Gossiping About an Arrogant Leader: Sparked by Inconsistent Leadership,Mitigated by Employee Resilience

Abstract

This study explains the process by which significant changes may take place in how organizations operate in the presence of arrogant leadership: their employees start to believe that their leaders are inconsistent in their actions, and the employees, in turn, engage in negative gossip behavior about these leaders. It also proposes that this process is mitigated to the extent that employees can rely on their own resilience levels. Data collected from employees and their peers in the banking and telecommunication sectors confirm these theoretical predictions. For organizational practitioners, this study thus pinpoints a critical mechanism by which a pretentious leadership approach can upset and deteriorate the organizational status quo: it escalates into negative work behaviors in the form of gossip among employees who believe that their leaders are unreliable. This counterproductive spiral can be contained, however, to the extent that employees are able to bounce back from difficult work situations.