Being a leader, we all get nervous once a day, our heartbeats fast and our palms get sweaty. We don’t even know when anyone will walk into our cabin and make us count our qualities of bad leadership.
Who are you? A horrible boss or a nagging project manager? If you don’t know what role you’re playing in your organization and always fear your respect, you must work on your leadership traits. A leader never wants to be disrespectful, distrustful, and to be known for poor leadership qualities. If you don’t know who you’re and want to bring some changes in your leadership, we curated a short post telling qualities of bad leadership.
We are sure, after going through these characteristics of a bad leader, you will be able to make required changes in yourself and meet a better personality hiding inside you. Before we head to traits of a bad leader, first know ‘what is bad leadership’.
Table of Contents
What Makes a Bad Leader?
Put simply, leading an organization or project means you’re working with a team. What a team means is — a group of people, different thoughts, and different ideas. Being a leader, it’s your responsibility to listen to those ideas, get them executed by the team with a strategy in order to bring maximum innovation and productivity to the project.
Poor leadership lacks focus on the ideas that come up with their own perspectives. A bad or poor leader will disregard different opinions, will not engage with the team, and disagree with their thoughts. Also, avoid having an open discussion with the team and doesn’t have decision-making skills are two characteristics of bad leadership.
Let’s know the qualities of bad leadership.
What are the characteristics of a Poor Leader?
We spend a lot of time developing good leadership qualities, but we never focus on getting rid of negative leadership traits. In this section, we will help you to meet attributes of bad leaders to help you to improve your leadership qualities.
#1. You are Not a Good Listener
To be a bad listener is one of the qualities of bad leadership. A poor leader will always focus on their own ideas and disrespect the opinions of other team members. They always put their thoughts above and avoid others in the discussion and are later known for their negative leadership qualities. If you want to learn effective leadership skills, try being a good listener or click here.
#2. They Play a Blame Game
If you’re around such a leader, don’t expect a fair favor from them. Playing safe and blaming others is one of the qualities of bad leadership. While leadership means taking responsibility for each action taking place around the leader, a poor leader will blame his team instead of defending them. If you know you’re playing the role of scapegoat, let us clarify that this is one of the problems of bad leadership.
#3. The Fear of Challenges
Leadership always comes with a bundle of challenges and everyone doesn’t have the guts to deal with them. Always remaining the same, being in a comfort zone, never accepting new challenges, is one of the weak leadership qualities. If you, being a leader, or your boss fears challenges, that means you’re around bad leadership. This is among the qualities of bad leadership, so think if you’re looking forward to leading a business.
#4. They Don’t Have Empathy
Leadership involves many aspects, from connecting with employees, understanding them to being around them when they need you. A bad leader is apathetic and poor in understanding their employees and that is why they are known for having qualities of bad leadership. Showing a lack of interest in your employees is among the causes of poor leadership.
#5. They are Inconsistent
Leaders who are inconsistent in their behavior, their protocols, and their thoughts are not leader-worthy. Inconsistency in leadership is one of the poor leadership traits. Such leaders mold the situation according to their convenience. They might not be aware of the qualities of bad leadership which lead them to misconnections with the team and soon start getting ignored, disrespect, and hatred from their employees.
#6. They Don’t Communicate
Just because they are leaders, they feel superior and always give their decision without thinking necessary to communicate with their team. This starts aching when an employee has some exceptional strategy to discuss with the team to be executed on the project. This attribute shows a characteristic of a bad follower that results in poor leadership.