Nowadays it is relatively easy to identify leaders, whether in a job or in a movement, political, social or religious group. We understand that a leader is responsible for directing or leading a human group.
Nevertheless, an anti-leader would do the opposite, since he cannot make a group connection between individuals in a job or organization; It turns out to be a person who, instead of promoting good work in the group, ends up harming it. In this article we will see what an anti-leader is and what its main characteristics are.
An anti-leader would be that person who fails to make a connection with his or her work team and fails to generate group cohesion. Therefore, it fails to meet the most important objectives it hopes to achieve. So, An anti-leader is a leader whose main objective is to achieve his own goals and not those of the group and those of the organization to which they belong.
One characteristic that this person may have is that he or she may represent enough power to possess subordinates whom he or she mistreats. This is why an anti-leader tends to intimidate, threaten, yell, and the work environment is subject to his mood. Added to this, these people manage to generate a substantial loss to the organization to which they belong.
Finally, it is known that Many of these people deep down have high levels of insecurity and fear of being replaced by someone who can achieve a supposedly higher level of performance or knowledge than him or her.
Characteristics of an anti-leader when managing teams
Generally, an anti-leader usually presents several of the characteristics that we present below.
1. It damages the work environment
It is known that the anti-leader does not have the capacity and ability to inspire and motivate others, on the contrary, these people They tend to use threats and fear generation on employees to be able to get them to comply with their wishes, orders or mandates. Thus, the anti-leader forms an environment of fear or fear in the place where he works, negatively damaging the work environment, consequently damaging the work environment.
The final objective that the vast majority of anti-leaders have is neither the company nor that of their collaborators, since every decision they make is made by them. depending on their individual enrichment and the maintenance of power For this reason, it is very common to see behaviors or attitudes in them that vary according to their needs. Consequently, they tend to present dishonest, incoherent behaviors, unfulfilled promises, etc.
3. Believes to be the possessor of the truth
It is very common to notice that anti-leaders consider themselves possessors of the absolute truth. For them, their opinion turns out to be the correct one, so they do not promote or accept proposals different from theirs. Thus, they only tend to accept praise for their certainties or when others corroborate or praise the ideas that they have mentioned or pointed out.
4. He never takes responsibility for mistakes
If there is something that we will hardly be able to appreciate, it is seeing an anti-leader taking responsibility for some failure or error that he or she may have made. This happens because these people They consider that all their actions are always correct or suitable , or at least they behave as if they believe it. It is for this reason that anti-leaders will always look for a collaborator to be able to hold responsible or blame for the failure, not taking responsibility for the mistake that they themselves have made. But what they will assume as their own will be the successes that the collaborators obtain as theirs.
5. Avoid excellence in your environment
The anti-leaders They tend to surround themselves with professionals who they consider to be less trained or prepared or with less experience ; This way no one will be able to doubt his supposed wisdom and leadership. This is how they prevent a talented person from overshadowing them and revealing the lack of leadership they possess.
Anti-leaders have a very arrogant and negative character, since they renounce the new acquisition of learning and skills. This occurs because they have fear and insecurity because they think that others could stand out over them, which ends up leading them to not stimulate group training of the work team, since they prioritize their main objective, which is that no one takes away their position.
7. Lack of business vision
Anti-leaders hold power by tradition or by imposition, they almost never do so on their own merits As mentioned above, these people present a deep insecurity which leads them to be very comfortable and always want to remain in their comfort zone, since it is in that scenario where they can hide the gaps or faults they have in relation to their abilities or They establish unrealistic and disproportionate objectives out of a display of arrogance.
8. Non-compliant par excellence
Anti-leaders are also characterized by promising things and not fulfilling them, their work team or collaborators make excessive efforts to achieve the promised reward and in the end it does not occur. This ends up causing these people to lose all their credibility. Thus, the work team ends up losing confidence in them and they will not be willing to continue making additional efforts in the next opportunity.
9. He is fearful
Anti-leaders are also characterized as fearful and insecure people. Consequently, They tend to be jealous of their plot of power , because they have an irrational fear that some collaborator may show their defects or overshadow them, and this ends up leading them to only interact with people who they consider to be below you in terms of intelligence, skills, etc. Thus, these people also appear self-conscious and afraid of showing ignorance or weakness, which is why they tend to reject suggestions or advice and do not listen to others. This is how they try to ensure that other workers do not stand out or shine more than them. It turns out to be very common that many of them end up being despised by their own work team.
These people are also characterized by not promoting optimism in workers and not being able to create incentive systems that generate correct motivation. On the contrary, rather than motivating, they manage to demotivate and reduce the involvement of your collaborators and subordinates
11. Avoid risk
Anti-leaders also tend not to fight for the group’s objectives; on the contrary, they only look after their personal objectives without caring about the rest. Likewise, these people tend to avoid risk at all costs, since they are characterized by being conformist and They feel satisfied with the position and income they have already achieved, leading to stagnation by not seeking to achieve new goals. Therefore, it is very unlikely that they can lead to any significant or important development in the organization.
12. He is dishonest
These people are also characterized by not having ethical or moral principles and it is not strange in their actions that they tend to commit injustices. It is so the team stops following the anti-leader and, on the contrary, there will be a feeling of contempt for these people.
13. Lack of vision
Leaders mostly tend to seek the support of the company or organization in exchange for providing them with a very ambitious, innovative and stimulating project. On the contrary, once they are inside an organization, anti-leaders will not offer or propose any change or improvement in the organization.
14. He is selfish
Anti-leaders are characterized by having a concern for their own personal interests Thus, it is difficult for them to receive the support of their collaborators. It is very likely that the workers realize the risk they present by entrusting their destiny to these people, so they will try to take it away from them to every extent.
15. It’s unrealistic
While a leader tends to be one who looks ahead to the future, anti-leaders are the complete opposite. For this reason many of the anti-leaders It seems that they do not have their feet on the ground and live far from reality An anti-leader has the idea that he is an enlightened person, in other words, he considers that he has a supernatural power or above all to be able to undertake, take actions or know the absolute truth, which ends up putting the future of the organization at risk.
