Tackling psychopathy: a necessary competency in leadership development?

Silva, Prasanna de

doi:10.1002/pnp.344

Cited by 8 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…Echoing the report from New Zealand, this details how lives were needlessly lost, through poor management, in a major hospital of the UK's National Health Service (NHS). Since then one retired senior doctor, with specific reference to the NHS, has suggested that managers should be taught how to deal with psychopaths in the workplace, to help prevent further ethical lapses (de Silva, 2014).…”

Section: The Effects Of Organisational Psychopaths On Organisationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Organisational psychopaths: a ten year update

Boddy

2015

Management Decision

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Purpose – This current paper reviews the theoretical speculations concerning psychopaths in the workplace that were originally presented in a paper published in this journal in 2006. The 2006 paper was called: “The Dark Side of Management Decisions: Organisational Psychopaths”. Design/methodology/approach – This is a review of the literature on workplace psychopaths since 2006. Findings – This current paper determines that while many of these prior speculations about workplace psychopaths have since been supported by evidence, several others remain unexplored. This finding suggests that several important avenues for further research remain in this important area. In particular, links between corporate psychopaths, bullying and lowered corporate social responsibility have been established. On the other hand, links between corporate psychopaths, career advancement, fraud, and corporate failure as exemplified in the 2007 global financial crisis, have been under-explored. Social implications – Corporate psychopaths are worthy of further research because of their impact on society, for example on corporate social responsibility and their willingness to dump toxic waste material illegally. Originality/value – The paper provides an extensive review of research into corporate psychopaths to date and highlights areas where further investigation would be potentially rewarding.

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Section: The Effects Of Organisational Psychopaths On Organisationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Organisational psychopaths: a ten year update

Boddy

2015

Management Decision

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“…Unfortunately, as we outline in this section of our study, once a workplace monster has been hired, the first an organisation is likely to know of their presence is after the negative consequences of their conduct manifest. Despite being recommended (de Silva, ), few organisations undertake pre‐employment screening for dark triad traits such as psychopathy. Thus, no lead indicators or early warning signs exist, leaving organisations to rely on detecting monster presence via various lag indicators, if at all.…”

Section: Signs Of Monsterly Presence and Activitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Interestingly, in Wearne v State of Victoria [2017] VSC 25 (refer Table ), the Judge criticised what they referred to as the noticeable inaction by the HR function, explicitly referring to its failure to intervene in a known escalating conflict, and further declaring the absence of a formal complaint or grievance was not a reliable defence in the context. Additionally, as mentioned earlier, barely any organisations undertake any proactive measures such as pre‐employment screening for workplace monster personalities, despite it being recommended (de Silva, ).…”

Section: Ways Forwardmentioning

confidence: 99%

Working with monsters: counting the costs of workplace psychopaths and other toxic employees

Michalak¹,

Ashkanasy

2018

Accounting & Finance

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We explore the role of 'Workplace Monsters' in the global burden of disease, including the $US1.15 trillion annual cost of depressive and anxiety disorders. We propose the productivity drain created by these individuals is a wicked problem, integrating several disciplines to position workplace monsters as significant corporate governance issues for organisations. Our discussion covers Monster prevalence, impacts on fellow workers and estimates of the costs incurred to business. We classify Monsters as 'appreciating liabilities' and call for future research to develop means of accounting for their inherent organisational costs in an effort to prompt action to address their destructive impacts.

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“…In line with this viewpoint, in commenting on the NHS a retired medical consultant has recently written that psychopaths within the service need to be managed or screened for in order to minimise the damage they do, especially in relation to bullying. de Silva observes that psychopathy and bullying are correlated and that psychopaths therefore need to be screened for and/or managed in the NHS to minimise their destructiveness (de Silva, 2014). de Silva suggests that the culture of endemic bullying described in the 2013 Francis Report on the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust may exist across the whole NHS and is a barrier to the delivery of good quality care to patients.…”

Section: Possibly Systemic Psychopathy In the Nhsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Psychopathy screening for public leadership

Boddy

2016

IJPL

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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to re-open a debate as to whether candidates for public leadership should be screened for psychopathy. Design/methodology/approach This is a conceptual paper which examines the diffuse literature concerning psychopaths in public leadership positions. Findings Psychopathy researchers have been divided as to whether psychopathic individuals should be screened out of leadership positions in public and corporate life. Recent evidence from bullying research and historical research into psychopaths in politics sheds new light on this issue. Practical implications There is increasing evidence that psychopaths are detrimental to the organisations they work for, to other employees, to the environment and to society. Screening for psychopathy should therefore be considered. This may help to prevent governments entering into illegal wars and committing crimes against humanity. Screening in the corporate sector may also help prevent the worst excesses of greed and fraud that were evident in collapses like Enron and the Mirror Group as well as in the events leading up to the global financial crisis of 2008. Originality/value The paper makes a contribution to the literature on public leadership by bringing together the diverse reports on the effects of psychopaths in public organisations like the National Health Service, publicly listed corporations, academia and politics. The paper uses historical and corporate examples to illustrate the initially favourable impression that psychopathic leaders can make but the ultimately disastrous outcomes they engender.

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Tackling psychopathy: a necessary competency in leadership development?

Abstract: In the second of his two reflections on the Francis Report, Dr de Silva discusses the culture of workplace bullying and the role of a leader in addressing associated psychopathy in the National Health Service.

Cited by 8 publications

References 3 publications

Organisational psychopaths: a ten year update

Organisational psychopaths: a ten year update

Working with monsters: counting the costs of workplace psychopaths and other toxic employees

Psychopathy screening for public leadership

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