The dark side of teaching: destructive instructor leadership and its association with students’ affect, behaviour, and cognition

Abstract

Leadership theory can provide a route for investigating teaching via the concept of instructor leadership. Instructor leadership is defined as a process whereby instructors exert intentional influence over students to guide, structure and facilitate classroom activities and relationships in a class. Instructor leadership in higher education research has focused primarily on constructive leadership. However, the classroom context is also conducive to destructive leadership. The objectives of this study are to (a) conceptualize destructive instructor leadership and (b) investigate the association between destructive instructor leadership and student reactions. Using 13 in-depth semistructured student interviews at management schools across various universities worldwide, the results of a thematic analysis indicate that destructive instructor leadership can be conceptualized as three dimensions, including callous communication, chaotic carelessness and irresponsibility. The interview data are then used to demonstrate that destructive instructor leadership is associated with students’ affective, behavioural and cognitive reactions. Theoretically, this study (a) contributes the concept of destructive instructor leadership, (b) extends previous organizational behaviour research on destructive leadership by offering a multidimensional concept and (c) examines the reactions of two manifestations of destructive leadership. Limitations, suggestions for future research and practical implications are discussed.

Acknowledgements

I would like to express sincere thanks to Dr. Kamal Birdi and Professor Ute Stephan for their feedback on this paper. This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. When describing a unit of teaching over an academic term, ‘module’ is typically used in the United Kingdom and Australia, whereas ‘course’ is typically used in the United States and Canada. Moreover, in the United Kingdom, a course is used to refer to an entire programme of modules.

2. In the process of conducting interviews, the sample consisted of seven females and four males. At that stage, the sample was not balanced by gender. Because of the slight gender imbalance, two potential female participants were turned away and I actively sought 2 to 3 additional male participants.

3. One student did part of her undergraduate programme in China and completed it in the United Kingdom. Her experiences were described from the HEI in China and so she was not regarded as part of the UK sample.

4. The aim of the supportive leadership question was to (a) start the interview on a positive note and (b) acclimatize candidates to the notion of leadership behaviours in the classroom.

5. The only difference between my thematic dimensions and that of the second researcher was that of the ‘irresponsibility’ dimension. The second researcher created a similar category labelled ‘professionalism’ but his category also contained lack of interest in student and embarrassment. Closer inspection of the raw data revealed that lack of interest and embarrassment appeared to be more relevant to teaching methods and communication respectively.

6. For affective reactions, students described their specific emotions and feelings. Therefore, because the elements and classes were nearly identical, only the classes are illustrated in Figure 2.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Paul T. Balwant

Paul T. Balwant is currently a Doctoral Researcher at the Management School at The University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK. Email: [email protected]. Paul also lectures at the Management Studies department at The University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad. His most recent paper titled Practice What You Preach: Instructors as Transformational Leaders in Higher Education Classrooms won the Best Paper in Management Education at the 2014 Academy of Management Meeting.