The Narcissistic Leader in Learning Organizations

Is there leadership in America following the stock market bust of 2000?

There’s a deafening quiet in the air. The glossy ghost-written how-to-manage books with bulleted lists extolling the virtues and insight of America’s genius CEO class, are nearly gone from the shelves of the airport bookstands. Is there no big boss with the courage to stand up and give leadership and direction in our time of need? The economy is sluggish and America looks to an absent chief to make sense of our layoffs and provide direction to the business world. Where are all those I-did-it-my-way books? The world economy is still moving along, not as vigorously as a few years ago but one has to suspect that there is no shortage of working top-level managers. Why aren’t they bragging to the world?

My thesis is pretty simple. You’ll have to read it to get a clear answer to the question, “Why aren’t our top leaders visible in today’s press?” What does the concept of a Learning Organization and narcissist leaders have to do with this? In my paper I intend to discuss the elements of a Learning Organization and narcissistic leaders and show how these two concepts interrelate. I hope to demonstrate how a correctly implemented Learning Organization can resolve the age-old dilemma of dealing with the narcissistic boss.

Narcissistic Leaders

Narcissus is a character from Greek mythology who died of thirst and hunger and unrequited self-love while staring admiringly into his reflection in pool of water. (Read the full story in the attached readings.) Narcissism is a term that has been used by Sigmund Freud to describe one of three major personality types (the other two being erotic and obsessive). Freud described the narcissistic type: “People of this type impress others as being personalities…. They are especially suited to act as a support for others, to take on the role of leaders, and to give a fresh stimulus to cultural development or damage the established state of affairs.”^1. Consider the great and inspiring leaders in many fields such as Napoleon, Gandhi, Tesla, Teddy Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Churchill, Patton, John Kennedy, Edison, Henry Ford, and Rockefeller. These men shaped our political and economic and technological culture and fit the narcissistic personality type. Consider too that there is a dark side to the narcissistic persona and is characterized by emotional isolation, dramatic emotional responses to minor threats, and feelings of grandiosity.

Michael Maccoby makes the distinction between productive and unproductive narcissists in his article in the Harvard Business Review.^1. Jack Welch, ex-CEO of General Electric and probably the most visible CEO of the past twenty years, is considered a productive narcissist. Jack ran GE from 1981 until 2001. He was perhaps the most successful CEO GE ever had--turning in record breaking profits over a record number of quarters, increasing the worth of the company by 20X. Jack was the inspirational leader who convinced his board and shareholders that his grand vision was valid. Jack laid off over 100,000 employees and was known as “Neutron Jack” (read the attached article) for his similarity to a neutron bomb which destroys people but not the facilities. These two features of Jack: 1. The ability to communicate a grand vision while attracting followers, and 2. An inability to empathize are a clear demonstration of the narcissistic leader. In Jack’s case the stockholders and board were demonstrably pleased as evidenced by his long reign and generous compensation package (Jack’s personal worth was over $900 million upon retirement, but read the interesting piece about his wife in the attached readings.)

Maccoby sums up the qualities of the narcissistic leader.

Strengths:

Great vision
Scores of followers

Weaknesses:

Sensitive to Criticism
Poor listeners
Lack of empathy
Distaste for mentoring
Intense desire to compete

The dark side of narcissism gets much darker than what Maccoby addresses in discussing the productive narcissist. Dr. Sam Vaknin writes extensively about the narcissistic personality in his book Malignant Self-Love, Narcissism Revisited.^2. Vaknin also has an excellent web site where he shares his observations of traits in narcissists:

amoral/conscienceless authoritarian care only about appearances

contemptuous critical of others cruel

disappointing gift-givers feel entitled don’t recognize own feelings

envious and competitive flirtatious grandiose

seductive hate to live alone hard to have a good time with

hyper-sensitive to criticism impulsive lack of sense of humor

naïve passive pessimistic

religious secretive self-contradictory

stingy strange work habits unusual eating habits

weird sense of time

It’s interesting to note that Vaknin regards himself as a narcissist. The traits he lists above are from high-functioning individuals with jobs, marriages, and family life as opposed to clinical observations. He claims to know these people well and for a number of years. Looking at the above set of characteristics, realize that we are all a bit narcissistic and Vaknin is describing a person that has most of these traits and he is describing a personality disorder. Attempts to make sense of a narcissist from the viewpoint of a normal personality may be difficult or confusing.

It’s a mistake to think that narcissists are in love with themselves, they are not. They are in love with the reflection of themselves. They need the reflection to be fed. Vaknin calls this need a need for narcissistic supply or NS. Like a drug or addiction, the NS becomes extremely important to the narcissist. This is where the sense of entitlement enters in. For example, if the narcissist sees his reflection as that of a great industrialist, he’ll need his NS to somehow feed the image that he is a great industrialist. The narcissist might have to purchase an expensive car or hire an unneeded secretary or buy an imposing-looking factory or discharge a subordinate to sate his NS appetite and add clarity to his reflection. Making sense of these actions can be very puzzling to a saner person.

The love of the reflection can serve as a substitute for lack of love of one’s self. The narcissist knows that he doesn’t amount to that much in actuality. However, the reflected image can be flawless. Here’s where the paranoia comes into play. If the narcissist gets the idea that someone isn’t buying into the reflected self-image, he can become paranoid that his real self will be exposed.

I won’t pretend to be a psychologist with a deep understanding of personality theory. Use of the narcissism concept in my paper is only to bring out how to make the most of a difficult boss who is brilliant and capable but is narcissistic.

Allow me to discuss another narcissistic leader. I would characterize him as unproductive but you are free to judge for yourself. L. Ron Hubbard was the founder of the religious group known as the Church of Scientology. He is perhaps the closest example to a textbook narcissist that I can come up with. Hubbard began his organization with virtually nothing in the early 50’s yet when he died in 1987, his Church had hundreds of millions of dollars in assets as well as thousands of followers. Hubbard’s personal fortune was estimated to be about $26 million dollars at his death but it’s fair to say that he had complete access to the Church’s assets and could purchase virtually anything he wanted. Hubbard demanded total obedience from his followers. The inner circle had to sign a billion year contract to work with him. He was constantly surrounded by a dozen young teenage girls wearing short shorts who would light his cigarettes and send verbal messages from him to anyone he wished mimicking his voice intonations (this was part of their training). He insisted that people call him “The Commodore” even when he didn’t own any boats. He demanded that his shirts be dunked in a succession of 15 buckets of clean water by hand. This would prevent any of the soap smell from persisting. He demanded that his followers shout, “Hip, Hip, Hooray” at any Church gathering in his honor whether he was present or not. If one of his staff was unable to complete an assignment correctly, they might be literally thrown overboard if they were at sea or assigned to cleanup detail for months or even years. Hubbard lived in paralyzing fear that FBI agents, CIA agents, Interpol, IRS agents and psychiatrists were constantly trying to seek him out and destroy him. He was convinced that all psychiatrists were out to destroy his organization because they were afraid that he would take over their place as experts in field of mental science. Only a few people saw him in the last ten years of his life. Apparently, he was given to fits of intense rage or even hysterical crying when things didn’t go his way. I bring the Hubbard example up because it amplifies a question. How do you make an organization work with his kind at the top? Hubbard was the guy that developed his religion, nurtured his growing organization and gave sufficient inspiration to a great many people.

It’s easy to say that you’d never work for a guy like Hubbard and maybe you wouldn’t, but thousands of people did and do every day. One can naively comment that Hubbard had a bunch of needy or deluded followers who were foolish. Perhaps. Consider that in the 70’s and 80’s, one of Boston’s leading criminal defense lawyers, Harvey Silverglade, worked for the Church of Scientology; and in 1979 one of the nations leading tort lawyers (King of the Torts), Melvin Belli, also defended the Church and Hubbard’s wife.^3. These guys don’t seem like deluded followers to me. My point is that most of us are subjected to odd leaders and we need to figure out how to work with them to make our organizations successful.

The Learning Organization

A Learning Organization focuses on bringing the underlying structures to light that are in fact, the true forces behind the behavior, actions and activities of a system. Senge speaks about building “’learning organizations’, organizations where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together.” ^4.

We have learned about a learning organization where there are five distinct disciplines, which if functioning well will make up a successful group. These disciplines are systems thinking, personal mastery, team learning, mental models, and building shared vision. Systems thinking is considered to be the most important and fifth discipline. The result of understanding an organization in this way gives visibility to the highest leverage points if one is to improve the organization.

The text for the course, Ten Steps to a Learning Organization, shows a number of methods for gaining a better understanding of the inner workings of the organization, its culture and it’s makeup. As one implements or experiences each of the 10 steps, a learning organization will result with improved profits and be positioned for strong growth because the firm’s members have a much deeper understanding of the mental models that are at work, a greater familiarity with the shared vision and an excellent appreciation for the underlying structures that make the organization function.

Mixing a Learning Organization and a Narcissistic Leader

A dynamic, narcissistic leader may negatively impact the implementation of these Learning Organization steps. For example, our Boy Scout leader is dynamic, extremely well organized and provides a wonderful program. However, he tends to keep some of the parents away from the campouts because he likes to be in complete control. I would call him a productive narcissistic leader. “you can’t move ahead on any of the Ten Steps until the corporate decision makers are ready and willing to face the truth about what all the employees are thinking.” ^5. Our Boy Scout leader is a retired Air Force colonel and has no interest in discussing what all the other Boy Scout parents are thinking and wouldn’t see a need for a 10 step program if it bit him. He’s been doing scouting for 15 years and simply isn’t in a frame of mind to listen to what all the other parents want. Do we give up? No. But we do have to rethink how we are going to work with him to get the best program for our boys. This is the point where you have to ask yourself if the texts we’ve been reading only have limited workability.

The Clinton Presidency, a Narcissistic Leader and a Learning Organization

Let me bring up another example of a narcissistic leader with President Bill Clinton. Bill is/was a productive narcissistic leader. He personifies the strengths that Maccoby listed above. Bill was obviously capable of providing a great vision. He promised to bring government into the next century and into the information age. I remember him playing the saxophone at the inauguration party with Hillary, Al and Tipper Gore in the background. I felt it was clear that he was the personification of youth and brains beating experience in a dramatic contrast to the fossilized recent administrations—Johnson / Nixon / Ford / Carter / Reagan / Bush. Clinton came from a lower class broken home in Arkansas, but went to Yale, was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, became Governor of Arkansas and then was elected President and maintained the highest average approval rating of any President, in spite of being impeached. Clinton was bright, gifted, a winner who overcame great odds. He was capable of delivering a convincing vision and he had people that were eager and willing to follow him.

But the narcissistic leader has that weaker side. In light of the Maccoby model, an obvious Clinton weakness is his inability to be mentored. His handling of the Lewinsky affair was his method and no one could coach him.^6. Clinton possessed an inability to empathize as shown while lying to his own staff about the Lewinsky affair. Most telling was his lying or not informing his wife about the Lewinsky affair and letting her speak on the “Today” show in defense of him. Letting Hillary look patently gullible is the most public instance of failing to empathize I have seen. Switching to Vaknin’s model, Clinton’s sense of entitlement shows clearest in having sex with Monica in the Oval Office and standing in front of the world and telling us that it’s somehow okay but a mistake because it’s a private matter and oral sex isn’t sex (“While my answers were legally accurate,…” see attached article). (as a side note, Hillary’s comment about a vast right-wing conspiracy makes me wonder about her sense of paranoia and by association, Bill, but that’s only speculation.)

Where does the Learning Organization fit in? Clinton’s mishandling of the Lewinsky affair validates a need for systems thinking in all our affairs (groan). Seriously, Bill and Hillary had been a team since law school. What the book, The Natural, The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton, ^6. points out is that this husband and wife team were a high performance functioning team. They argued policy and politics non-stop. Joe Klein mentioned walking in on them during a very heated discussion regarding voting one’s conscience versus voting to represent your constituency. They both appeared so angry and involved that Klein felt he should leave but they asked him to stick around during this high volume yelling, dig-in-your-heels level argument. Finally, Bill conceded some point, kissed Hillary profusely and thanked her for being so supportive and what would he do without her. I think this anecdote supports the notion that the Clintons aggressively pried at their mental models but could sort out the relative importance of their shared vision. Bill used many of Hillary’s ideas and leaned on her for support and guidance. It’s fair to say that Hillary was certainly Bill’s closest advisor in all things presidential but much more in that she was the foundation of the Learning Organization that they both participated in while running the country. But Hillary knew Bill well and in spite of the “Today” show defense, we know Hillary to be a bright and capable person who could to make the Clinton Presidency Learning Organization work. Bill Clinton didn’t start acting narcissistic in 1997. We can surmise that elements of his White House behavior had followed him for much of his life and Hillary knew how to keep the Clinton machine working, in spite of his shortcomings.

In 1997 Clinton was gaining momentum as a successful and popular President. Gingrich was losing support and life was looking good for the Democrats. In 1998 when the Lewinsky scandal broke and Hillary went on TV supporting Bill and mentioned that this was the result of a vast right-wing conspiracy, no doubt fulfilling her role as the supportive wife, sharing an insider’s look at her husband, she smiled when she said that she had discussed the issue at length with Bill. The Bill – Hillary Learning Organization was still functioning at this point. It appeared that Hillary was the strength behind the throne and the Clinton supporters had nothing to worry about. In spite of their very shaky start in the first term, the Clinton administration was showing strength. They had taken steps as a Learning Organization, by being brutally honest about what they needed to do and were doing it.

Months later, when evidence proving Lewinsky’s claim surfaced and Bill had to testify before the Senate committee, the Bill – Hillary team was done. After the proof became evident, Bill was expected to say something apologetic and admissive and humble to the American public. He spoke and made a brief apology to the American public emphasizing that the most damage had to do with his family. It is my opinion that the impeachment proceeding of the following months would have ceased had a sufficient apology been delivered at that time. Orrin Hatch even offered a deal to that effect. According to Joe Klein in The Natural, ^6. Hillary told Bill to “say whatever you want.” Here is where Hillary’s ability to tolerate the narcissistic leader’s entitlements was obviously done and Bill Clinton was impeached but not convicted and retained his office by 1 vote.

A true Learning Organization intervention would have turned up the obvious structure. Bill the Governor/President was really the result of his relationship with Hillary. Clinton was known for his encyclopedic knowledge of policy and who was doing what in what state or country or city. He could name all the programs and how much they cost and who was sponsoring them. He could and would convincingly argue both sides of numerous political arguments frequently changing sides. One of the White House rules was never to leave Clinton alone to negotiate a deal because he’d cave in so easily. It was Hillary that was the one who could steer Bill to feed his narcissistic source, whatever that was. The Bill-Hillary team was unstoppable as long as Hillary tolerated Bill’s sense of entitlement. After Bill’s philandering with Lewinsky (or his silence about it), Hillary withdrew support and guidance. Bill hung his head until the end of his term and the real structure behind the Clinton Presidency was destroyed. Bill’s NS was removed.

What Can We Do?

If a narcissistic leader is in charge and you want to take the Learning Organization method to the next level, one needs to acknowledge the value of the narcissist as a necessary piece of the system. According to Maccoby and Vatkin, it’s nearly impossible to change a narcissist’s behavior. Maccoby and Vatkin are both psychoanalysts and if they can’t repair them, it’s unfair to ask co-workers to resolve the narcissism. What can one do? You can feed the narcissistic supply in alternate ways or acknowledge that the entitlements will continue and work around them. Maccoby suggests getting a trusted sidekick epitomized by Don Quixote’s Sancho Panza. Many narcissistic leaders lean heavily on their wives (consider the past President’s wives, all these women were brilliant, integral and supportive). Maccoby further suggests “empathizing with the boss’s feelings and don’t expect any empathy back….”Give your boss ideas, but always let him take the credit for them.[‘Good idea Jetson, glad I thought of it’]….Hone your time-management skills….Make yourself available, or be prepared to get out.”. ^7.

In dealing with the narcissistic leader the individual has to ask himself whether it’s worth the trouble and the humiliation. I’m not asking anyone to degrade themselves or their character and certainly not their sense of self-worth. I am not advocating that the reader tolerate abusive behavior. I am asking that one take an honest appraisal of the benefits and costs of working with a narcissistic leader and if the benefits outweigh the costs, realize that there are ways to be a success in spite of the narcissistic leader.

Jack Welch used an authoritative style when he started his reign as CEO of GE. This was a cultural mandate. As Jack settled in, he became more emotionally intelligent which was appropriate when sharing his new vision to mobilize others. ^8. Jack also rebuilt the GE training center (at great expense) and insisted on frequent visits by GE employees to this training site. This program served Jack’s needs very well because it provided a way for him to share his vision with more and more people. Maccoby points out that, “The narcissistic CEO wants all his subordinates to think the way he does about the business.” ^7. This is an effective way for Jack Welch to receive his narcissistic supply. Jack writes and speaks about sharing his vision with as many GE people as possible. ^9. From a systems thinking viewpoint, Jack is making a structure that supplies his narcissistic supply or in other words, feeds his desired reflection. In 1995, Jack introduced his Six Sigma program which served to further indoctrinate other GE personnel. This Six Sigma program is now an industry standard method for process improvement in all areas of an organization. Part of the Six Sigma tool kit is process mapping which is a journeyman’s method for seeing what an organization actually does. Jack was smart enough to set up an organization that continued to support his glory while succeeding in its own right. Training and indoctrination provide the shared vision which continuously feeds an underlying structure that serves both to support the organization and Jack’s legacy.

Jack Welch didn’t invent effective organizations. Harold Geneen ran the corporate giant, IT&T from 1959 until 1977. Under his leadership, the firm exceeded the prior year’s quarterly earnings for 58 consecutive quarters and enjoyed remarkable growth. ^10. Geneen’s management meetings were legendary. They’d start at 10 AM and go until 10 PM and frequently past midnight Monday through Friday. These meetings would take place 35 weeks each year. The managers were expected to be prepared for inquisitorial grilling from Geneen whose memory for detail was uncanny. Geneen would leave work each night with 2 custom made large briefcases full of reports that would be read by the time he returned the following morning. Geneen was inspirational to many. I’m not sure how well he’d do in today’s climate, especially considering his latest book, The Synergy Myth, which criticizes much of the touchy-feeling, team-spirit, less authoritarian methods of today. But Geneen had a great following and certainly lacked empathy; joking about the guys who couldn’t handle the sleep and life deprivation he visited upon his executives. In light of the Learning Organization methods, his was innovative for the time. The rules of his meetings were fairly simple, no surprises and be prepared. The management team got to know each other very well and were free to ask anything of anybody and to keep asking until the facts were verified. I feel that this is a strong technique similar to dialoguing or brainstorming. This is where mental models are challenged and developed. Another interesting element of this structure was that the management group were determined to have every part succeed--even if they dragged the manager across the finish line. The goal was to succeed without apology. Geneen was a productive narcissist with enough brains to provide a support network for himself. Here again is where Learning Organizations need to take note. This guy must have been hell to work for, enjoying his entitlement of running long and daunting meetings and bribing people to be members of this club (his execs were the best paid by at least 10% over the competition). Yet the underlying structure which made IT&T such a success was these meetings and the decisions that came out of them. The manager’s meetings were a model for Learning Organizations. During of the seventeen years of Geneen, their management methods (or shared vision or mental models or personal mastery or systems thinking) were so profitable in running the international phone business they found that they could run many other businesses more successfully than anyone else, buying up over 350 businesses by the end of his tenure.

Summary:

At the beginning of the paper I asked why we hadn’t seen any glitzy, I-did-it-my-way type of CEO how-to books since the economy slowdown. I believe the reason for this absence is that the narcissistic supply for a CEO is surrounded by their devotion to achievement and success. The narcissists don’t want to show themselves as anything but profitable to the organization and profitable to Wall Street. Other personalities might be eager to share the difficulties of managing during a downturn. They might be eager to discuss struggling to convince a weakened staff that there really is a future with the company and the low stock prices are simply a temporary setback. The dynamic narcissists are quiet now because their reflections won’t be served by anything less than success.

As we embrace the techniques and ideology of the Learning Organization we need to acknowledge the contribution of productive narcissistic leaders and find ways to tolerate their need for entitlement while building supporting structures around them. Otherwise, the true strength of the Learning Organization will be diverted to select organizations without narcissistic leaders. In the book, Boss Talk, ^9. 21 different leaders speak about their styles and their organizations. At the end of each interview, there is a summary list of 4 or 5 key pieces of advice. I have to wonder how many people read those pieces of advice and did anything differently. A Learning Organization peels back the layers of fluff and PR and appearances and reveals reality, the underlying structures that make things run or not. It requires honesty and patience and work to see what the actual mental models are. It takes curiosity and interest to feel the rhythm of a working culture and know what elements can be changed and what systems are in place. Frequently, the people we are most curious about are the challenging personalities of the visionary elite who can guide us to a better world. It’s the responsibility of all of us to determine what our personal limits of tolerance are for difficult managers and not to compromise. With a deeper understanding of a narcissist’s motives and needs, we can choose to use the narcissist’s talents to our best advantage. We can adopt their shared vision, even if they don’t want to be mentored, demand entitlements and appear aloof. We can enjoy their large and inspired following, see their mental models clearly, and embrace their impact as part of our systems thinking.