Breaking Toxic Triangles: How Courageous Followers stand up to Destructive Leadership A Thesis Presented to the Swinburne University of Technology in fulfilment of the requirements for the award of: DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 2020 by Alain Marc Mario de Sales Principal Co-Ordinating Supervisor : Dr. Samir Shrivastava Associate Supervisor : Prof. Christopher Selvarajah Associate Supervisor : Prof. Timothy Moore Abstract Instances of Destructive Leadership abound. It is a growing phenomenon with very real consequences and yet it remains under-researched. The scant work that exists on Destructive Leadership tends to focus on leaders and generally discounts the role of followers. Responding to calls for models which recognise that outcomes are often co-created by leaders and followers, this study explores how followers stand up to leaders to mitigate destructive outcomes. This study anchors its arguments to the Toxic Triangle framework (Padilla 2013), which focuses on the confluence of Destructive Leaders, Susceptible Followers, and Conducive Environments. The insights from this study augment the Toxic Triangle by adding Courageous Followers to the framework. Using Power and Structuration theories as theoretical lenses, the study analyses the discursive actions undertaken by Courageous Followers to shift the power balance while attempting to collapse the Toxic Triangle. The study analyses twelve longitudinal episodes from three cases of Destructive Leadership that spanned decades. Given that the cases entailed shifts in power balance and the fact that discourse and power are said to be indistinguishable from each other and mutually constitute each other, the study adopted Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) as a method. CDA explored the tension between agency and structure as the power balance shifted. The findings showed that when faced with Destructive Leadership, discursive actions related to building and maintaining coalitions were necessary (but not sufficient). ‘Rubiconising which was acting decisively to cross a point of no return was also found to be an effective discurisive act. Courageous Followers had to ‘activate’ individuals and entities across levels to confront the Destructive Leadership phenomena which tended to span micro-macro level boundaries and across social systems. Thus, boundary spanning was a key action that shifted the power balance. Courageous Followers often succeeded through intensifying their actions across levels (i.e., persisting using various avenues and structures). Somewhat counter-intuitively, the act of internally confronting Destructive Leadership proved ineffective. The emergent theoretical frameworks identify discursive actions that can collapse Toxic Triangles despite being at a power disadvantage. This research has implications for how societies, organisations and followers might combat Destructive Leadership. The study suggests policy changes that could be made to institutionalise structures to mitigate destructive outcomes and makes a case for researchers to treat outcomes as artefacts that are co-created by leaders and followers. Breaking Toxic Triangles: How Courageous Followers stand up to Destructive Leadership i To all the women and men throughout history that had the courage to resist destructive leadership. Our world has been improved by your sacrifice. Breaking Toxic Triangles: How Courageous Followers stand up to Destructive Leadership ii Acknowledgements While my name might be on this thesis, the completion of this thesis is a testament to the assistance, guidance and encouragement from many people. I would like to recognise those people that constituted my informal and formal team on this journey. Melody Powell, my best friend and partner, I would not have completed this project without your support, inspiration and dedication. You lifted me up in my most difficult times, encouraged me and patiently listened to my endless rantings about thoughts so esoteric, that I even lost myself. These words do not come close to expressing my gratitude for you. I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude for my supervisory team. My Principal Coordinating Supervisor, Dr. Samir Shrivastava, for supporting me over these years, for guiding me, challenging my thinking while empowering me to challenge him. Beyond his brilliant attention to detail, Samir supported me in navigating through the non-academic challenges as well. My Associate Supervisor, Professor Tim Moore, who joined the supervisory team at a critical moment. Tim, you have elevated the quality of my thesis and pushed me to improve my analysis and writing in ways that will serve me into the future. My Associate Supervisor, Professor Christopher Selvarajah, has provided me with continuity through this project and opportunities that have allowed me to enter academia. The collegiate environment that Chris fosters encouraged me to join Swinburne University. He along with Samir and Tim would make the time to show me their friendship and support. I would like to thank Professor John Fien who was on my initial supervisory team and understood what I wanted to achieve in my thesis before I did, and pointed me in the right direction. I am grateful to you all. I want to thank my fellow PhD candidates that have encouraged, supported and understood me. This journey has been made easier with the support network that we have. I have learned from you and enjoyed this journey in no small part because of getting to know you. Finally, I want to thank my family, who emphasised the importance of education, from my parents that forced this dyslexic boy to go to school, to my grandparents who studied in a village without electricity under candle light to elevate their lives, to my sister who inspired me with her work ethic. All that I have achieved has been by standing on the shoulders of those that have come before me. Breaking Toxic Triangles: How Courageous Followers stand up to Destructive Leadership iii Declaration This thesis: • Contains no material which has been accepted for the award to the candidate of any other degree or diploma, except where due reference is made in the text of the examinable outcome; • To the best of the candidate’s knowledge contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference is made in the text of the examinable outcome; • Where the work is based on joint research or publications, discloses the relative contributions of the respective workers or authors; • This thesis is less than 100,000 words in length exclusive of reference list and appendices; • Melody Powell edited parts of this thesis. The editing addressed only style and grammar and not its substantive content; and • This thesis used archival data with no participants and did not need Ethics Approval from the Swinburne University of Technology. Alain de Sales nd June 22 , 2020 Breaking Toxic Triangles: How Courageous Followers stand up to Destructive Leadership iv Table of Contents ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................................................... I ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................................................... III DECLARATION ................................................................................................................................ IV TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................................................ V LIST OF TABLES ..............................................................................................................................XII LIST OF FIGURES ............................................................................................................................ XIII CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................. 1 1.1 OVERVIEW ........................................................................................................................... 1 1.2 RESEARCH BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT .................................................................................... 1 1.3 RESEARCH PROBLEM .............................................................................................................. 4 1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS ........................................................................................................... 7 1.5 METHODOLOGY .................................................................................................................... 8 1.6 CONTRIBUTIONS .................................................................................................................. 10 1.7 CONCLUSION ...................................................................................................................... 11 CHAPTER 2 – LITERATURE REVIEW: LEADERSHIP AND FOLLOWERSHIP ............................. 13 2.1 OVERVIEW ......................................................................................................................... 13 2.2 FOLLOWERS IN LEADER-CENTRIC THEORIES .............................................................................. 14 2.2.1 Followership in Trait Theories ................................................................................. 15 2.2.2 Behavioural Theories Influenced by Followers ........................................................ 16 2.2.3 Followers in Contingency Theories .........................................................................