An Empirical Study On The Antecedents Of Destructive Leadership

Leaders play an important role in the development of employees, organizations and society. For this reason, there are increasing interests of leadership studies in both academia and industry. After years of development, scholars not only pay attention to effective leadership, but also begin to look in to the negative side of leadership, the so-called destructive leadership. The studies of destructive leadership enrich the theory of leadership system. However, most studies focus on the definitions, concepts and outcomes of destructive leadership, and few studies have investigated the cause of destructive leadership.In order to understand how organizational context, and personality influence destructive leadership, we establish a theoretical model based on theoretical exploration, and applies empirical analysis to test the theoretical model. The following questions have been considered: whether organizational context and personality could predict destructive leadership; whether organizational mechanization and reference points could moderate the adverse effects of destructive leadership on political atmosphere; whether moral disengagement could buffer the interaction between personality and destructive leadership; whether political skills play a moderating role in the interaction between moral disengagement and destructive leadership. This paper could contribute to a more systematic and comprehensive understanding of destructive leadership, improve the theoretical system of destructive leadership, and help organizations to spot and reduce destructive leadership.This study was conducted by a survey of 170 leaders and 300 employees with convenience sampling method. Theoretical hypotheses were tested by reliability analysis, validity analysis, descriptive analysis, correlation analysis, regression, using SPSS15.0 and AMOS7.0. The following conclusions were reached in the study.(1) Organizational context can predict destructive leadership.(2) Organizational mechanization and locus of control moderate the interaction between perceptions of politics and destructive leadership(3) Personality(narcissism, neuroticism and machiavellianism) serves as a significant positive predication for destructive leadership.(4) Moral disengagement buffers the interaction between personality and destructive leadership, and political skills regulate the interaction between moral disengagement and destructive leadership.The nature of destructive leadership is hazardous. It is therefore vital that organizations spot and eliminate the roots of destructive leadership before it leads to further damage. In this regard, this thesis has provided suggestions and measures for preventing destructive leadership, focusing on organizational context and personality.