The dark side of leadership: A systematic review of creativity and innovation

Abstract

It is believed that workplace creativity and innovation are fostered by positive leader behaviors and positive workplace relationships and hindered by the opposite. However, some challenge this view and argue that creativity and innovation can also be fostered when employees experience what is increasingly referred to as “the dark side of leadership”. Research in this area is sparse, contradictory, and overly confusing. We provide a comprehensive systematic review of 106 empirical studies on this topic. We review research on a broad range of constructs, including abusive supervision, authoritarian leadership, narcissistic leadership, and close monitoring. As might be expected, a larger number of the articles reviewed found a negative relationship, but there are important discrepancies and details. Our review reports the main effects, summarizes the results of the mediating and moderating variables, and highlights methodological shortcomings of the previous literature. On this basis, several recommendations are made to advance this field of research.