I was doing some research for a paper this weekend and came across an interesting article titled Responding Destructively in Leadership Situations: The Role of Personal Values and Problem Construction by Jody J. Illies and Roni Reiter-Palmon.
The concept of destructive leadership is one that has become very interesting to me. The idea is that a destructive leader is one who’s repeated behavior undermines organizational goals and/or the motivation, well-being and job satisfaction of their subordinates. Basically, they are looking at short-term personal goals over the long-term best interests of the organization.
Here’s the thing: Not all of their destructive behavior is overt, or even intentional. That is, it doesn’t necessarily have to be something as cut and dry as verbal abuse of a subordinate.
What really stuck out to me in this article the idea of problem construction:
The ambiguous situations in which organizational leaders work requires a high degree of interpretation. When encountering a problem in one of these situations, a leader must first define and construct the problem before directing and/or engaging in solution generation and implementation. Problem construction is a critical initial stage of ill-defined problem solving where the problem solver interprets and structures a problem and identifying the opportunities, objectives, and restrictions associated with solving it.
The article goes on to state that internal characteristics/values impact how individuals perceive a situation, and then how they behave – it effects how they construct the “problem” and the efforts they take to solve it. Leaders with “self-enhancement values” are more like to choose destructive solutions, while leaders with self-transcendence values are more likely to put the long-term interests of the organization first.
When I read this article, I couldn’t help by think of one of my former bosses. When I started building my reputation online, she perceived it as a problem…so much of a problem that it became all-consuming and impacted every part of my involvement in the organization. She actively tried to sabotage projects I was working on, verbally assaulted me in front of co-workers, and cut budget items purely out of spite. All of this because of things I was doing outside of the organization that had no impact on my job responsibilities. Ultimately, I ended up quitting because I just couldn’t take it anymore…and when I did, more than a few of my co-workers were annoyed. They had seen what was going on and wanted her to quit and me to stay, which I’ll admit made me feel more than a little bit vindicated! (By the way, they got their wish not long after I left…the day my former boss was laid off, I immediately got several emails from my former co-workers informing me of the news).
In this case, it was pure ego getting in the way, but I don’t necessarily think that it would have to be. I can certainly imagine a situation where a manager, because of generational differences or their own values, could perceive their subordinate’s online personal brand development to be an honest-to-goodness organizational problem. Since this concept is such a new idea, it certainly falls into the ambiguous category. From the stories that I’ve heard (and certainly, I’m not presenting this as verifiable evidence at all), when a situation like this occurs, all sorts of long-term perspective seems to fly out the window. Managers seem to lose cite of not only an employee’s past work, but also their potential long-term contribution to the organization, and instead focus on the most narrow perspective: getting the person to stop regardless of how it may impact their future with the organization.
Have you encountered a situation like this? Do you have a different experience? I’d love to hear your story.
By the way, one of the final points of the article is this:
If [leaders] consistently model behaviors that show honest concern for others and for the good of the organization in general, as those with self-transcendence values are likely to do, others in the organization will follow, creating an organization that promotes non-destructive behavior and a work environment were employees feel respected and valued.
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