How can poor leadership hurt an organization?
Chaos comes immediately to my mind. Leaders that don’t have vision, exhibit integrity, or build trust lower the morale in the workplace. If employees lose their sense of common purpose and feel demoralized, they will choose to focus on other things that make them feel good — like family life or social activities. This has a direct negative impact on the bottom line through lower productivity, which leads to escalating costs to hire more staff or pay overtime. In a negative atmosphere, sales also tend to fall off. What specific actions or attitudes create this negative impact? Leaders can do many things that hurt the organization and foster a lack of trust. Some will ignore the current status of the business, thinking they are above the fray. Some will tell people what they think they want to hear, avoiding the tough decisions. Most will stray from a ‘say-do gap’ or a lack of vision. The ‘say-do gap’ refers to times when you say something is important to you or the organization but then
