The cover photo of Fortune Small Business magazine's March issue is a guy sitting on top of a water cooler. He's wearing a red striped shirt and a blue and red tie. He has red horns popping out of his bald head. The topic: “Employees from hell.” One of the cover stories is about The turncoat No. 2 who tries to take over the business. A woman who started a company hired a guy, called Benedict Arnold in the story, as her second-in-command. After about a year, she noticed that Arnold was inflating his expenses, taking two- and three-hour lunches, and showing up late for important meetings. She was about to discipline him when Arnold dropped his own bomb. He told her she had to resign from …
Red flags for workplace sociopaths
Lovefraud readers continue to contribute their insights about spotting sociopaths. Last week a reader contributed her list of red flags to watch for when dating. Of course, sociopaths do not limit their victimizations to romantic relationships. They often create havoc in the workplace. So inspired by last week's post, Adrian Melia of Humane Resources Ltd, a UK company that helps employers recognize and prevent workplace bullying, adapted the red flags to help you spot a sociopathic boss or coworker. Here's what he wrote: Workplace habits of a career sociopath Chooses and sucks up to allies (not "friends") who are more powerful, or who he can use to further his aims, or who have …
Psychopaths in the executive suite
If you're one of those people who still thinks anyone should be able to recognize a psychopath, wake up: Not all psychopaths are beady-eyed serial killers. The psychopath you see every day could be your boss. Snakes in Suits is the new book by Dr. Robert Hare, the international expert on psychopaths, and Dr. Paul Babiak, an industrial-organizational psychologist. (I wrote about the book last Sunday as well.) Buried on page 193 is a shocking statistic: 3.5% of business executives are psychopaths. Hare and Babiak conducted original research with 200 high-potential executives. The 3.5% who scored as psychopaths were "superficial, grandiose, deceitful, impulsive, irresponsible, not taking …
Enron and corporate sociopaths
Last week former Enron executives Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were found guilty of fraud and conspiracy. Lay was convicted of six counts, including conspiracy to commit securities and wire fraud. Skilling was convicted of 19 counts of conspiracy and fraud. On the same day, the verdict was announced in Ken Lay's separate non-jury trial related to his personal finances. He was found guilty of bank fraud. In January, 2004, Andrew Fastow, Enron's former finance chief, accepted a 10-year prison sentence in a plea-bargain deal in which he agreed to testify against his former bosses. Had he not cut the deal, he would have faced 98 counts of fraud, money laundering, insider trading and other …