Destructive Leadership

Craig, S.B., & Kaiser, R.B. (2011). Destructive leadership. Chapter to appear in M. G. Rumsey (Ed.) The Oxford handbook of leadership. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

There is a growing recognition among leadership scholars that destructive behavior by leaders is at least as important to organizational outcomes as the positive or desirable behaviors that have been more commonly studied. This chapter offers a robust definition of destructive leadership as a superordinate category containing multiple narrower facets within it and integrates previous research within this over-arching framework. Emphasis is placed on the implications of destructive leader behavior for measurable organizational outcomes, with each facet of destructive leadership considered in terms of its relevance to organizational outcomes via leaders’ interpersonal influence and decision making. The chapter closes by identifying gaps in our understanding and suggesting new avenues for advancing the state of our knowledge.

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