Why Bad Guys Win At Work

NOT ALL PSYCHOPATHS are in prison – some are in the boardroom,” Robert Hare famously said during his aptly titled lecture, The Predators Among Us.

- Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic

Psychopathy is one of three “dark triad” traits, the other two being narcissism and Machiavellianism. It should be noted that, unlike clinical personality traits, these traits are normally distributed in the population – e.g., you can score low, average or high – and perfectly indicative of normal functioning. In other words, just because you score high doesn’t mean that you have problems, either at work or in your personal life. And despite the antisocial implications of the dark triad, recent research has highlighted a wide range of career-related benefits for these personality characteristics.

Psychopathic individuals are generally more dishonest, egocentric, reckless, and cruel than the population average. Machiavellianism is somewhat more related to superficial charm, interpersonal manipulation, deceit, ruthlessness, and impulsivity. People who score highly on this trait are morally feeble and likely to endorse the idea that “the end justifies the means” or agree that “it is hard to get ahead without cutting corners here and there.” Narcissism relates to unrealistic feelings of grandiosity, an inflated – though often unstable and insecure – sense of self-worth, and a selfish sense of entitlement coupled with little consideration for others. As the term, and the legend of Narcissus, suggests, narcissistic individuals are so self-indulged that they may end up drowning in their own self-love – this makes it harder for them to focus on others. Narcissists are often charming, and charisma is often the socially desirable side of narcissism: Silvio Berlusconi, Jim Jones, and Steve Jobs personified this.