leadership Drunks looking for keys under a lamp post?

When the sun sets, shadows that showed at noon but small, appear most long and terrible.
Dark Side Leadership
Drunks looking for keys under a lamp post?
Nathaniel Lee

Reasons to be un-cheerful about Psychology’s evidence base
© AM Azure Consulting Ltd 2014
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Another fad?
What is new here?
Is Dark Side Leadership simply another way of reminding us of what we already know?
Or does it offer new insights and methodologies to make advances in how we assess and develop leaders?
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Despite the popularity of competency models, their popularity has not been accompanied by any leadership renaissance
The dynamics of the causes of leadership impact and the effects of organisational performance have proven elusive
Exceptional leadership it is argued is needed to produce outstanding returns
How do the dynamics of dark side leadership shape success and failure?
The dark side to help rethink leadership
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Dark side leadership is bad
The global financial crisis was largely caused by corporate psychopaths….Measures exist to identify corporate psychopaths. Perhaps it is time to use them.
Clive Boddy
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Dark side leadership is necessary
Dark side leadership is key to how the current system functions. We need:
A few sociopaths to run the “system”
The clueless who maintain the system despite any lack of loyalty from the system
The losers who just coast along with enough discretionary effort
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I shot 630 elephants and 63 men, and I regret the elephants more.
Arthur Jones, Nautilus
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Jack Welch at GE: a sociopath who understood the dark side?
Jack Welch’s greatest genius wasn't in reading a balance sheet or executing a business strategy, but rather in his preternatural understanding of raw power.
He knew how to ingratiate as well as intimidate the media - to squelch, kill or chill unflattering portrayals of him. That meant rewarding allies and punishing potential adversaries.
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Dark side leadership may be good
Psychopathy is like sunlight. Overexposure can hasten one’s demise in grotesque, carcinogenic fashion. But regulated exposure at controlled and optimal levels can have a significant positive impact on well-being and quality of life.”
Psychopathy……is personality with a tan.
Kevin Dutton, The Wisdom of Psychopaths
Does dark side leadership incorporate important qualities that organisations value?
The seven deadly wins:
1. ruthlessness
2. charm
3. focus
4. mental toughness
5. fearlessness
6. mindfulness
7. action
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Is the dark side a positive predictor of leadership?
Based on prior theory and the experiences of practitioners, we hypothesized negative relationships between the subclinical disorders and leader development over time. With regard to this hypothesis, our results were certainly more ambivalent. …..we found … positive relationships with leader development over time and across multiple dimensions of leadership.
The remaining dimensions had few or inconsistent effects.
The results require some explanation.
Peter Harms on research tracking the development of leadership within West Point

Tunnel vision helps. Being a bit of a shit helps. A thick skin helps. Stamina is crucial, as is a capacity to work so hard that your best friends mock you, your lovers despair, and the rest of your acquaintances watch furtively from the sidelines, half in awe and half in contempt. Luck helps, but only if you don't seek it.
Felix Dennis, How To Get Rich
Felix Dennis is candid about the dynamics of success
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Leadership: business success and failure
One business leader was a tyrant whose leadership style “created a culture that condemned his organisation to an inevitable fate.”
The other was a visionary and business genius “who reshaped entire industries by the force of his will.”
What made the difference?
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The halo effect of business success and failure
Our attributions of success and failure are shaped by the Halo Effect
We evaluate the causes of business outcomes from our knowledge of the consequences of what happened; not so much prediction as post-diction
Our romanticism of leadership leads us to over-estimate the impact of leadership in business success and failure
We continue to make up plausible narratives as explanations for success and failure
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Do we know the extent of the problem?
Do we have a “theory”; which frameworks and constructs seem more or less useful?
Overview
External selection
Talent management and succession planning
Implications for practitioners
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Are we headed for hell in a hand cart?
A range of “gloomy” estimates based on different sources, with very different definitions, criteria, samples and methodologies
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The Chicken Little industry of the consulting business
Is the sky about to fall on our heads?
If these figures are remotely accurate:
■how does business life continue?
■did the leadership industry fall asleep for the last 2 - 3 decades?
Estimates are very much at variance from other studies, e.g. employee engagement or 360 feedback data
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An interesting study of “bad” leadership
About one-third rated their bosses as “failures” (question mark) An empirical investigation of the antecedents, behaviours, and outcomes of bad leadership Journal of Leadership Studies, 2007
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An interesting study of “bad” leadership
Maybe the solution is easy. Stop:
ignoring the problem
rewarding bad behaviour
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Impact of dark side leadership: a perspective from succession
In 1996 Enron Chairman Kenneth Lay agrees a succession plan with Rich Kinder, his President. He would remain as Chairman and Kinder would become CEO.
Rich Kinder falls out with Kenneth Lay (a combination of disagreement about the strategic direction of Enron and Kinder’s affair with Lay’s PA).
Kinder leaves to form Kinder Morgan.
Jeff Skilling sees the succession gap as his opportunity and demands to be made CEO.
Never get yourself in a position where you have only one candidate. It’s too risky. Jim Robinson, ex CEO American Express
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Do we have a theory of dark side leadership?
The confusion between the ineptitude of leaders who lack capability vs. the behaviour of leaders who display “vices”
The complication that virtue and vice may be highly inter-connected; the bright side may have a dark side, and the dark side may have a bright side
How can we tell the difference?
Is it useful to think of a spectrum of dark side leadership? A kind of index that runs from the inept through to the “asshole” to the toxic?
Or does dark side leadership come in any variety of forms? If it does, why does it seem to cohere within patterns?
Our virtues are most frequently but vices in disguise.
Duc de la Rochefoucauld
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Frameworks of dark side leadership
Specific models of psychopathy
Hare, Lilienfeld, Paulhus and the Dark Triad (Narcissism, Machiavellianism, Psychopathy) or Quartet (Sadism)
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Personality models
Eysenck’s Psychoticism and variations of the Big 5
Ancient wisdom
character and an appeal to the seven deadly sins
Sub-clinical models
Manfred Kets de Vries and 5 varieties of neurotic leadership: Dramatic, Suspicious, Detached, Depressive and Compulsive
Hogan Development Survey and 11 maladaptive themes
Nigel Guenole and DSM 5: Negative Emotionality, Detachment, Antagonism, Disinhibition, Compulsivity, Psychoticism

A variation of a Big 5 model
g: general intelligence vs. concretistic thinking n: emotionality, neuroticism, sensibility, id vs. placidity, stability e: extraversion, energy, surgency, eros vs. introversion, gravity c: conscientiousness, control, superego vs. impulsivity, casualness w: will, independence, ego vs. subduedness, passivity, affability a: affection, idealism vs. tough- mindedness, cynicism, thanatos The Scientific Study of Human Nature, Edited by Helmuth Nyborg
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a
e
c
g
n
w

Dark side leadership as permutations of personality traits?
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high w, low a, low c
low n
Fearless Dominance
high n Self-Centred Impulsivity
low g Reckless Idiot
low g Dangerous Fool
high g
Confident Risk Taker
high g Charismatic Doer

FT interviews with 60 CEOs
Describing their dark sides, 58 of the 60 admit weaknesses that are really strengths, e.g. impatience, perfectionism
1.Control freakery
2.Vanity
3.Dithering
4.Poor listening
5.Bullying
6.Fear of conflict
7.Lack of small talk
The three worst traits of chief executives are: a lack of self knowledge, a lack of self knowledge and a quite extraordinary willingness to give themselves the benefit of the doubt. Lucy Kellaway, FT
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Lucy Kellaway’s 7 deadly sins

Vices as re-interpreted as virtues
1.Control freakery: accepting the buck stops with me
2.Vanity: projecting pride in my company’s achievements
3.Dithering: caution to assess decision options carefully
4.Poor listening: simply managing information load
5.Bullying: abruptness to tackle bad behaviour
6.Fear of conflict: civility and courtesy to maintain interpersonal harmony
7.Lack of small talk: cutting to the chase in a busy world
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Vices & Virtues Scale (VAVS) and the Dark Triad
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Machiavellianism
Narcissism
Psychopathy
Veselka et al, The Dark Triad and the seven deadly sins. Personality & Individual Differences, 2014

Patterns across different frameworks of dark side leadership
Douglas et al, 2012, “Distinguishing the Dark Triad: Evidence from the Five-Factor Model and the Hogan Development Survey”
Dark Triad measures of Narcissism, Machiavellianism and Psychopathy
Hogan Development Survey
Measure of Big 5
Dark Triad constructs were highly related but sort of “distinguishable”; all associated with high aggression and low empathy
Substantial correlations across Primary (callous, selfish and manipulative) and Secondary (impulse emotional instability)
Psychopathy and Big 5
Factor analysis:
1. Emotional reactivity of aggression and paranoia
2. Extraverted narcissistic risk taking
3. Antagonistic anti-social behaviour
4. Inflexible conscientious compulsiveness
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How do we decide which framework to use?
Coherence: is the model a simple listing of dimensions? Or does the framework make the connections between context, causes and consequences? The right amount of elegance
Insight: how much insight does it provide? Is the framework largely descriptive or does it offer explanatory power that goes beyond description to provide an understanding of causal dynamics? The right amount of explanation
Pragmatism: can it be used practically within organisational life with applications for assessment and development? Or will the constructs and associated terminology be off putting to end users? The right amount of relevance
Impact: will it improve organisational decision making? Not in principle in the abstract but in practical gains of business benefit. The right amount of utility
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CONTEXT
When does the theory work?
Under which specific circumstances?
With which individuals?
CAUSES
How does the theory work?
How simple or complex is the causal mechanism?
How elaborate is the causal sequence?
CONSEQUENCES
What outcomes are predicted from the theory?
What is the size of the effect?
How sustainable are the outcomes?
What does any decent theory look like?
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The context of dark side leadership
Strategic
Structural
Cultural
■Bold and adventurous aspirations for growth
■Intense competition
■Fast moving change, complexity and uncertainty
■Weak regulation and lax enforcement of financial and professional standards
■Incentive systems
■Complexity of business model
■Lack of diversity within the senior management team
■Low levels of technical expertise
■Inadequate systems for corporate governance and risk assessment
■Hierarchical operating model
■Individualistic
■Compliance based on fear
■Arrogance
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The causes of dark side leadership
Power and its effect on leadership and the toxic tandem with followership
Stress and imbalances with personal and working life
Early life experiences and unresolved issues (e.g. family dynamics)
Exposure to specific triggers (e.g. role models of success and failure)
Personality traits
Values and motivations and mind-sets (e.g. sense of entitlement)
When you give people power they basically start acting like fools.
Dacher Keltner
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Last Friday night, I Twitted a photograph of myself that I intended to send as a direct message as part of a joke to a woman in Seattle. Once I realized I posted to Twitter I panicked, I took it down and said that I had been hacked. I then continued with that story which was a hugely regrettable mistake.
Anthony Weiner

The consequences of dark side leadership
Personal consequences:
At best: the “degrees of freedom” to perform and progress
At worst: risk of career derailment and any number of life disruptions
Organisational outcomes:
The possession of psychopathic traits has proved a useful passport to high office.
Norman Dixon
At worst:
the loss of talent that has the capability and character to achieve for the long run
counter-productive work behaviours and absent citizenship
a toxic impact on corporate culture with a knock on effect on productivity and innovation
distorted strategic decision making
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Why do organisations make bad strategic decisions?
They fail to manage two difficult tensions:
Pushing into the market vs. creating a viable organisational infrastructure
Grasping the opportunities of change vs. benefiting from the gains of consolidation
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Business Challenges: integrating strategy and capability
ARCHITECT: redefining the organisation infrastructure to create new operating methods and practices; exploiting technological capability to create new organisational structures, systems and operating styles TROUBLE-SHOOTER: identifying and removing unproductive and inefficient business function; tackling those business activities which are no longer contributing to corporate performance REGULATOR: focusing attention on the efficiency and consistency of all internal processes; applying financial discipline and administrative control over organisational activity to gain improved levels of efficiency INTEGRATOR: raising the overall skill level of the work-force through focusing resources on training, development, recognition and reward; raising levels of staff capability and motivation to improve organisational loyalty and pride
VISIONARY: planning next generation products and services to formulate an innovative business strategy; developing new business concepts which redefine the rules of business success EXPLORER: investigating opportunities to break into new markets in pursuit of a diversification strategy; developing relationships with other key players in the industry to explore scope for alliances and joint ventures BUILDER: translating business strategy into sales and marketing priorities; reviewing the customer service delivery process for areas of improvement; exploiting the organisation’s customer-base through attention to sales and marketing activity LOBBYIST: representing the organisation’s interests across the wider business community to improve corporate image; planning a programme of corporate communication which gains greater influence and freedom of manoeuvre for the organisation
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Business Challenges as leadership mind-set
Connecting strategic choices to organisational capability to leadership effectiveness
Assumption:
Strategic decision making is not just a rational exercise to identify the basis of competitive advantage.
But is shaped by the mind-sets of the decision makers and their:
Functional expertise and experience
Exposure to business success and failure
Motivational and personality traits
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Understanding and addressing the assumptions management is making about its industry and the business’s relative position in the industry is crucial….the sheer logic of strategic choice is not enough; it will not be convincing if it ignores management’s assumptions.
Michael Porter

Business Challenges and Hogan Development Survey
ARCHITECT TROUBLE-SHOOTER Less Imaginative More Sceptical and Diligent REGULATOR More Diligent, Reserved and Cautious Less Colourful and Imaginative INTEGRATOR Less Bold More Dutiful
VISIONARY
Less Mischievous and Sceptical
EXPLORER
More Colourful, Bold and Mischievous
Less Cautious and Diligent
BUILDER
More Imaginative
Less Cautious
LOBBYIST
More Colourful
Less Sceptical
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Implications
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Character
the values and attributes which provide leadership purpose and meaning for the longer-term
Career Management self management and political savvy to navigate through organisational realities
Credibility
background credentials and connections to build confidence as a potential leader
Capability
the functions, tasks and skills to be deployed to meet the problems of leadership and to be effective
External recruitment
Talent and succession planning
Somebody once said that in looking for people to hire, you look for integrity, intelligence, and energy. And if you don’t have the first, the other two will kill you. If you hire somebody without integrity, you really want them to be dumb and lazy. Warren Buffett

The challenge of self report
A dramatic increase in research and literature on faking: the “volitional attempt at increasing scores on personality assessment to obtain a desired outcome.”
Going from:
Can applicants fake?
Do they fake?
Does it matter?
To now ask:
Who fakes?
Why do some fake?
When do applicants fake?
Under which circumstances is it more or less a problem?
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Solutions to faking
Proactive
Use of warnings in instructions
Questionnaire design
subtle and non transparent item content
alternative formats such as forced choice
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Reactive
Social desirability response scales to detect faking
applying any number of tactics e.g. scale correction, applicant exclusion
Bogus items and over-claiming technique
Social Desirability Response scales…not a valid proxy measure for faking behaviour…. usage should be discontinued.
D L Paulhus

Faking and dark side leadership
Dark side leaders not only fake but can fake successfully to avoid “detection”
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Given the manipulative nature of psychopathy, it was predicted, and found, that respondents who successfully faked good would have significantly higher psychopathy scores than individuals who were caught faking.
Book et al, Psychopathic traits and experimentally induced deception in self-report assessment, 2006
Respondents successful at faking good scored higher than unsuccessful fakers on factors of Machiavellian egocentricity and blame externalization and lower on stress immunity..
MacNeil & Holden, 2006

Unobtrusive measures of dark side leadership
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It has long been an axiom of mine that the little things are infinitely the most important.
Sherlock Holmes
Company reports and press releases
Office décor and artefacts
The language used
Awards and success
Reactions to the small annoyances of life
The books read, recommended and written

Robert Horton, then boss of BP... the main thing to be displayed on the bookshelves were his own leather bound dairies stretching back 10 years or more. My conclusion about him: overbearing and out of touch. Within months, he was fired from BP for being overbearing and out of touch.
Lucy Kellaway
Snoopology in the office
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Fred Goodwin’s Brave heart sword

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The language used
I am soft, I'm lovable but what I really want to do is reach in, rip out their heart and eat it before they die.
Dick Fuld, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Lehman Brothers

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Reactions to the small stuff: the biscuit test
The best index to a person's character is how he treats people who can't do him any good, and how he treats people who can't fight back.
Abigail Van Buren

Talent management and succession planning
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Sociopaths, in their own best interests, knowingly promote over-performing losers into middle- management, groom under-performing losers into sociopaths, and leave the average bare- minimum-effort losers to fend for themselves.
Venkatesh Rao
The nine-box category system is crude and clumsy.
Adrian Furnham

Who conducts the assessment, using which methods?
top down, largely based on the personal judgement of the top team?
line management evaluations?
HR driven, drawing on additional data (e.g. assessment centres)?
bottom up in which individuals complete career profiles?
the process of data consolidation and integration to summarise talent intelligence
the choice of technology
How is talent data used in decision making and action planning?
processes for review, debrief and development planning
optimising the impact of talent reviews and career conversations
What frameworks are in place to inform the judgements and decisions we make about individuals?
the factors that are key to the organisational “model of success”
how the outputs of past success are integrated with the inputs of future success
Rigour in talent management and succession planning

Conclusions
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Dark side leadership seems to incorporate both potential vices and virtues
But knowing what makes the difference – the upside and downside – is proving more troublesome
Its prevalence is over-stated, but its impact can be devastating to businesses
Do the obvious to deal with emerging signs
If a business needs the virtues of the dark side, it should be prepared to manage it very well
Self report measures can be problematic; but we can look for other clues
Succession and talent management processes need more rigour to go beyond line management ratings of the “potential” of the good guys

Dark Side Leadership Drunks looking for keys under a lamp post?

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