Examining Toxic Leadership: An Integrated Framework for Organizational Recovery

Abstract

In the context of leadership evaluation and toxic personalities, much extant literature serves to review the characteristics and traits associated with toxic leadership. However, few studies explore the conducive conditions supporting these individuals; and still fewer studies provide insight in how leadership and others may be empowered to overcome and restore trust and organizational culture and to support employee retention. This qualitative phenomenological study considers the lived experiences of a varied cross-section of fourteen people-leaders who have worked for or alongside toxic leaders, and presents practices towards culture recovery and employee retention. Further presented is an integrative framework tool to assist in these culture recovery and associate retention efforts. This study reviews the toxic leadership actions and consequences, the follower observations and contributions, and the organizational factors found in these circumstances with the central question: What are the influencers that affect associate retention where a toxic leader has existed, and what steps can organizations proactively act upon to positively influence associate retention?