There’s nothing more insidious than a toxic boss who undermines morale and motivation, takes credit for others’ work, or blames them for their own mistakes – and yet turns on the charm and plays nice with subordinates. This kind of behaviour could be particularly damaging, according to researchers at the Stevens Institute of Technology in the US.
The scientists found evidence of this after questioning over 650 American and European workers about what they called “Jekyll and Hyde” leadership. Leaders of this type are known for their highly ambivalent attitude: they are angry and mean one day, then sweet and kind the next, even going so far as to offer snacks to their colleagues to make up for the previous day’s blow-up.
This can ultimately be a confusing and damaging form of behaviour.
In a study published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, the researchers claim that “Jekyll and Hyde” leadership causes particularly serious harm. “If you’re constantly guessing which boss will turn up – the good cop or the bad cop – then you wind up emotionally exhausted, demoralised, and unable to work to your full potential,” explained lead author Haoying Xu.
This kind of unpredictable attitude has cascading repercussions throughout a company: a manager who is faced with the fickle behavior of their boss can lose the respect and trust of their teams. This generates a feeling of instability among staff, compromising cohesion and collective efficiency.
“In today’s workplaces, employees are very attuned to their supervisors’ relationships with more senior leaders. If that relationship becomes unpredictable, or is marked by repeated bouts of good and bad behaviour, it can cause real problems for the whole team,” Xu noted.
Organisations, therefore, have every interest in combating toxic management by promoting a leadership model based on kindness and respect. They must be attentive to the low-level signals that may come from employees, and take any reports seriously.
This approach is not always easy, given the taboo nature of the subject in the workplace, but it’s worth their while to take an interest. Toxic management can have serious consequences, similar to those of other forms of abusive behaviour at work: low morale and productivity, excessive staff turnover, even burnout.
“Organisations tend to intervene when bosses are consistently abusive, but are more tolerant of leaders whose abusive behaviour only shows through from time to time. With this study, however, we’ve shown that intermittent bad behaviour can actually be more toxic for organisations,” said Xu.
At a time when mental health in the workplace is becoming a priority, it seems crucial to reinvent the codes of leadership, and to stop underestimating the impact of leaders’ mood swings and unpredictability.