June 2015

Narcissistic leaders see themselves as a reward for the organizations and people they work with. Their relationship with their families is no different. Everyone around them is there to serve them, they are valuable to the extent that they fulfill their needs, and they are expected to become “invisible” when that need disappears. Because of their irrepressible lust for power, narcissistic leaders perceive expansion as development. As a result, they tend to increase their power by taking the company into businesses outside its core business. For example, Jan Carlson, who was the hero of all of us 15 years ago with the customer-centered approach he brought to the agenda with his book “Moments of Truth”, consumed the credit he received for his high performance at SAS by bringing SAS to the point of bankruptcy with unnecessary acquisitions.