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SBR
2,3 Organisational sociopaths:
rarely challenged, often
promoted. Why?
254
Richard J. Pech and Bret W. Slade
Faculty of Law and Management, Graduate School of Management,
La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia

Abstract
Purpose – Organisations sometimes select and promote the wrong individuals for managerial
positions. These individuals may be incompetent, they may be manipulators and bullies. They are not
the best people for the job and yet not only are they selected for positions of authority and
responsibility, they are sometimes promoted repeatedly until their kind populate the highest levels of
the organisational hierarchy. The purpose of this paper is to address this phenomenon by attempting
to explain why it occurs and why organisational members tolerate such destructive practices.
It concludes by proposing a cultural strategy to protect the organisation and its stakeholders from the
ambitious machinations of the organisational sociopath.
Design/methodology/approach – The authors develop an explanatory framework by attempting
to combine elements of the theory of memetics with structuration theory. Memetic theory helps to
analyse culture and communication of beliefs, ideas, and thoughts. Structuration theory can be used to
identify motives and drives. A combination of these theoretical approaches can be used to identify the
motives of organisational sociopaths. Such a tool is also useful for exploring the high level of
organisation tolerance for sociopathic managers.
Findings – Organisational tolerance and acceptance for sociopathic managerial behaviour appears to
be a consequence of cultural and structural complexity. While this has been known for some time, few
authors have posited an adequate range of explanations and solutions to protect stakeholders and
prevent the sociopath from exploiting organisational weaknesses. Reduction of cultural and structural
complexity may provide a partial solution. Transparency, communication of strong ethical values,
promotion based on performance, directed cooperation, and rewards that reinforce high performing
and acceptable behaviour are all necessary to protect against individuals with sociopathic tendencies.
Originality/value – The authors provide a new cultural diagnostic tool by combining elements of
memetic theory with elements of structuration theory. The subsequent framework can be used to
protect organisations from becoming the unwitting victims of sociopaths seeking to realise and fulfil
their needs and ambitions through a managerial career path.
Keywords Employee behaviour, Managers, Promotion, Organizational culture
Paper type Conceptual paper

Society and Business Review
Vol. 2 No. 3, 2007
pp. 254-269
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1746-5680
DOI 10.1108/17465680710825451
Introduction
Research has identified numerous causes and explanations for managerial bullying,
deceit, manipulation, and greed. This includes the existence of psychological traits
such as narcissism, where managers misuse the organisation as a vehicle for furthering
their own goals at the organisation’s expense, using tactics such as manipulation and
exploitation (Lasch, 1979). When such bullying behaviours occur without remorse, or
goals of self gratification are pursued without consideration for the well-being of
others, they can be termed as sociopathic behaviours. Surprisingly, and in apparent
contradiction to every rational management principle, Kets de Vries (2003) points out
that sociopathic managers often rise rapidly through the organisational ranks into Organisational
positions of increasingly greater power. sociopaths
Poor managerial performance has been explained with concepts such as the
Peter Principle, where people are promoted one or more levels beyond their optimum
level of competence (Peter and Hull, 1969). Performance shortfalls may be hidden by
using bullying tactics. McGregor’s (1960) Theory X and Y suggests that a manager’s
views of others may influence the manner in which people are managed. A negative 255
view (Theory X) could mould a managerial style focusing on lower-order behaviours
and thereby result in an overly authoritarian and task-centred management style. The
job may still be accomplished but the method may unnecessarily antagonise
intelligent, experienced, and qualified staff.
McClelland’s (1965, 1985) research on managerial motivation identified the need for
power as a strong motivator with potentially undesirable secondary effects. Yukl
(1994) points out that the most direct form of gratification for someone with a high need
for power is to exercise influence over the attitudes and behaviours of other people.
A need for power that verges into the pathological will drive the individual to seek
control, win at all costs, and eliminate rivals. The price of such behaviours can be
excessive in terms of unnecessary and costly mistakes, high staff turnover, low levels
of confidence, and falling morale. Adams’ (1963) equity theory suggests that people
may withhold commitment if they perceive inequities in rewards or recognition, thus
demonstrating the impact that comparative perceptions may have on performance
outputs. Bullying behaviours and inequitable treatment by managers do not go
unnoticed by staff. Such “bad” managerial behaviour incurs a significant cost to the
organisation through withdrawal of effort and energy.
These only represent a few explanations for poor performance and managerial
shortcomings. Unnecessary and preventable poor managerial decisions continue to be
made every day, and this may be because the wrong people are promoted into positions
of authority and responsibility. Employees and stakeholders suffer because of the
twisted machinations or greed of a few (Pech and Durden, 2004). Rather than filtering
out such individuals and their destructive tendencies, Giblin (1981) suggests that the
culture in the modern organisation actually rewards and reinforces such behaviours.
Giblin (1981) identifies the increasingly complex nature of the corporate world as
the main catalyst for reinforcing pathological behaviours in the organisational context.
Research by authors such as Giblin (1981), Kets de Vries and Miller (1984), and Jones
et al. (2004) suggests that the organisational culture actually tolerates and in many
ways favours manipulative, egotistical, and self-centred managerial behaviour. Donald
(2002, p. 320) argues that we are “married to culture and fated to play out its algorithm
in our conscious acts”.
Giblin (1981) recommends a number of approaches to solve what he terms as the
problem of bureaupathology, which includes developing a reward system that
reinforces task performance rather than manipulative behaviours, and a simplification
of the organisational structure, processes and staffing levels to remove performance
obstacles. Two decades after Giblin disseminated his advice; managerial
decision-making still suffers from unhealthy symptoms due to over-complexity,
selfishness, and reward systems that continue to encourage narcissistic behaviours
(McFarlin and Sweeney, 2000). Warnings by authors such as Giblin (1981) and Kets de
Vries and Miller (1984) that cultural reinforcement and structural complexity are
SBR determining factors that promulgate pathological managerial behaviours have either
2,3 not been taken seriously, or the necessary means for eradicating undesirable
behaviours from our organisations are yet to be discovered. Further, investigation into
organisational pathology is therefore warranted.

Diagnosing culture and motivation through the frameworks of memetics

256 and structuration
Poor decision behaviours can be diagnosed from many positions including
psychological, philosophical, sociological, etc. The following is an attempt to integrate
elements of the theory of memetics with elements of structuration theory in an attempt to
add to our understanding of organisational behaviour from a cultural position. The
focus for discussion is specifically on the advancement of some types of personalities
that are least suited for managerial roles, largely because their motivations may be in
direct conflict with the needs and goals of the organisation. Problems with the
organisational culture have been given as one explanation for this phenomenon.
Memetics can be viewed as the study of messages (whether explicit or implicit) that
are transmitted through acts of mimicking behaviour within an organisation’s culture.
Memes can be viewed as coded, replicable and transmittable units of information that
travel from mind to mind (Dawkins, 1998, p. 302). Pech and Slade (2005) describe the
concept of “toxic memes” or memes that are displayed in destructive, undesirable, or
illegal behaviours. Memetics provides a useful framework for cultural diagnosis –
particularly when a culture may contain toxic elements.
Giddens’ (1981) structuration theory is sometimes viewed as being highly
theoretical and complex, with few authors appearing to make the transition between
theory and application. Structuration theory suggests that individuals take action in
order to achieve control over their lives and “go on thus to alter the world” (Cassell,
1990, p. 22). Such efforts may in turn manifest themselves through physical action. An
adaptation of structuration theory may be used to explain the mind and motivations of
people with pathological power needs who are driven to seek positional power through
the vehicle of the organisation’s cultural Achilles’ heel. These are the people who
advance themselves through shameless self promotion, manipulations, and through
their ingenious cover-ups of mistakes and inadequacies.
Theories of memetics and structuration have been in existence for several decades.
An amalgam of these two theories may increase our understanding of culture,
particularly where a culture appears to encourage non-rational decision-making and
narcissistic behaviours.

Memetics
The memetic perspective describes the evolution and replication of ideas and thought
processes through human populations evident in mimicked ideas and behaviours.
Figure 1 shows major memetic catalysts within the organisational milieu responsible
for encouraging and facilitating deviant (pathological) and undesirable managerial
behaviour. The organisation has a number of idiosyncrasies that make it the ideal
vehicle for narcissistic and ambitious destructive behaviour. The structures, processes,
and systems are complex, which means that incompetence, mistakes, shadow alliances,
bullying, and the formation of sycophantic in-groups can all occur unnoticed. Reward
systems reinforce aggressive and ambitious behaviours, and these behaviours can be
 Personality and traits Organisational
• Narcissistic
Organisational factors
sociopaths
• Ambitious
• Complexity
• Arrogant
• Reward systems
• Opportunist
• Lack of conscience
• High need for power
• Driven by greed • Delegated authority
• Goal abstraction 257
• Neurotic
• Conforming • Information filters

Success results in confidence

to repeat and increase scope
and intensity of deviant
behaviour (pathology)

Reinforcement of deviant behaviour creates:

• State of disinhibition
• Aggressive scripts
• Cognitive priming

Observers note that deviant behaviours are rewarded and

reinforced. Observers develop a toxic managerial meme Figure 1.
communicating the success of pathological behaviours. This Organisational factors
meme behaves in a viral fashion and is communicated and that encourage, facilitate,
mimicked from mind to mind. Its integral message is enacted and reinforce deviant
by those with the personality and traits that make them (pathological) managerial
susceptible to pathological mind contagions. behaviours

inflicted upon a number of stakeholder groups without “interference” from an

individual conscience or collective.
Rewarding and reinforcement of the wrong behaviours occurred at metropolitan
life, the second largest insurance firm in the USA in the 1990s. In 1993, it was
alleged that MetLife agents swindled US$11 million from gullible people who believed
that they were purchasing retirement plans. What they thought were savings deposits
towards their retirement were actually insurance premiums for insurance disguised as
a new type of investment plan. Much of the blame fell on Rick Urso, the Tampa branch
manager for MetLife. There were plenty of indicators that Urso’s branch was an
anomaly. Its budget for mailing brochures was ten times that of any other MetLife
offices and from 1989 to 1993 Urso’s commission-based salary rose from US$270,000 to
over US$1 million (Lohse, 1999; Hartley, 2005). Rather than investigating this
performance anomaly, MetLife’s response was to award Urso with the Sales Office of
the Year Award for two years running, to invite him as a motivational guest speaker at
MetLife conferences, and to reward him by promoting him to the position of third
highest-paid employee. The organisation was unwilling to see the warning signs and
reinforced Urso’s behaviour through rewards and public recognition, creating a culture
SBR that encouraged replication of dubious sales techniques, costing MetLife over US$1.7
2,3 billion in lawsuit payments in 1999.
Davison and Neale (1998) define such behaviour as anti social, demonstrated
through superficial displays of charm, habitual lying, no regard for others, no remorse,
no shame, taking no responsibility for mistakes and no evidence of learning from either
making mistakes or from punishment meted out for making mistakes (except to
258 become more cunning in future, to avoid getting caught). The real dangers for the
organisation reside at two levels. The first is the nature of the damage done to
well-intended and performing individuals by sociopathic managers, and the second is
the reinforcement and replication of these behaviours throughout the organisation by
way of memetic contagion.
Organisational complexity encourages delegation. Tasks can be effectively delegated
to specialists, but it also means that some managers do little that directly adds value to
the organisation, except managing the delegation of work. The sociopathic manager will
establish a network of operatives within and without the organisation. These select few
individuals will be nurtured, but not for reasons of close friendship. They provide a
means of control through a carefully managed program where sycophantic behaviour is
rewarded and nay saying is punished. A dependent arrangement is established whereby
the rewarded feel a sense of gratitude, and, hungry for more, will ingratiate themselves
further into the controlling clutches of the rewarder.
Managerial job descriptions may sometimes contain abstract goals – “manage
relationships” “supervise” employees, “oversee” the project. Such goals are often
difficult to quantify. Abstract goals may encourage extremes of impression
management in order to enhance perceptions of performance. According to Yukl
(1994, p. 335) attempts to create impressions of exceptional performance and
perceptions that the individual is essential to the organisation, may have negative
consequences for the organisation. Structural and procedural complexity may conspire
to facilitate impression management and conceal its destructive consequences.
Organisational complexity may filter and/or distort information from and to
decision-makers. Such filtration may act to conceal and obscure the truth, and provide
reporting barriers that can be easily manipulated by deviant managers. Every success
serves to reinforce their sense of invulnerability and audacity. They view this as
positive performance feedback, encouraging replication and justification for increasing
the intensity of such deviant activities.
Figure 1 shows how reinforcement of deviant behaviours may encourage and
facilitate three psychological triggers that serve to propagate continuing sociopathic
behaviours (Pech, 2003):
(1) A state of disinhibition, where successful acts of organisational “violence” and
deviance reduce the perpetrator’s inhibitions against engaging in and repeating
similar actions.
(2) The formation of aggressive scripts where a preconception about how a series
of events is likely to occur or should occur. An example may be where a deviant
manager responds aggressively toward anyone who has an opposing view or
who is perceived as an impediment to their rise in the organisation. Such
aggressive scripts act as behavioural blueprints instructing the deviant
manager how to respond in a given situation, and the response is generally
aggressive or manipulative in its manner.
 (3) Cognitive priming suggests that certain stimuli, such as weapons, are Organisational
meaningfully associated with violence, and that such stimuli may activate sociopaths
thoughts and behavioural tendencies towards episodes or acts of violence. In an
organisational setting such violence may be less obvious. Bullying and
manipulation can be subtle. It can be delivered in the guise of managerial
“wisdom” that is unable to be questioned, or managerial controls that form a
part of the organisation’s policies and standard operating procedures. The 259
organisational deviant may meaningfully associate stimuli such as higher
salaries, the company car, a larger office, or power over others with pathological
managerial behaviours. This provides susceptible people with the stimulus to
seek out managerial positions in order to find an acceptable fit between their
pathological power need fulfilment, and the organisation’s sometimes
misguided search for a managerial “type” that appears aggressive and
ambitious, as well as appearing to be an independent thinker.

Figure 1 shows how such psychological states may reinforce deviant behaviour, which in
turn may appeal to people with susceptible personality traits. Observers recognise this as
a form of legitimation of deviant managerial behaviours and communicate it as a proven
technique for gaining recognition and promotion within the organisation. Once this
message becomes embedded within the cultural norm its failings are tolerated and the
behaviours are mimicked by those susceptible to its siren call – these are the
overly-ambitious, the narcissists, the opportunists, those with a high need for power, and
those who can easily conform to rigid behavioural roles. Such behaviour may then become
the predominant meme, a culturally reinforced means of communicating acceptable, yet
toxic, behavioural norms for those seeking advancement in the organisation.

Structuration theory
An element of Giddens’ (1981) structuration theory suggests that individuals take
action in order to establish control over their immediate environment. For the
individual this creates predictability, and therefore stability through a sense of control.
Efforts to establish predictability may for some, lead to aggressive attempts to control
resources. This would then place such an individual in a position to allocate and
distribute rewards. The overwhelming desire to be in a position of control may
inevitably result in power-grasping tactics, feeding the need to have power over others.
Some individuals may be more highly motivated to enact change than others.
Giddens, according to Staber and Sydow (2002, p. 412), argues that structure and
process form a recursive interplay that deals “simultaneously with power, cognition
and legitimacy as inter-related aspects of the processes through which structures are
constituted”. According to Giddens, the interaction between the rules and resources of
society are critical to its existence and comprise the scaffolds of its social systems.
Cassell (1990, p. 22) frames the concept as “structures – of signification, domination
and legitimation” wherein knowledgeable individuals, those who understand the
system “may go on and thus alter the world”.
These structures of signification, domination, and legitimation provide an
explanatory framework for the organisation’s unwitting and yet considerable
facilitation and reward of sociopathic managerial behaviours. Such behaviours can
have a destructive impact on the lives of organisational members, particularly those
trapped in a subordinate relationship with a sociopathic manager.
SBR The memetic elements shown in Figure 1 discribe the culturally and psychologically
2,3 influenced viral-like elements that facilitate and reward some elements of deviant
managerial behaviour. Figure 2 shows how the impact of cultural structure and
motivational desires, actions and interactions within the organisational context can
also facilitate and reward pathological managerial behaviours. Structuration theory
may give three major insights into deviant managerial behaviours:
260 (1) Signification. The needs and desires within a person that drive them to attempt
the attainment of “presence”. The individual with a high need for ambitious
fulfilment will work to establish a sense of signification. This is not necessarily
a problem unless they attempt to achieve signification through manipulative
Personality and traits Organisational factors Drivers seeking to
• Narcissistic • Complexity fulfil a desire to
• Ambitious • Reward systems achieve signification:
• Arrogant • Lack of conscience • Ambition
• Opportunist • Delegated authority • Narcissism
• High need for power • Mate-ocracy • Greed
• Driven by greed • Goal abstraction
• Neurotic • Information filters
• Conforming
Drivers seeking to
fulfil a desire for
domination:
Success results in confidence to • High need for power
repeat and increase scope and
• Ambition
intensity of deviant behaviour
(pathology) • Narcissism
• Insecurity

Reinforcement of deviant behaviour creates:

• State of disinhibition
• Aggressive scripts Drivers seeking to
• Cognitive priming fulfil a desire for
legitimation:
• Organisational culture
• Psychological susceptibility
Observers note that deviant • Need for reinforcement
behaviours are rewarded and
therefore reinforced. Observers
develop a toxic managerial
meme communicating the
success of pathological
behaviours. This meme behaves
in a viral fashion and is
Figure 2.
communicated and mimicked
Structures of signification,
from mind to mind. Its integral The recursive nature that exists between the
domination, and
message is enacted by those with organisation and the individual adds the final
legitimation and how they
the personality and traits that dynamic that encourages and reinforces toxic
facilitate deviant
make them susceptible to managerial behaviours. Motivation to
managerial behaviours in
pathological, organisationally cooperate and collude is greater than
the organisational context
transmitted mind contagions. motivation to rebel.
 and deviant behaviours. The organisation may inadvertently facilitate a sense Organisational
of satisfaction by providing a structured pathway for the overly ambitious sociopaths
through the devices of authority and control.
(2) Domination. The forces, needs, and desires that drive a person to seek control.
This includes a need to have control and overcome a sense of powerlessness.
Individuals with a high need for power, those with narcissistic tendencies, and
those with insecurity issues may employ pathological behaviours in order to 261
dominate their landscape. Organisations enable domination through
hierarchical structures, command and control, and the allocation of power
and authority to individuals for extended periods.
(3) Legitimation. The forces and dynamics that legitimise acts of a socially deviant
nature. As demonstrated in the MetLife example, businesses sometimes glorify
those who walk the fine line between entrepreneurial and unethical practices –
as long as they are not caught breaking the law. Organisations may glorify the
manager who comes in under budget and produces quantifiable results,
regardless of the subsequent stress imposed upon subordinates or clients.

Figure 2 shows how elements of structuration converge with elements of memetics.

The diagram is a visually intricate interpretation of complex organisational dynamics.
The organisational elements encouraging deviant behaviours from Figure 1 are shown
on the left side of the diagram in dashed-line boxes while structuration-related
elements are added in larger font on the right. The final dynamic element driving this
complicated scenario is added at the bottom right of the diagram; this is the power of
recursivity. Recursivity in this context refers to the recursive nature that exists
between pathological elements, organisational complexity, and a socially constructed
culture that legitimises and reinforces pathological managerial behaviours. The
organisation may provide the ideal vehicle for these deviant behaviours to alter their
immediate world through the structures of domination, signification, and legitimation
that are so open to manipulation by the sociopath. Membership of the organisational
culture implies employee acceptance of the limitations and risks associated with
destructive and pathological managerial behaviours. Motivation to collude and
cooperate appears greater than motivation to rebel. Why is this so?

The organisational world: a socially constructed reality cemented by

collusive behaviours
Paul et al. (2002, pp. 391-92) argue that collusion occurs when fundamentally political
motivations move people to agree with ongoing social processes. They also point out
that people often collude in socially sanctioned behaviour to minimise risk. Winston
(2004, p. 409) takes this a step further by arguing that the human mind appears to be
hard-wired to receive pleasure from the act of cooperation. He describes research with
MRI scans revealing specific patterns of brain activity in areas linked to pleasure and
reward (the caudate nucleus and the nucleus accumbens) when subjects are asked to
act in a cooperative manner. Acts of collusion could have similar pleasurable outcomes
if perceived as a form of acting cooperatively.
A business organisation is a socially constructed reality designed to achieve a
purpose that cannot be achieved by an individual operating alone. Such social
constructs can only succeed when cooperation and/or collusion occurs.
SBR In order to prosper in the organisational context, members are required to abide by
2,3 rules. These rules provide cultural scaffolding. Some rules may be arbitrary but for its
members they comprise the organisational construct. Some rules may be legislated
and/or formalised, and some may be unspoken and yet deeply buried within the
culture. These rules demand varying levels of conformity and obedience that span the
spectrum of social behaviours from cooperation through to collusion. But such
262 collusions are sometimes difficult to manage, largely because of the complex dynamics
under which they are created and maintained.
In an organisational context, rules and structure are designed to prevent
disintegration. Sometimes these rules and structures are the means by which that
society disintegrates. Gigantès (2003) claims that French King Louis XVI may have
aided the American cause for independence from England simply as a retaliatory
response to England’s defeat of the French in North America. The French King and his
decision makers failed to predict that circumstances such as food shortages, when
combined with a rising tide of dissent, could expose his hypocrisy of aiding democracy,
and thereby alter the precarious balance of power maintained by the various groups
that, across the spectrum of cooperative and collusive behaviours, supported the
monarchy through their actions.
Every social reality is comprised of cooperating and colluding groups that
are motivated to preserve and sustain their reality. These groups are comprised of
those who benefit, those who aspire to benefit, those who know no better, those who
fear the consequences of change, those who see no benefits from change, and those who
simply wish to minimise perceived risk. An imbalance or strong divisive element
between these cooperating and/or colluding groups may potentially destabilise the
status quo and alter the socially constructed reality by which power is maintained.
Such a reality may function under a number of given or accepted rules. As an example,
nations and profit-driven organisations seek to maintain and increase their quality of
life. They may employ a variety of methods to achieve growth, but will generally
operate within a socially acceptable framework – aside from such aberrant examples
as Enron and WorldCom. One such socially acceptable rule may express the belief that
trading is more acceptable than raiding, therefore business and diplomacy provide a
more acceptable means of wealth creation than belligerent solutions.
How does this relate to the topic of deviance and toxic managerial behaviours?
There are a number of means by which an individual can acquire power. These means
may be of a legitimate or an illegitimate nature and the sociopath may choose the latter.
Acquisition of power in organisations generally demands acceptable completion of
established rituals and routines. These rituals and routines are accepted by
cooperating and colluding groups who have no reason to benefit from change and who
have every reason to benefit from the status quo. These rituals and routines may be
designed to provide career paths as well as career speed humps and roadblocks, a
means of indoctrination, or they may act as selection filters as well as providing
recognition and rewards for performance. Some employees lack the ability, energy,
motivation, or perseverance to successfully complete these rituals and routines, or they
may simply not desire managerial responsibility.
Unfortunately, the narcissists, the greedy, the pretenders, and those with a high
need for power do covet higher managerial positions, largely to satisfy their power
needs. They will either attempt to acquire power by conforming to the demands of the
organisation’s rituals and routines or they will attempt to gain power through Organisational
illegitimate means. Both approaches provide pathways for achieving the individual’s
nefarious ambitions. Criteria for selecting a particular pathway will be dependent on
sociopaths
the ambitious individual’s values, determination, personality, and ability. The nature
of the rituals and routines will also influence or impact on the decision criteria.
The ambitious individual may not be prepared to leave promotion or career decisions
in the hands of others, perhaps he or she is not capable of meeting expected 263
performance standards, perhaps they fear the competition, or they may be driven to
acquire power by any means. Such individuals may be driven to monopolise the
organisational machinery and its rituals and routines to achieve need fulfilment and
power ambitions. Employees who are not similarly motivated will have little chance or
will find fewer opportunities for promotion when competing against the ambitious
narcissists, the greedy, the pretenders, and those with a high need for power.
While structural complexity and cultural reinforcement are key determinants for
facilitating recruitment and selection of individuals who are predominantly driven by self
interest, collusive behaviours will cement and reinforce their positions of power. Such
people are consummate manipulators, if they have one skill that stands above the rest; it is
their ability to manipulate others. While such manipulative skills may sometimes benefit
the organisation, the costs, according to (Conger, 1990) can be excessive.

Storming the Bastille

King Louis XVI of France and those who cooperated and colluded with him lost sight of
their central purpose, which was to maintain the fabric of their society at all costs.
Carefully crafted and deeply embedded rituals and routines would ensure the constancy of
French governance through a royal line. The cultural complexity of such a society ensured
that everyone understood the rules and obeyed through cooperation or collusion. But a
combination of rapid population growth, extreme poverty and idealism, combined to put
increasing pressures on older social, economic, and political institutions (McNeill, 1984).
These factors finally galvanised the French revolution. The revolutionaries in turn
cooperated and colluded to successfully break the balance of power.
Organisational members may similarly cooperate and collude across the spectrum
of group behaviours to maintain and perpetuate the status quo. An immense and
collective sense of discomfort may motivate change. While some managers lord it over
their subordinates, they do so with a surprising degree of impunity. Attempts to alter
the nature of their socially constructed reality may be resisted because:
.
Attempts at change often require more effort than suffering the consequences of
the status quo.
.
Attempts at change are viewed with suspicion.
.
Attempts at change disrupt rituals and routines designed to support the status
quo, thus requiring the development of new rituals and routines to displace the
old. In the event of a power struggle, the absence of new rituals and routines may
leave a void that will allow the overthrown power to return, perhaps in a
different form, but still involving elements of the original power faction.
The French example shows how prevailing circumstances can combine to replace
structures based on old memes with structures comprising new ones. These new
memes must be replicated by newly established colluding and cooperating groups with
SBR the intent of creating a fresh socially constructed reality. These new groups are
2,3 motivated by a different set of structures of signification, domination, and legitimation.
In the midst of this complexity lies the problem for those compelled to suffer at the
hands of an incompetent or pathologically motivated manager. Every meme, structure,
process, and rule in the organisation supports and facilitates the status quo. Colluding
power groups view unsanctioned change as mutiny and rebellion. The forces needed to
264 fracture and overthrow the power of incumbent colluding groups, establish new
cooperating and colluding groups, and introduce new memes through new rituals and
routines must by necessity be widespread and far-reaching. Inevitably, forces for
change must be antagonistically deployed against those who are the preservers and
beneficiaries, if not the architects, of the organisation’s currently accepted social
reality.
The storming of the Bastille was largely a symbolic gesture demonstrating the
destruction of the old French form of rule. This act is often viewed as a metaphor for
the overthrow of rigid structures or the status quo. Few organisations have an
equivalent metaphor for instigating change. Disgruntled employees can initiate a
variety of industrial relations solutions. They can withhold commitment, they can even
sabotage the organisation, but they will rarely experience the convergence of complex
circumstances that aided French revolutionaries. Revolution is therefore rarely a viable
option for change. Poor managers continue to manage poorly, and subordinates
continue to tolerate their lot or seek alternative employment. It is therefore in the
greater interests of the organisation to ensure that incompetent, greedy, and
pathologically motivated people do not acquire positions of power because once
embedded in the system, they may be difficult to remove, they have now become
guardians of the system.

Guarding against organisational sociopaths

Can the sociopath be identified and stopped before it is too late? Probably not.
According to Cleckley (1976) there are some overt signs that separate the sociopath
from the rest. These include poverty of emotions, both positive and negative. They
have no sense of shame and any emotions for others are often an act. They can be
superficially charming but will manipulate for personal gain. They may not
be motivated by money but rather through impulsive thoughts that fulfil their
excessive need for thrills. Hare et al. (1990) devised a dual checklist that identifies
clusters headed under “emotional detachment” and “impulsivity and irresponsibility”.
The former can often be recognised through their inflated self-esteem and exploitation
of others, while the latter may be marked by alcohol or drug abuse. Unfortunately, such
symptoms may not become evident until the sociopath is already rising up the
corporate ladder, and to some extent, almost everyone can be accused of displaying
some of these symptoms some of the time. The organisational sociopath may also not
display the extremes of pathological behaviours that are normally associated with the
criminal psychopath and sociopath.
Short of forcing every managerial aspirant to take a battery of psychological
assessments, pathological, predatory, or anti-social personalities may be difficult to
identify and eliminate from the list of managerial contenders. Displaying behaviours
oozing with wit, charm, audacity, and enthusiasm, they may stand out in the interview
more for their attractive personal qualities than for their underlying destructive
behaviours, which remain carefully concealed. While organisations must continue to Organisational
employ a variety of sophisticated recruitment, selection, and promotion criteria and sociopaths
filters to ensure that the best people are selected and promoted, protection against
exploitation by sociopaths requires much more. Giblin (1981) suggests that
organisations be simplified, in other words, accountability must be increased,
transparency must be improved, and performance must be quantifiable and
appropriately rewarded. Even these measures may not deter the motivated sociopath. 265
The answer to the problem may possibly be found in the fabric of the organisation’s
culture. The culture can be defined by the memes that drive and support the
organisation and the actions and motivations of the organisation’s members – and in
some instances the actions and motivations of the organisation’s wider community,
stakeholders, and even their market.
Donald (2002, pp. 321-2) argues that the:
. . . nature and range of human conscious experience are no longer a biological given. Rather
they depend on a somewhat unpredictable chemistry of brain and culture, whereby the
processes of mind can be endlessly rewritten and rearranged by cultural forces . . . Evolution
has nudged us in this direction, interlocking brain and culture, toward the absorption of
individuals by communities of mind.
The culture of the organisation provides the construct from which each individual
receives instructions regarding behaviour, expectations, standards, outputs, what
matters and what does not. The culture of the organisation must be strong enough to
influence behaviour. Words, symbols, gestures, narratives, these are the defining parts
of the cultural meme; they paint the colours and provide the details. If left to their own
devices and urges, some managers may default to a host of unacceptable behaviours,
weaknesses in the organisation may be exploited; personal ambition may override or
obscure organisational goals. A culture that clearly defines boundaries, directs and
channels energy, guides decision processes, and opens everything up to scrutiny, will
provide the means for the organisation to actively secure itself against the destructive
machinations of incompetent and/or selfishly-motivated individuals.
Such a culture will be cemented through positive cooperative systems, policies,
laws, and memes that motivate as well as serve a transparent control function with
appropriate checks and balances. A healthy culture will not be defined by rigid and
imposed systems and structures. That will only recreate the authoritarian and
mechanised organisations of the past.
Figure 3 shows what could be termed as a binary culture model. This describes a
dual culture that shields the organisation from toxic elements while at the same time
espousing freedom of thought and action through devolved and informed
decision-making. This cultural pyramid framework emphasises the foundational
positioning and importance of memetic management issues. Memetic or cultural
management refers to management of the values that communicate and reinforce
openness, honesty, cooperation, transparency, and accountability. There should be no
small and powerful in-groups and the formation of such should not be tolerated,
nothing should be hidden, staff should be encouraged to articulate episodes of
discontent and displeasure. The culture should be continually re-examined to ensure
that the recursivity that exists between the people, the culture, the rules, the
expectations, and reality is healthy and in balance. Buchen (2005, p. 5) argues that
SBR
2,3

266

Performance
Control and
systems reward
management

Sophisticated
Policy
recruitment, selection,
Management
and promotion policies

Figure 3.
Components of a binary Open channels of
culture framework – one communication and
part controls for aberrant transparency
behaviour while the other Memetic
facilitates performance, cultural
instructs, motivates, and management
guides. The result is a Espoused and reinforced
culture of high performing values of integrity, openness,
and cooperating honesty, cooperation, and
individuals accountability

organisational health should be maintained by rotating the CEO and other leadership
positions, “there is nothing like rotation to task the egos of all alpha dogs”.
The mid-level of the pyramid is comprised of policies and procedures that
discourage undesirable behaviour and protect the organisation by ensuring that rules,
laws, and formalities are enforced and not compromised. It also ensures that the
organisation follows due process in order to attempt to recruit, select, retain, and
promote the best people. The top of the pyramid comprises control measures that
remove or minimise temptation, as well as rewarding desirable behaviour and thereby
reinforcing memes that promote the organisation’s espoused values.
Formalised rules and procedures are essential to the organisation’s survival, but
they are placed at the top and mid-level of the pyramid in Figure 3 to suggest that they
are underpinned by the organisation’s culture. Policies and controls without a healthy
culture may not stop the sociopath. A healthy culture without supporting policies and
controls may also not stop the sociopath.
As an example of cultural management, Lennick and Kiel (2005, p. 158) state that
American Express has 25 designated culture champions who communicate and
reinforce a culture that is articulated under three sets of values:
 (1) Moral values: Organisational
.
Integrity – uphold the highest standards of integrity in all of our actions. sociopaths
.
Respect for people – value our people. Encourage development. Reward
performance.
.
Personal accountability – be personally accountable for delivering on our
commitment. 267
(2) Social values:
.
Teamwork – we work together across boundaries.
.
Good citizenship – we are good citizens in the communities in which we live
and work.
(3) Business values:
.
Customer commitment – develop relationships that make a positive
difference in our customers’ lives.
.
Quality – provide outstanding products and unsurpassed service.
.
Will to win – demonstrate a strong will to win in the market place and in
every aspect of our business.

These values are underlined by one important statement, “If you don’t subscribe to
Amex’s moral values, you probably shouldn’t work here” (Lennick and Kiel, 2005, p. 158).
Such a moral code may not stop the organisational sociopath, but it may facilitate
standards and expectations, establish boundaries, and provide direction. It should
inhibit recursivity where recursivity promotes dysfunctional managerial behaviour.
The sociopathic personality will no longer find a promotional pathway that can be easily
manipulated and subverted, and observers will no longer witness the rewarding and
reinforcement of sociopathic behaviours. Most importantly, organisational members
will not stand idly by when they see pathologically-motivated and overly ambitious
individuals attempt to manipulate and scheme their way into managerial positions that
they either don’t deserve or are incapable of filling.

Conclusion
It has been argued that behaviour is deeply influenced by culture. Memetic theory
provides a means of diagnosing communication of cultural artefacts, whether oral or
symbolic. Structuration theory provides an explanation of what motivates and why. A
blending of these two theories may increase understanding of sociopathic motivation
and deviant behaviours in organisations, and increase understanding of organisational
acceptance and tolerance for such behaviours. An important element of the driving
force within a culture is its memetic construct and the means by which the meme is
communicated. Group behaviours often stretch across the continuum ranging from
cooperation through to collusion and these act to cement a culture in place. It has been
argued that a combination of memetic management and sophisticated policies,
procedures, and controls will protect organisations from becoming the victims of
sociopathic manipulation.
Acts of sociopathic behaviour are often viewed as belonging to the domain of the
criminal justice system or such acts are thought to belong within the study of abnormal
psychology. The authors have deliberately avoided detailed reference to these two
SBR fields of study to emphasise that sociopathic behaviours and their destructive
2,3 consequences are sometimes not far removed from our daily lives in the organisational
context. The impacts of cultural and structural complexity have also been highlighted
to demonstrate their unwitting roles as facilitators of some pathologically motivated
behaviours. Unspoken messages and symbolic gestures may communicate powerful
messages that can be misinterpreted by individuals with unhealthy needs and
268 motivations. The organisation must examine its culture to identify the messages
that are being transmitted. It must examine the complexity of its structure and
procedures, and it must examine its recruitment, reward, and promotion policies to
protect itself and its stakeholders against the destructive ambitions of the corporate
sociopath.

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About the authors

Richard J. Pech is a Director of Research at La Trobe University’s Graduate School of
Management in Melbourne, Australia. He lectures in decision psychology, strategy,
communication, as well as entrepreneurship and business innovation. He consults in
organisational problem diagnosis and change management. Richard J. Pech is the
corresponding author and can be contacted at: r.pech@latrobe.edu.au
Bret W. Slade lectures at La Trobe University’s Graduate School of Management in
Melbourne, Australia, in the areas of defence studies, strategy, and management. He consults in
change management. E-mail: b.slade@latrobe.edu.au

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