Exploring Subordinates' Perceptions and Experiences with Abusive Leaders in Higher Education: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

Tepper (2000) stated that abusive leaders and supervisors often utilize a variety of hostile verbal and nonverbal behaviors toward their followers and subordinates. Coldwell (2021) identified abusive supervision; authoritarian leadership; narcissism; self-promotion; and unpredictable behavior as five dimensions of a toxic leader. Lipman-Blumen (2005) stated that toxic leaders instill fear, make bad decisions, and assault their followers. Neves and Schyns (2018) posited that top executive leadership teams have failed to hold middle managers accountable for the strategic focus of organizations and the creation of healthy organizational cultures and working environment for their followers. Clifton and Harter (2019) concluded that the failure of organizations to engage their employees is due to ineffective managers and supervisors who are poorly trained and who do not understand the meaning and roles of leaders. Caldwell and Okpala (2022) emphasized that the ability to care, or to lead with passion, has been identified as a leadership quality in today's environment and has been cited as an essential condition for successful organizations.

Most research on abusive, hard, toxic, petty, and destructive leadership focused on the definition and constructs (Aryee et al., 2007; Ashforth, 1994, 1997; Coldwell, 2021; Conger, 1990; Dearlove, 2003; Frost, 2004; Henley, 2003; Lipman-Blumen, 2005; Tepper, 2007). There is no research that focused on exploring the experiences of higher education professionals with abusive leaders. The current research was intended to bridge the research gap by exploring higher education professionals' perceptions and experiences of abusive leaders as well as identifying strategies used to navigate the workplace environment.

The study was grounded in toxic leadership which has been of interest in recent years for many organizations (Burns, 2017; Dyck, 2001; Krasikova et al., 2013; Lipman-Blumen, 2005; Milosevic et al., 2019; Padilla et al., 2007; Pelletier, 2012). Flynn (1999) stated that a toxic leader is one who bullies, threatens, abuses, yells, and belittles followers with poor interpersonal skills. It is a toxic leader who has the goal of promoting themself and bringing others down. Dyck (2001) emphasized that toxic leadership can be costly to organizations in terms of poor employee health, poor performance, high turnover rate, and legal dilemma. Milosevic et al. (2019) defined toxic leaders as those who seek to maintain their leadership position through toxic influential approaches while shielding their own lack of leadership competence. Abusive supervision is closely aligned to toxic leadership as it includes abusive use of nonverbal and verbal intentional destructive behaviors (Tepper, 2007). Tepper concluded that abusive supervisors lead to higher turnover rates, poor attitudes toward work, decreased job satisfaction, and poor interaction with others in a business organization.

Six themes emerged from the study, which include leadership incompetence, self-centered, micromanagement, intimidation, forming an alliance, and being authentic (see Table 2).

When asked to describe their experiences with their abusive supervisor, the majority of the codes were leadership incompetence. The participants indicated that the leader was using destructive actions such as blaming them for errors and faults to cover her own level of leadership incompetence. As one participant, Nessy eloquently stated:

The purpose of the study was to explore the perceptions and experiences of five higher education professionals with abusive supervisors and to identify strategies used to navigate the abusive environment. The participants overwhelmingly described how they experienced a leader that was incompetent, self-centered, micromanaged, and intimidated them. They formed an alliance and utilized their authentic voice to advocate for their colleagues and self in an abusive environment. Some findings from the study align with previous research studies (Burns, 2017; Milosevic et al., 2019; Tepper, 2000).

In conclusion, the current study has profound implications for organizational leadership, practice, and policy. Senior organizational leaders must focus their attention on employees' complaints about abusive and toxic leaders and take those complaints very seriously. The participants stated that it took almost 2 years for senior administrators to act and remove their abusive supervisor. This particular leader had the qualities of a toxic leader rather than an abusive leader based on the themes that emerged from the study and literature (Krasikove et al., 2013; Milosevic et al., 2019; Padilla et al., 2007; Tepper, 2007). Good and efficient leaders that lead with passion do matter in higher education because it is apparent that abusive leaders described by the participants in the study had no passion nor empathy. I challenge leaders to reassess their styles, behaviors, characteristics, as well as their levels of engagement and interactions within their followers and make a thoughtful decision to lead with passion.