Have You Been Skunked?

14

HAVE YOU BEEN SKUNKED?

Have you Been Skunked?

Further Exploration of the Dysfunctional Leadership Phenomenon

Kevin Rose, Ed.D.

Assistant Professor

University of Louisville

Brad Shuck, Ed.D.

Assistant Professor

University of Louisville

Matt Bergman, PhD.

Assistant Professor

University of Louisville

College of Education and Human Development

1905 S. 1st Street

Louisville, KY 40292

A Working Paper Submitted for Presentation at the 16th International Conference on Human Resource Development Research and Practice

Leadership, Management, and Talent Development Stream

Abstract

Dysfunctional leadership is a phenomenon of great concern for individuals and organizations because of the impact leaders can have on performance, productivity, and organizational outcomes. Thus, organizations should be concerned with identifying and appropriately dealing with those leaders that exhibit dysfunctional behaviors towards their subordinates. The purpose of this study is to operationalize the construct of dysfunctional leadership and to understand the negative outcomes for employees working for a dysfunctional leader.. This study builds upon and expands previous conceptual work we undertook in the area of dysfunctional leadership and we seek to provide an enhanced empirical understanding of the domain of dysfunctional leadership.

Keywords: leadership, dysfunction, job stress, engagement

Thousands of employees in the US endure dysfunctional leadership in their current workplace and many more have, at one time or another, felt the oppressive and burdensome psychological stresses of working for one of these individuals (Keashly & Neuman, 2005). Indeed, even employees’ families can feel the damaging effects of a dysfunctional leader at work (Hoobler & Brass, 2006). Given the documented negative effects dysfunctional leaders can have on employees and organizations, it is surprising that these behaviors are still reported so widely. Our initial work on leadership dysfunction (Rose, Shuck, Twyford, & Bergman, 2015) described a scenario in which negative leader behaviors contributed to negative outcomes for employees. Unlike some other forms of negative leader behaviors, we posit that dysfunctional leadership is more ordinary and mundane, rather than overtly apparent in its manifestation.

Over time, these simple aggressive acts can have major impacts on employees (Rafferty, Restubog, & Jimmieson, 2010). Thus, it becomes important to not only measure dysfunctional leadershp, but to also understand more fully the consequences of a dysfunctional leader for employees. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to empirically operationalize the construct of dysfunctional leadership and to understand the negative outcomes for employees working for a dysfunctional leader. In our previous work, we metaphorically desecribed these dysfunctional leaders as “skunks” and those who suffer the consequences of dysfunctional leaders as being “skunked.” Drawing from previous research we now hope to provide empirical evidence that describes an employee’s state when working with a dysfunctional leader. In the following sections we will explain our conceptualization of dysfunctional leadership, discuss the consequences for employees (what it means to be skunked), describe our intended methodological approach, and explore connects to HRD theory and practice.

Defining Dysfunctional Leadership

Several conceptualizations of bad leadership exist in the extant management and HR literature. For example, Anderson and Pearson (1999) described the phenomenon of workplace incivility as consisting of “deviant behavior with ambiguous intent to harm [a] target” (p. 457). This kind of behavior may occur between many combinations of workplace arrangements (e.g. coworker to coworker, leader to subordinate, subordinate to leader), regardless of the power differential that exists. Uncivil behaviors like rudeness, taking unduly long breaks, or badmouthing others are startlingly common in the workplace (Reio & Ghosh, 2009). Similar to workplace incivility, the concept of workplace bullying has gained important scholarly attention. These kinds of behaviors are distinguishable from workplace incivility in that bullying occupies a space of greater negativity and intensity than incivility (Bartlett & Bartlett, 2011). Like incivility, the individuals involved in bullying can vary in their positional influence.

Although these kinds of counterproductive behaviors (Fox, Spector, & Miles, 2001) are detrimental to all working relationships, it becomes particularly insidious when leaders manifest them towards their subordinates. Boddy (2006) described the concept of organizational psychopaths as individuals who exhibit psychopathic behaviors in their workplaces and noted that these individuals are indeed rare, making up only a very small percentage of leaders. These kinds of individuals have been described as lacking a conscience and “not driven by any notion of social responsibility or commitment to employees” (Boddy, Ladyshewsky, & Galvin, 2010, p. 3). Organizations unwittingly allow corporate psychopaths into their ranks because negative behaviors are often masked or outweighed by other characteristics. Perhaps less egregious is the leader described as abusive. Tepper (2000) described abusive supervision as “the sustained display of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors, excluding physical contact” (p. 178).

We define dysfunctional leadership using many of the same characteristics as incivility and abusive supervisions, but offer a definition that encompasses the power differential extant in a leader-subordinate dyad and includes behaviors that are, prima facie, not necessarily heinous and unforgiveable. We also acknowledge the issue of subordinate perception as noted previously by Schyns and Schilling (2013), Tepper (2000), and others that makes defining this construct difficult. That is to say, some may perceive certain actions as dysfunctional while others do not. Taking these issues into account, we defined a dysfunctional leader as someone “in a position of influence, status, and resource differential overtly exhibiting verbal and nonverbal behavior that impairs operational function of individuals, teams, and organizations” (Rose, et al., 2015, p. 67). The kinds of behaviors we see included in this definition are leaders who unnecessarily question a subordinate’s actions, focus on weaknesses rather than strengths, obscure or withhold important information, cause employees to doubt their self-efficacy, and, in general, contribute to frustration, fear, and disengagement.

Consequences for Employees

No one likes working for a bad boss. To cope with situations in which a dysfunctional leader is present, individuals resort to several tactics. Unfortunately, many of these tactics are counterproductive to both the work environment and family/social environments outside of work and could lead to unhealthy lifestyle choices (i.e., over eating, drinking heavily, etc.). Employees coping with a dysfunctional leader may experience negative affective states such as lower self-esteem (Burton & Hoobler, 2006; Hornstein, 1996), psychological distress (Demir & Rodwell; 2012, Tepper, 2000), and emotional exhaustion (Aryee, Sun, Chen, & Debrah, 2008). These negative states engender symptoms such as psychological withdrawal and disengagement as well as decreased motivation and higher intention to leave the organization (Boddy, Ladyshewsky, & Galvin, 2010; Tepper, 2000). Research has suggested that these various mental and psychological states can manifest into behaviors like avoidance and aggression as well as withdrawal of positive behaviors (OCB) (Boddy, Ladyshewsky, & Galvin, 2010; Raferty & Restubog, 2010).

Consequences for Organizations

In the aggregate, employee reactions to dysfunctional leaders can be exceptionally detrimental to organizations. Clearly, for some employees, leaving the organization and taking their experience and institutional knowledge with them is an option exercised when faced with a dysfunctional leader (Tepper, 2000). For those that decide to stay in the organization, their chosen coping techniques and the subsequent impact on the organization are perhaps more subtle, but equally as damaging. For instance, in-role work effort is diminished thereby reducing overall productivity and profitability. Additionally, discretionary effort is reduced, interfering with the “social machinery of organizations” (Smith, Organ, & Near, 1983, p. 654). Employees may also find the organization to blame for a leader that is not properly dealt with (Shoss, Eisenberger, Restubog, Zagenczyk, 2013). In the aggregate and over time, the effects of dysfunctional leadership can be deleterious to organizations.

Method

To examine dysfunctional leadership as a distinct construct, we propose developing a battery of scales grounded in definitions offered from the literature.We note that while conceptually similar to abusive supervision (Tepper, 2000), bullying(Bartlett & Bartlett, 2011), and workplace incivility (Reio & Ghosh, 2009), we maintain that dysfunctional leadership is distinct from like constructs due to the power differential that exists between the leader and the subordinate as well as the severity of the perceived behavior. Unlike a corporate psychopath or an abusive supervisor, a dysfunctional leader may not be as obvious in his or her negative tendencies – and they may be blissfully unaware of their own dysfunction.

We propose using an online survey battery of items taken from the Negative Acts Questionnaire-Revised (NAQ-R; Einarsen, Hoel & Notelaers, 2009) to measure dysfunctional leadership. Although developed to measure workplace bullying, many items on this instrument are salient to dysfunctional leadership. For example, items such as “had information withheld that affected your performance” and “been ignored, excluded, or isolated from others” seem to fit our definition of and taxonomy of dysfunctional leadership well (Rose et al., 2015). Even items such as “been shouted at or targeted with spontaneous anger (or rage)” are seemingly connected with definitions of bullying; such behavior aligns with the upper quadrant of the dysfunctional leader behavior taxonomy proposed by Rose et al. (2015) from which we drew our inspiration.

To address the second part of this study’s purpose, we have identified outcome variables that we have theoretically and conceptually positioned as describing an individual’s state of being “skunked.” For the purpose of this study, we focus on variables that describe psychological, cognitive, and affective states rather than behavioral outcomes such as absenteeism, turnover, and counterproductive workplace behavior. Outcome variables to be included in the study are self-esteem (Rosenberg, 1965), engagement (Rich, LePine, & Crawford, 2010), burnout (Iverson, Olekalns, & Erwin, 1998), and job stress (Jamal & Baba, 1992).

Given the sensitive nature of the topic, our implementation protocol is to deploy the survey via social media (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Vine) to recruit participation.While this method of participant recruitment does introduce limitations to the study, it also facilitates the gathering of data from a wide variety of participants and bypasses potentially limiting roadblocks in organizations such as social desirability (see Kolb & Owen, 2014).We seek only participation from employed (full time or part time) adults.

Structuralequationmodeling, path analysis, and exploratory factor analysis (Gerbing & Anderson, 1988) will be used to determine loadings of items measuring abusive supervisions, bullying, workplace incivility, and our proposed scale of dysfunctional leadership.Theseprocedures will help us understand those distinctive factors that may be related to construct of dysfunctional leadership. We note, however, that there are certain limitations to this study. First, though we argue in previous literature that dysfunctional leadership is a distinct construct from other negative leadership behaviors identified, we are aware that empirical investigation may not support this idea. Second, the method by which data will be collected (social media) may provide access to wider audience, but may provide a very heterogeneous sample. Further, when conducting a survey via social media, we cannot necessarily guarantee that participants meet our sample requirements (employed adults), but will attempt to guide unqualified individuals out of the survey.

Implications for HRD Theory and Practice

The study and understanding of leadership practices is a paramount concern for HRD practitioners and scholars alike. Leaders in organizations have responsibility for both individual as well as team performance and they achieve performance through a variety of behaviors. When those behaviors are positive such as those embodied in transformational leadership (Bass, 1991), situational leadership (Hersey, Blanchard & Johnson, 2012), servant leadership (Greenleaf, 2002), authentic leadership (Avolio & Gardner, 2005), and others, the affects on employees is similarly positive. In turn, the organization benefits through various means. However, poor leadership behaviors have a congruent affect in that employees and organizations are impacted negatively. Thus, with a focus on organizational performance and human development and well-being (Swanson & Holton, 2009), HRD practitioners are well-suited to influence and develop the leadership capacities of individuals in organizations. In short, HRD practitioners seek to develop positive leadership behaviors and mitigate negative ones. Understanding the commonplace issue of dysfunctional leadership can provide practitioners with yet another lens through which to examine individual behavior in organizations.

As noted previously, dysfunctional leadership has nomological overlap with other constructs such as incivility, bullying, corporate psychopathy, abusive supervision, and other similar negative sets of behaviors. Our conceptualization of dysfunction both adds to the theoretical understanding of these leadership behaviors as well as seeks to further understand the cognitive and affective states of employees suffering under such a leader. These states may be further linked to behaviors such as absenteeism, counterproductive work behaviors, or turnover, although we draw short of hypothesizing such a linkage. Adding to the theoretical understanding of the conceptual notion of a dysfunctional leader in addition to the consequences thereof further extends empirical research around leadership behavior and may provide new avenues for practitioners to influence and intervene to protect both individuals and organizations.

References

Andersson, L. M., & Pearson, C. M. (1999). Tit for tat? The spiraling effect of incivility in the workplace. Academy of Management Review, 24, 452–471.

Aryee, S., Sun, L. Y., Chen, Z. X. G., & Debrah, Y. A. (2008). Abusive supervision and contextual performance: The mediating role of emotional exhaustion and the moderating role of work unit structure. Management and Organization Review, 4(3), 393-411.

Avolio, B. J. & Gardner, W. L. (2005). Authentic leadership development: Getting to the root of positive forms of leadership. The Leadership Quarterly, 16(3), 315-338. doi:10.1016/j.leaqua.2005.03.001

Bartlett, J. E., & Bartlett, M. E. (2011). Workplace bullying: An integrative literature review. Advances in Developing Human Resources, 13(1), 69-84. doi:10.1177/1523422311410651

Bass, B. M. (1991). From transactional to transformational leadership: Learning to share the vision. Organizational Dynamics, 18(3), 19-31.

Boddy, C. R. (2006). The dark side of management decisions: Organisational psychopaths. Management Decision, 44(10), 1461-1475.

Boddy, C. R., Ladyshewsky, R. K., & Galvin, P. (2010). The influence of corporate psychopaths on corporate social responsibility and organizational commitment to employees. Journal of Business Ethics, 97(1), 1-19.

Burton, J. P., & Hoobler, J. M. (2006). Subordinate self-esteem and abusive supervision. Journal of Managerial Issues, 340-355.