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Being a Follower

When leadership goes wrong

Exploring the impact of poor or weak leadership

In Section 2, you considered different types of poor leadership. Here, you're going to look at the potential impact of that leadership.

Figure 3 Poor leadership can be shattering.
Figure 3 Poor leadership can be shattering.

Activity 3 Impact of poor leadership

Think of a time when you felt demotivated. Could your leader (manager, supervisor, team captain etc.) have done anything to change how you felt? What could they have done? What could you have done yourself to change the situation? Summarise your thoughts.

The impact of poor leadership can be felt in many ways across an organisation. In their meta-analysis of destructive leadership, Schyns and Schilling (2013) propose a framework made up of four concepts:

  1. Leader related
    • Followers show resistance towards a destructive leader e.g. ignoring requests
    • Followers lose trust in the leader
  2. Job related
    • Job satisfaction diminishes as the environment becomes less pleasant
    • Followers become less dedicated or motivated
  3. Organisation related
    • Commitment reduces as followers feel the organisation has failed to protect them
    • Productivity and turnover is affected
  4. Individual follower related
    • Followers experience stress and there is a negative impact on well-being
    • Followers reduce their efforts, leading to poor performance

You can see from this framework that the impact of negative leadership can have profound consequences for everyone involved.


Activity 4 Case study

Read this case study:

Lucy was a Head of Department in a school. She was an effective leader with a dedicated and successful team and a strong relationship with the Headteacher.

After a few years, the external context started to change. The school came under pressure to obtain better results and the increasingly stressed Headteacher started to change his approach. Instead of supporting and encouraging Lucy, he started to make unrealistic demands of her and her team.

As Lucy had a strong relationship with the Headteacher, she resisted his demands and repeatedly argued the case for a different approach. He disagreed and became increasingly autocratic, telling her what to do and how to do it, and criticising work that he had previously been happy with. She felt she had no choice but to follow his instructions.

When she communicated his demands to her team, Lucy met with resistance. She represented her boss's vision as enthusiastically as she could, despite her misgivings, but the team could see she lacked her usual conviction. They interpreted this as Lucy losing interest and not fighting their corner, and started to lose their respect for her. Eventually, many of them became demotivated and critical.

Lucy started to lose confidence. As a result, she communicated less with her team and became increasingly intimidated by her boss, which only increased his frustration. She felt she had lost the support of both the Headteacher and her team and she eventually left the school.

In the box below answer the following questions:

  1. Was the Headteacher a destructive leader?
  2. What could Lucy have done differently?
  3. How might Lucy have maintained the motivation of her team?
  4. Might members of the team have viewed Lucy as a destructive leader?

In Activity 4, you've started to consider ways you might mitigate the impact of poor leadership. You'll explore these ideas in more detail in the next section.