The Phenomenon of Dark Leadership A Conceptual Evaluation

Abstract

The concept of leadership has become a concept that attracts more and more attention with each passing day. Leadership is one of the most researched subjects in organizational literature, management discipline and many other fields. It is recognized that leadership is crucial for key organizational issues such as performance, as well as many other individual, group, and organizational indicators. The concept of leadership always includes a mystical meaning. It is thought that leaders are very different people from other people and have different characteristics. Because of this, it is believed that they are more competent and impressive than other people. However, many studies have shown that leaders do not consist of only positive, ideal characteristics. They even have some dysfunctional dark sides. Because of these aspects, they sometimes experience difficulties in bringing themselves and their organizations to success. The phenomenon of dark leadership has been tried to be expressed with many concepts in the literature. However, in essence, dark leaders are leaders who are characterized by the pursuit of power, success, and control, and are able to deftly use tools of psychological manipulation and control over others. This study was conducted with the motivation to better understand this phenomenon.