When a boss is successful, employees are less likely to realise they are also abusive, study finds

Have you ever wondered why some bosses, despite their abusive behaviour, are revered and tolerated? Take Steve Jobs, for example. While his leadership pushed Apple to the top, there are countless examples of Jobs being a general jerk to the people around him. Many accounts note that the Apple visionary was often observed yelling and name-calling his employees when irked — behaviour certainly unworthy of any ‘Best Boss Ever!’ mugs.

But how do employees reconcile such behaviour? What makes them willing to stay under such crass leadership? A new study has answered these questions, revealing that a leader's success can significantly influence how employees interpret their actions — including abusive behaviour in some instances.

Tough love, and little else

The research surveyed 576 workers from various industries across the United States, reporting on their bosses' abusive behaviours, such as ridicule and dismissive comments, and rated their overall effectiveness. The findings showed that employees who viewed their bosses as high performers were more likely to label the abuse as "tough love" rather than outright abuse. Descriptions of tough love included phrases like “stern but caring,” “insensitive but nurturing,” and “rough but well-meaning.”

“If employees see their boss as a successful leader, that seems to be incompatible with being abusive,” explained study author Robert Lount. “So they label the abuse as something more positive, like ‘tough love”.
Interestingly, the study also found that employees who were subjected to abuse by high-performing bosses endured it out of hope for better career prospects. They thought enduring such treatment might lead to promotions, which made them less likely to rebel against their tormentors.

“If the leaders have high performance, that suggests they are successful at bringing out the skills of their followers,” notes author Bennett Tepper. However, this could not be further from the truth, considering how years of research have already shown that abusive behaviour is detrimental to both employees and organisations.

Students think similarly

These findings were further fortified in the second part of the study where 168 undergraduate students were misled into thinking they were working in teams led by MBA students. Some received abusive messages from their fictional “leaders,” while others got encouraging ones. After being told their teams either excelled or underperformed, the students evaluated their leaders. Those who received abusive messages rated their leaders as less abusive if their team performed well.
“Just finding out your team did better because of your leader’s judgement really dampened the willingness to label that person as abusive — even though your leader made the exact same statements as the other leaders who were called abusive after a below-average performance,” Lount remarked.

This might also explain how some abusive bosses manage to sustain longer careers. As per the authors, the high performers' track record may be “insulating” them from consequences because their employees refuse to view them as an abusive character.

This study is a wake-up call for organisations to scrutinise not just what leaders achieve, but how they achieve it. No matter how impressive the results, abusive behaviour should never be excused in the name of success.

The findings of this study have been published in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Process and can be accessed here.