The subordinates of petty leaders tend to withdraw physically to leave the unit or organisation or psychologically cease to care and become passive and less creative. The pettiness of leaders in such organisations contributes to an “institutional neurosis,” resulting in a lack of initiative, disinterest, and a general layback attitude.
Therefore, it is pertinent to note that petty leadership often undermines a subordinate’s self-esteem through several mechanisms: belittling a subordinate may chip away at their sense of competence and self-worth; discouraging initiative and forcing conflict resolution implicitly devalues a subordinate’s contributions, and withholding consideration devalues a subordinate’s worth as a unique individual with personal needs and concerns.
Indeed, some petty leaders systematically destroy their subordinates’ self-esteem to render them more compliant and less of a potential threat to the leader. Relatedly, petty leadership may affect subordinates’ task performance.
On the other hand, the increasing sense of helplessness and work alienation, and the decreasing sense of self-worth, may reduce subordinates’ intrinsic motivation and receptiveness
While close and punitive supervision may induce defensive conformity to the leader’s wishes, particularly on easily observed or verified tasks, such conformity would reflect the social influence process of compliance rather than identification with the leader or internalisation of the merit of the demands.
On the other hand, the increasing sense of helplessness and work alienation, and the decreasing sense of self-worth, may reduce subordinates’ intrinsic motivation and receptiveness to the leader’s instructions and expectations.
Some subordinates may choose to lower performance as an indirect means of reacting against petty management. Also, for complex tasks, particularly, the use of vindictive punishment and arbitrariness and the absence of positive reinforcement and constructive feedback may inhibit task learning.
It should also be noted that the association between petty leadership and subordinate self-esteem and performance may be partly attributable to differential selection and attrition.
– First, petty leaders may be more inclined to select compliant and non-threatening subordinates.
– Second, high-esteem and high performing subordinates may provoke more under petty management and have greater mobility than low-esteem or low performing subordinates. It has been reported that punitive supervision in a workplace causes the greatest frustration and resentment among workers with a high achievement orientation.
Next, it is difficult to achieve work unit cohesiveness under a petty leader. Consequently, pettiness undermines social solidarity. On the one hand, it can be argued that petty behaviour may drive subordinates together as a collective defence against the petty leader and provide a much-needed sense of social support.
Behavioural experts describe how a marketing organisation’s close and seemingly arbitrary and punitive supervisory practices helped draw the staff together to “shield one another.” However, the literature suggests that managers often utilise punitiveness and tight control deliberately as a wedge to keep subordinates apart.
For example, experts argue that petty political leaders intentionally sow distrust among subordinates to prevent coalitions from arising and increase subordinates’ dependence on the leader.
Additionally, following the notion of “displaced aggression,” subordinates may prefer to vent their frustration against one another rather than challenge the more powerful leader. However, pettiness may foster a hostile work unit climate which inhibits the emergence of cohesion. This suggests that petty behaviour is negatively associated with subordinates’ cohesion.
Further, as depicted in previous parts of this article, petty behaviour may trigger a vicious circle such that the effects prompt even greater petty behaviour.
First, elaborating on an earlier discussion, the exercise of power often induces a manager to: attribute subordinates’ successes to themselves rather than to the subordinates; develop an inflated sense of self-worth; prefer greater psychological distance from subordinates, and view subordinates as objects to be manipulated.
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Second, as analysis of the dynamics between powerful and powerless groups attests, the various effects of vindictiveness, helplessness, low commitment, and so forth may foster or strengthen a negative stereotype of subordinates (e.g., lazy, untrustworthy) which justifies further coercion.
Thus, experimental research indicates that leaders encountering low endorsement and high reactance are more likely to use coercion to secure compliance, and leaders experiencing declining subordinate performance are more likely to act in an autocratic and punitive manner.
To the extent these behaviours further reduce leader endorsement and incite reactance, the vicious circle becomes complete. Indeed, given the often-traumatic array of cognitive, affective, and behavioural adjustments caused by petty leaders, a subordinate’s disaffection with the manager may generalise to other managers and the entire organisation.
This notion of a vicious circle helps explain why a manager may persist with such a patently ineffective leadership style. Supported by defensive attributions and self-fulfilling attitudes and behaviours, they may be unable or unwilling to recognise the role that these attitudes and behaviours play in the genesis of the very behaviours they are presumably trying to prevent.
Further, petty behaviour may command at least short-term attentiveness and compliance, which may seduce a manager to discount the longer-term, more disruptive effects, especially if the labour market supply is abundant.
Once triggered, the initial individual predispositions and situational facilitators may no longer be necessary to sustain the vicious circle. Therefore, this process suggests what is called a “bully’s paradox”: the very means used to gain control undermines the viability of that control.
This analysis indicates that to the extent a manager’s overall effectiveness depends on their subordinates’ effectiveness, petty behaviours will be negatively associated with managerial effectiveness.
Please lookout for a continuation of this article.
