When an employee is single-focused, demeaning at times, and generally not pleasant to be around, from a business standpoint, that person would likely be on the shortlist to termination.  Yet, many times they are not, especially when they are successful.  The greater the success, the more they are tolerated.

History shows that the philosophy to a successful approach is unclear.  Machiavelli (“It is far better to be feared than loved”), Dale Carnegie (“Begin with praise and honest appreciation”), and Leo Durocher (“Nice guys finish last”) all bring up various points of view.   Yet in the end it is the vision and dedication to that vision that generates success, which likely means being a jerk. 

Hard charging bosses such as Steve Jobs and Jeff Bezos are not known for their likeability.  They have vision and that vision came first.  All other relationships were sidelined by that vision.  Bill Gates is another whose vision came first.   

For business, disrupters are hitting the various competitive edges constantly.  Today it is artificial intelligence that is taking central stage, arguably increasing both efficiency and productivity by taking the less valued tasks and assigning it to machine learning.  Therefore, being tough and single-minded is important to keep the organization in laser focus on building value for customers; otherwise it is bankruptcy and loss of jobs.

But does that mean that kindness is a weakness?  A study at the University of Amsterdam found that obnoxious behavior can lead to success.  Not only does the behavior make the person seem powerful, it makes them more powerful.   And the same works with confidence.  When someone acts like they’re the smartest person in the room, it makes them more likely to end up running the show.  “We believe we want people who are modest, authentic, and all the things we rate positively” to be our leaders, says Jeffrey Pfeffer, a business professor at Stanford. “But we find it’s all the things we rate negatively—like immodesty—that are the best predictors of higher salaries or getting chosen for a leadership position.”

A subset question arose.  Being obnoxious does not equate to narcissism, but it can.  The question is whether narcissism is a trait of successful leaders.  Donald Hambrick of Penn State in a 2007 study with Arijit Chatterjee came up with a narcissism indicator.  The researchers used indirect measures from:

• The prominence of each CEO’s picture in the company’s annual report

• The size of the CEO’s paycheck compared with that of the next-highest-paid person in the company

• The frequency with which the CEO’s name appeared in company press releases

• The CEO’s use of pronouns in press interviews, comparing the frequency of the first-person plural with that of the first-person singular

Although Hambrick's hypothesis was that these types of leaders would create organizational failure, he found that narcissistic leaders can be very successful.  What the study found is that narcissistic CEOs tend to be gamblers. These types of leaders tend to take on risk and create the opportunities for innovation to achieve success.  Going back to the Dutch study, it found that rule breakers are more likely to be promoted to positions of power.  Gerben van Kleef, the study’s lead author, found that breaking rules could help people ascend to power in the first place.  Yet being a jerk can only go so far as General George Patton found out in World War 2. 

Therefore, HR walks a fine line at times trying to help managers control the obnoxious employee.  That employee, however, may at some point be HR’s boss.

Source: The Atlantic June 2015