Narcissistic Leadership: Why the Conversation Needs to Change

On alpha wolves, polished narcissism, and why the most dangerous misconception in leadership is that narcissism is the enemy.

The popular narrative about narcissistic leadership goes roughly like this: narcissists rise to power because they are charming and manipulative. Once there, they exploit, devalue, and discard the people around them. The organisation suffers. The solution is to recognise narcissistic leaders early and remove them before the damage becomes irreversible.

This story is not entirely wrong. But it is dangerously oversimplified. And the oversimplification causes real harm — not just to the leaders it mislabels, but to the organisations that lose their most potent change-makers because someone read a pop-psychology article and concluded that confidence equals pathology.

In the introduction to Let’s Talk Leadership, I summarised this popular view deliberately: ‘First, they’re all narcissists. They can’t feel, can’t tune in to other people’s emotions, and like to abuse the weak.’ I wrote those words to name the narrative, not to endorse it. Because this neo-Marxist point of view, explaining the world based on binary truths, is simply incorrect. And it is dangerous, because without a correct understanding of leadership, the world will be a mess forever.

In my work coaching C-suite executives across Europe, and in the research Martin Appelo and I conducted for Red de Alfawolf, I have come to see narcissism in leadership very differently. Not as a simple villain story, but as one of the most complex and fascinating dynamics in organisational life. (For the Dutch perspective, see: Narcistisch Leiderschap.)

The Alpha Wolf Problem

Let me start with what narcissistic traits actually do in a leadership context. They provide energy. They provide vision. They provide the courage to walk into a room and say what nobody else will say. The qualities we label ‘narcissistic’ — self-confidence, risk tolerance, an unshakable belief in one’s own direction — are often the exact qualities that organisations desperately need in their leaders, particularly during periods of crisis or transformation.

Think about what happens in a crisis. When an organisation is under threat — financial collapse, competitive disruption, existential uncertainty — people instinctively look for someone who radiates certainty. Not someone who convenes a committee. Not someone who asks for more data. Someone who stands up and says: ‘Follow me. I know the way.’ That person almost always has what we would clinically describe as narcissistic traits. And in that moment, those traits are not a pathology. They are a survival mechanism for the collective.

Martin Appelo, a clinical psychologist and my co-author, puts it precisely: ‘There are many successful leaders with narcissism, but there are also many successful leaders without narcissism, and there are many people with attachment wounds who never become leaders at all. We are talking about risk profiles, not diagnoses.’ This distinction matters enormously. The popular discourse treats narcissism as a binary: you are either a narcissist or you are not. But narcissism exists on a spectrum. Every leader I have ever worked with has narcissistic traits. The question is not whether those traits exist, but what the leader does with them.

Polished and Unpolished: The Framework

In Red de Alfawolf, we introduced the concept of the ‘polished’ versus ‘unpolished’ alpha wolf. The distinction is not between narcissistic and non-narcissistic leaders. It is between leaders who have learned to harness their narcissistic energy with reciprocity, and those who have not.

The unpolished alpha wolf is the leader everyone recognises from the headlines. Steve Jobs telling engineers their work was worthless. Zlatan Ibrahimović refusing to pass the ball because he was certain he could do better with it himself. The CEO who absorbs credit and distributes blame. The founder who builds an empire but cannot maintain a single trusting relationship. These leaders achieve remarkable things — and leave remarkable damage in their wake. Not because their drive is wrong, but because their drive operates without relational awareness. As we write in the book: ‘Unpolished alpha wolves go primarily for their own interest. Under the guise of being there for others, they primarily promote themselves. And when others don’t applaud or help, they are removed.’ (See also: Authority vs Legitimacy for how this erodes organisational trust.)

The polished alpha wolf is someone who has done the inner work. They still have the drive, the vision, the willingness to confront. But they have also developed what we call wederkerigheid — reciprocity. The capacity to see others not as instruments of their vision, but as participants in a shared enterprise. This is not about becoming ‘soft.’ It is about becoming complete. A polished alpha wolf can inspire in a crisis and collaborate in peacetime. That combination is extraordinarily rare, and extraordinarily valuable.

The Narcissistic Circle: Where It Comes From

The psychological origins of narcissistic patterns are almost always relational. In attachment theory, narcissistic defences develop as a response to early environments where vulnerability was punished or unrecognised. Bowlby’s framework suggests that the child who does not receive consistent emotional validation develops a compensatory strategy: ‘If nobody will meet my needs, I will meet them myself — and I will make sure I never need anyone again.’

Martin describes this as the ‘narcissistic circle’: an early deficit in what he calls oersoep — the primordial emotional nourishment every child needs — followed by narcissistic inflation (compensating for the wound by enlarging the self), followed by a structural deficit in reciprocity. The circle is self-reinforcing: the more the leader inflates, the more others withdraw, which confirms the original belief that others cannot be trusted, which drives further inflation.

There are two variants that we see repeatedly in practice. Some leaders had too little oersoep — they were emotionally neglected, forced into premature autonomy, and learned to survive by being self-sufficient and superior. Martin describes this as the ‘depressive narcissistic’ dynamic: ‘If others won’t be there for me, I’ll do it alone. And now that I can do it alone, I don’t need anyone anymore.’ These become solitary performers: brilliant, driven, and fundamentally alone. They are often the best crisis leaders — calm under fire, decisive, willing to enter the danger zone — but they struggle profoundly with the relational demands of peacetime leadership.

Others had too much oersoep — they were over-validated, told they were exceptional without conditions, and never learned to tolerate frustration or develop genuine empathy. They become leaders who expect the world to serve them, who experience disagreement as betrayal, and who surround themselves with mirrors that only reflect what they want to see.

In both cases, the deficit is the same: a lack of genuine reciprocity. And in both cases, the leadership that results can be extraordinarily effective in certain contexts and extraordinarily destructive in others. The context determines whether the narcissism serves or sabotages. (This dynamic plays out visibly in boardroom settings.)

Why the Binary Narrative Is Dangerous

The popular narrative that equates narcissism with toxicity creates several serious problems for organisations and for the leaders themselves.

First, it pathologises strength. When we tell leaders that their confidence, their directiveness, their willingness to challenge the room are ‘narcissistic traits,’ we are implicitly telling them that the engine of their leadership is a disease. Many of the best leaders I work with have spent years in therapy or coaching trying to eliminate the very qualities that make them effective. That is not development; it is amputation. I have watched leaders become less effective, not more, after being told their decisiveness was ‘narcissistic.’ They became hesitant, second-guessing, consensual to the point of paralysis — and their organisations drifted.

Second, it creates a culture of mediocrity. As I argue in Let’s Talk Leadership, the current trend toward associating leadership exclusively with soft skills — empathy, connection, vulnerability — risks throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Without hard skills, without directiveness, without the courage to confront, organisations drift into comfortable consensus where nobody makes the difficult decision. Soft leadership is essential. But it is not sufficient. Both are needed. It is not either-or; it is both-and. Hard leadership is sometimes necessary, but it must be delivered in a polished way.

Third, it prevents real development. When you label someone a ‘narcissist,’ the implied treatment is removal. But when you understand narcissistic patterns as a developmental challenge — a deficit in reciprocity that can be addressed through structured coaching — the conversation shifts entirely. The question is no longer ‘How do we get rid of this person?’ but ‘How do we help this person develop what they’re missing while preserving what they do brilliantly?’

The Reality Distortion Field

I should be clear: narcissistic patterns without awareness cause real and sometimes devastating damage. In Let’s Talk Leadership, I describe working with a leader I call Erik — a self-made entrepreneur who had built his company from scratch and saw himself as a visionary. He spoke for almost forty-five minutes without pausing before I said a word. He described everyone around him as ‘lazy, political, or ungrateful.’

This was not arrogance in the conventional sense. It was what I call a reality distortion field: a protective delusion that filters all incoming information to confirm the leader’s self-image. Erik’s company was collapsing under his leadership — turnover was high, the board was restless, senior managers had left — but his perspective was that he was saving the company from mediocrity. The reality was that his impulsive decisions were driving it toward insolvency.

The organisational cost of unpolished narcissistic leadership is severe and well-documented. Talent leaves — the best people first, because they have options. What remains is a team selected for compliance, not competence. Decision-making distorts because information only flows upward when it is flattering. The culture develops learned helplessness — people stop innovating because innovation requires psychological safety, and psychological safety is the first casualty of narcissistic leadership culture.

But here is the crucial point: the problem was not Erik’s drive, or his vision, or even his confidence. The problem was that those qualities operated without a feedback loop. He had no mirror. No one in his system who could tell him what everyone else could see. His narcissistic defence had become so total that reality itself was curated.

What Actually Works: Coaching Narcissistic Leaders

Coaching narcissistic leaders is not about dismantling their strength. It is about building what is missing: the capacity for reciprocity. Not every narcissistic leader can be coached — some are too deeply entrenched, too defended, or too structurally protected by their position. But many can, particularly those who are beginning to feel the cost of their own pattern.

In the stakeholder-centred approach I use (based on Marshall Goldsmith’s methodology), we do not begin by arguing with the leader’s self-image. That triggers more defensiveness. Instead, we create conditions where the leader can encounter reality without being destroyed by it. We conduct confidential interviews with eight to fifteen stakeholders. We map the gap between how the leader sees themselves and how others experience them. And we design concrete, observable behavioural changes tied to specific situations.

The core insight from Goldsmith’s methodology — the one that makes it particularly effective with narcissistic patterns — is that behavioural change does not require insight into the psychological origins of the pattern. You do not need to resolve your childhood attachment wounds to change how you respond to critical feedback in a board meeting. You need practice, accountability, and a structured process. As Martin Appelo and I discuss extensively in Red de Alfawolf, this is what makes coaching different from therapy: it targets the behaviour, not the biography. (The full 7-Step Change Process is outlined in my pillar guide.)

With Erik, the breakthrough came when I invited him to explore the emotional cost of always being right. He resisted for weeks. But eventually he said, quietly: ‘If I’m not right, then who am I?’ That sentence cracked open the self-concept that had governed him for decades. His identity was fused with control. His perspective was not strategic — it was existential. Once he could see that, we could begin working on separating his worth from his certainty. It took months, but slowly, through reflective work and stakeholder feedback, Erik rebuilt his perspective to include vulnerability as strength.

The Four Leadership Scripts

One of the frameworks Martin and I developed in Red de Alfawolf is the concept of leadership scripts. Drawing on schema therapy’s insight that people do not have a single personality but multiple mental programmes activated in different contexts, we identified four leadership scripts that correspond to four core capabilities.

The sensitive alpha wolf detects threat and acts decisively. The soaring inspirator rises above detail to provide vision and direction. The reciprocal administrator builds trust through fairness, shared accountability, and genuine relationship. And the flexible manager knows when to switch scripts or delegate to someone who has what the situation needs.

Narcissistic leaders are often brilliant at the alpha wolf and inspirator scripts. They inspire through charisma and lead decisively in crisis. But they consistently struggle with the administrator script — the reciprocal leader who must share power, distribute credit, and earn respect through consistent behaviour over time. This is where the deficit in reciprocity becomes visible. And this is where coaching can make the most difference. The goal is not to eliminate the alpha wolf. It is to expand the repertoire. (See: Why Every CEO Needs a Coach.)

The Mirror Nobody Wants

I will end with something personal. In Red de Alfawolf, Martin and I write openly about our own narcissistic patterns. I recognise in myself what Martin calls the ‘anxious narcissistic’ pattern — the drive that comes from early experiences of not fitting in, the ‘entrepreneurial fire’ that is, at its root, a compensatory response to feeling excluded. Martin describes his own ‘depressive narcissistic’ pattern — the fierce independence that emerged from early emotional neglect, the reflexive resistance to authority.

We did not write about this to perform vulnerability. We wrote about it because the most important thing I have learned in two decades of coaching is that every leader carries narcissistic patterns, and the ones who acknowledge them are infinitely more effective than the ones who deny them. The leaders I admire most are not the ones without a shadow. They are the ones who know their shadow is there, who have named it, and who have built structures around themselves to prevent it from running the show. That is not weakness. That is the most sophisticated form of leadership there is. (See also: Leadership Loneliness and Critical Friendship.)

Power does not change who you are. It enlarges what was already there. The question is whether you are willing to look at what is being enlarged — and whether you have someone in your life who will tell you the truth about it.

Arvid Buit is an executive coach and founder of TRUE Leadership. Author of Let’s Talk Leadership and Red de Alfawolf (with Martin Appelo). Certified by ICF, NOBCO, EMCC, and APECS. Marshall Goldsmith trained.