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194 SNAKES IN SUITS
own research and that of others, we now know that some organizations
actively seek out and recruit individuals with at least a moderate
dose of psychopathic features. Some executives have said to us,
“Many of the traits you describe to us seem to be valued by our company.
Why shouldn’t companies hire psychopaths to fill some jobs?”
A proper, scientific answer is that more research is needed to determine
the impact of various doses of psychopathic characteristics on
the performance of different types of jobs. The “optimal” number
and severity of such characteristics presumably is higher for some
jobs (such as stock promoter, politician, law enforcement, used-car
salespeople, mercenaries, and lawyers) than for others (such as social
workers, teachers, nurses, and ministers). Until such research is done,
we can safely say that those who believe that “psychopathy is good”
clearly have not had much exposure to the real thing.
Anyone working with or for a psychopath will be painfully aware
of his or her destructiveness. For an organization, one psychopath,
unchecked, can do considerable harm to staff morale, productivity,
and teamwork. The problem is that you cannot choose which psychopathic
traits you want and ignore the others; psychopathy is a
syndrome, that is, a package of related traits and behaviors that form
the total personality of the individual. Unfortunately for business,
the “good” traits often conceal the existence of the “bad” when it
comes to a psychopath.
An important reason for mistaking a true psychopath for a leader
is that a talented psychopath can easily feign leadership and management
traits sought after by executives when making hiring, promotion,
and succession planning decisions. A charming demeanor and
grandiose talk can easily be mistaken for charismatic leadership and
self-confidence. Furthermore, because of its critical importance to effective
leadership, charisma, when it is found in a candidate, can lead
to a “halo” effect—that is, a tendency for interviewers and decision
makers to generalize from a single trait to the entire personality. The
halo effect acts to “fill in the blanks” in the absence of other information
about the person and can overshadow more critical judg-