This seminar paper examines how destructive leadership influences counterproductive work behaviour (CWB) while accounting for employees’ personality traits and gender. Destructive leadership is conceptualised as systematic, repeated leader behaviour that harms followers and undermines organisational goals. It is closely linked to Dark Triad traits – Machiavellianism, narcissism and psychopathy, and, in extended form, the Dark Tetrad – which are associated with self-promotion, manipulativeness, callousness and antisocial tendencies. These traits have been connected to reduced job satisfaction, burnout, turnover intentions and increased workplace deviance.
The paper first outlines the theoretical premises by defining destructive leadership, Dark Triad traits and CWB, differentiating between organisational and interpersonal deviance. It then integrates diversity aspects, focusing on personality and gender. Personality is discussed using the Five Factor Model and the HEXACO framework, highlighting especially honesty–humility, conscientiousness and agreeableness as key predictors of workplace deviance. Psychological Contract Theory is introduced to explain how transactional versus relational expectations shape behavioural responses to leadership and work environments.
Methodologically, the study is based on a systematic literature review using Scopus, combining search terms related to destructive leadership, Dark Triad, CWB, personality and gender. Inclusion criteria focused on peer-reviewed, English-language articles in business, management and psychology since 2018, with an emphasis on higher-ranked journals. The resulting sample covers both quantitative and qualitative studies, different countries and various employee groups.
The findings show that leaders high in Dark Triad traits are strongly associated with increased CWB and negative employee outcomes, with psychopathy showing the most detrimental pattern. At the same time, certain combinations of Machiavellianism and narcissism can be linked to high performance, underlining the ambivalent nature of dark traits. On the employee side, low honesty–humility, low conscientiousness and low agreeableness are robustly related to deviant behaviour. Gender differences are evident: men tend to score higher on Dark Triad traits and are more likely to prefer transactional psychological contracts, whereas women more often show communal traits and relational orientations.
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- Anonymous (Autor), 2024, Destructive Leadership and Counterproductive Work Behaviour, Múnich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/1675540
