Blog 3 : Unethical Leadership

 Unethical Leadership

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“Unethical leadership is conceptualized as leader behaviors and decisions that are not only anti-moral but most often illegal and exhibit an outrageous intent to instigate unethical behaviors among followers ”(Brown & Mitchell, 2010)

Due to The vast majority of those being unethical were managers, therefore not only leaders themselves who engaging in unethical behaviors but also enabling and harnessing unethical follower behaviors. Leader behavior that installs unethical conduct in followers can enable and harness unethical follower behaviors.

Furthermore, unethical leadership has also been found to negatively influence important work attitudes, e.g. lower job satisfaction. Thus, unethical leadership is considered detrimental to employees’ personal growth  satisfaction and intentions to stay (Ruiz-Palomino et al., 2021)

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Examples Of Unethical Leadership

1.The Exploitation Of Employees

Leaders  use their power and see opportunity to gain the benefits by treating their employee unfairly in order to make money or get an advantage using someone else's work. Exploitation can happen to those that are in a vulnerable position where they are in financial need, do not have an education, or have been lied to.

2. Discrimination

Leaders who engage in discriminatory practices based on race,        gender, sexual orientation, or religion. This can include biased hiring, promotion, and firing practices.

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3. Corruption

Corruption  is a form of dishonesty or a criminal offense   which is undertaken by a person or an organization which is entrusted in a position of authority, in order to acquire illicit benefits or abuse power for one's personal gain. Corruption may involve many activities which include bribery , influence peddling and embezzlement   and it may also involve practices which are legal in many countries.

4. Lack Of Transparency

Transparency means that decisions and actions are made with clarity and visibility, and employees are aware of the reasons behind them. It also involves sharing both positive and negative developments,  maintaining honesty, and ensuring that employees can trust the information they receive. But the leader who lacks of transparency, will withhold information from employees or stakeholders, or who deliberately misrepresent facts. Lacking transparency is major ethical problem in management  and leadership in complex organizations. It often leads to large consequences - not only for the employee but also for the management.

5. Toxic Culture

Leaders who foster a culture of fear, intimidation, or harassment in the workplace, lead to a high turnover rate, low morale, and poor performance.

6. Poor Decision-Making

Leaders who make decisions that are not in the best interest of the organization or its stakeholders, leading to negative outcomes such as financial loss, reputation damage, or harm to the environment or society.

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7. Micromanagement

Micromanagement is managing a team extremely closely, engaging in excessive monitoring of staff, and attempting to control processes and workflow without allowing autonomy or a say in decisions.

Micromanagement usually comes with good intentions, but monitoring employees so closely can damage motivation, workflow, and productivity. It can also cause additional stress for the manager who feels unable to delegate tasks in an effort to maintain a high level of control. 

Leaders who micromanage employees, fail to delegate tasks or provide autonomy, leading to burnout and reduced productivity.

Conclusion 

Top managers are not only leaders but also compass and example of the that work place. Managers are rulers who have power to control the  company brand value and policies which impact employee's characters and values. If the Top Manager conducts bad behaviors, the good employees will lose respect and trust and devalue the company but only the unethical employees will lookover and think it is not their jobs to voice what's right since they might be scared or do not want to be in troubles. Eventually staff will consider leaving company. Although Top managers might not realize that some actions are unethical and crush employee's emotions especially when the Top managers want higher or faster productivity. Therefore, as Top manager, he/she must be careful of the way they behave and they should think about outcome more than just themselves to have sustainability in the business.      

My Reflection and Key takeaway  

Being unethical is really easy because you can think less another others to gain the benefits. But doing unethical practice in the company will ruin the company and will only last for a short time due to company lacking of honesty, integrity, fairness, sympathy , core value and etc. 

References : 

• Wingrove, A. (n.d.). Are Your Employees Leaving Because Of Unethical Leadership. [online] Available at: https://peopledevelopmentmagazine.com/2023/04/22/unethical-leadership/.
• ‌Wikipedia Contributors (2019). Corruption. [online] Wikipedia. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption.
• ‌Cooks-Campbell, A. (2022). Transparency in the Workplace: What It Is (and What to Avoid). [online] www.betterup.com. Available at: https://www.betterup.com/blog/transparency-in-the-workplace.
• ‌CultureMonkey. (2023). What is transparency at work: Benefits, top tips and examples to practices. [online] Available at: https://www.culturemonkey.io/employee-engagement/transparency-at-work/.

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