Can Antisocial Leaders Succeed?

Sandra was a bold, charismatic woman who easily dominated the room when I was co-teaching a Bible study in the women’s mod of Santa Ana Jail in Santa Ana, California. Like many of her jail mates, Sandra had a tendency to say “all the right things,” but did not necessarily demonstrate real understanding of what the truths of Scripture could mean for her life.

Sandra had been brought to the U.S. by her mother when she was a small child. Her siblings had long since resolved their immigration issues, but not Sandra. She was too busy doing drugs and running with her gang to worry about documents and lines crossed. As a result, Sandra was about to be deported to a country she barely remembered.

For months, Sandra did a lot of subtle bargaining with God. My co-teacher and I worried that she would be unprepared for the inevitable outcome. Finally—miraculously—when all avenues for reprieve were exhausted, Sandra surprised us. She accepted her fate and began to demonstrate real change. She took responsibility for her behavior and, for the first time, expressed gratitude that her mother was not only caring for her children while Sandra was incarcerated, but had also committed to return to South America with her.

Whether or not Sandra suffered from antisocial personality disorder or just got caught up in a series of poor choices, I don’t know. But, antisocial leaders inevitably end up in jail or in some other kind of serious trouble, our experts say. So a leader like Sandra—and she was a dynamic leader—may be the only type of antisocial leader many of us ever encounter.

It’s an open question as to whether or not a religious experience can lead to authentic transformation for a true psychopath, says Dan Blazer, M.D., vice chair of faculty at Duke University School of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. “Most observed religious experiences tend to be superficial and self-serving and therefore do not last long,” he said. “However, occasionally if these persons reach the bottom, a true change may emerge.”

The disorder is not as uncommon as some believe, Blazer says. A study he participated in showed a 3% lifetime prevalence among Americans. “Common symptoms in those surveyed were job troubles (94%), violence (85%), traffic offenses (72%), severe marital problems (67%), vagrancy (51%), and persistent lying (44%).”

Therapy can help some psychopaths (and they tend to be young men), but their “propensity for glibness, superficially, and dishonesty make them difficult patients,” Blazer said, and medications offer “virtually no benefit.”

On the rare occasion when a person with antisocial personality disorder advances to an organizational leadership position, his or her behavior will eventually sabotage that leadership. “In some ways, like the narcissist, they cannot judge well the danger of the risks they take and they tend to be high on the risk-taking scale,” Blazer said.

Indeed. The mental life of an antisocial person is often quite narcissistic, adds Allan Josephson, M.D., director of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Services at The University of Louisville, Kentucky. “The difference would be that the narcissist is a little more subtle, more smooth, more sophisticated. He or she can cover it up more easily. If antisocial individuals rise in leadership positions – and it is a big if – they eventually run in to the same difficulties as narcissists.To summarize, the mind of the antisocial person is typically narcissistic, but antisocial, by definition, is someone that breaks a lot of laws and goes against the rules of society,” Josephson said.

Antisocial personality disorder often arises out of childhood trauma, neglect, or abuse, both psychiatrists said. So while we may never encounter a psychopathic leader in our organizations, we will have opportunities to intervene in young lives that could veer dangerously off course.

I don’t know what happened to Sandra after she was deported, but I hold on to the hope that she defied the odds and was authentically transformed.

Note: This concludes our series on psychological pathologies in leadership. We explored this topic in three previous articles: Leading From Psychological Brokenness, ADHD: Prescription for Leadership Success?, and When the Boss Is a Narcissist.

Image by Gideon. Used with permission. Sourced via Flickr. Post by Christine A. Scheller.