You know this boss. Maybe you've worked for them. Maybe you've watched them from across the organization, wondering how they keep getting promoted despite leaving destruction in their wake.
They hit their numbers, so leadership protects them. They fire anyone who brings inconvenient data. They surround themselves with loyalists who never challenge their decisions. When things go wrong, they blame saboteurs. When pressed for accountability, they point to metrics that make them look good—even if they're fake numbers.
The performance stays polished enough to deflect real scrutiny.
In corporate America, we call this a toxic high performer. Someone who delivers results while destroying everything around them. They govern through perception management—headlines, presentations, applause lines. The optics matter more than the underlying performance.
You've seen how this story ends. An employee finally stands up to them. The retaliation is swift—a demotion, a performance improvement plan, a slow erasure. The whistleblower goes to HR hoping for protection. But HR can't help because stepping in would put their own position at risk.
HR knows it's wrong. They draft strongly-worded memos, hold listening sessions, promise they're fighting behind the scenes. But when it's time to actually remove the toxic leader? They choose institutional survival over individual protection.
"We're doing our best from the inside," they say, while the damage spreads.
This isn't dysfunction. It's design. Systems that reward people who can work around broken processes instead of fixing them. That promote those who manage up beautifully while managing down destructively. That protect high performers no matter what they destroy along the way.
Here's the thing about toxic high performers: they're really good at gaming broken systems. They master the art of working around dysfunction instead of fixing it. They learn to manipulate metrics, exploit loopholes, perform authority without demonstrating competence.
Too many people mistake their ability to navigate broken systems for their ability to create successful ones.
The deeper problem isn't just one toxic leader. It's the succession pipeline that ensures only certain types of people can rise. Watch what happens when a long-serving CEO steps down. They don't really leave. They join the board. Become advisors. Their protégés get promoted. Their way of thinking gets preserved long after their official tenure ends.
Ideas calcify. Networks become echo chambers. Solutions that worked for problems we no longer have become institutional gospel.
The skills that help you survive dysfunction aren't the same skills that help you create healthy cultures. The person who can navigate a broken system isn't necessarily the person who should be designing the next one.
This is why organizations keep making the same mistakes. They promote people who succeeded in broken systems and then wonder why those systems stay broken. They reward the ability to manage around dysfunction instead of rewarding the ability to eliminate it.
This isn't just about individual companies anymore. When toxic leadership patterns become normalized across industries, they reshape entire economic systems. What we accept. What we reward. What we protect. And when those same patterns start showing up in our most critical institutions? The stakes become existential.
Lost talent. Destroyed teams. Competitive failure. The slow erosion of everything organizations claim to value.
But I see what's possible when leaders choose courage over comfort. When they stop protecting systems that protect dysfunction. When they build something entirely new instead of managing around what's broken.
The question isn't whether you need new leadership. The question is: who's willing to build entirely new systems instead of managing around what's broken?
Who's willing to stop protecting dysfunction just because it's comfortable?
Your company doesn't have to keep making the same mistakes. But it will if you keep using the same broken systems to fix them.
You need outside perspective. Fresh eyes. An independent audit of the skills of your leadership teams at all levels, the strength of your processes to align with business outcomes. You can't do it from the inside and you can't have an audit done by someone working for the CEO—the power hierarchy clouds results.
This is where you need courage. To have your bad systems and underperforming leaders exposed, and then to do something about it. Knowing is the small part. Doing is where most companies fail.
The choice is yours. But the pattern is predictable.