Bad Leadership in Organizations

Bad Use of Leadership
Jozelle Steenkamp, Director, South Africa
We would like to not use the two ideas together... Bad and leadership. "We" being society see leadership as being positive, guiding and supportive where bad is negative.
There is an old saying "Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely" and I think that is when leadership becomes negative.
In a corporate environment bad leadership is seen in the figures or financials. I believe it is the decision making and not the leadership style that is bad. If a person is in a position of power, which leaders are seen to be, there was something he or she did well before getting to that position which was his or her leadership skills or style, making bad decisions in that position does not reflect on the style of leadership rather the misuse of trust or power.
So a certain way of leadership, in my opinion, is not bad it; is the way it is used that is bad...
Comments?

Bad Leadership Style, Not adapted to the situation at hand
Roland Alech, Consultant, France
Hi all! It seems to me that a leader's style can be totally inadapted to the current situation, making it de facto a "bad" leadership in these circumstances.
In my experience, a leader must know himself / herself and adapt if needed to answer to a developing situation efficiently.
"Bad" leadership could also could be seen as a lack of leadership (ex: poor decision making ability.

Leadership Has Nothing to do with Good or Bad
Vipul Nahar, Other, India
Emily, Firstly I am not sure whether you are referring to good or bad leadership or good or bad way of practicing it. Well, if I assume the earlier part then yes I agree with what @Jozelle Steenkamp mentioned that neither leadership nor management is either good or bad. It's indeed the way people practice it, both inside and outside the organization.
Existing theories and styles might not fit well to every situation we come across so it largely relies upon we individuals how well do we understand the respective situation and craft a related theory and style.
Please note that Leadership and Management both are mere words with very simple meaning associated. It's just some people around us, who spoil the meaning of both the terms.

Stephen Covey's Circle of Influence
Tan Poh Lip, Manager, Malaysia
Hi everyone, in my opinion, what the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People mentioned about the "Circle of Influence" is very important.
It is whether we increase our "internal cycle of influence" to others or let external / environment factors to influence us which make us become good or bad leaders.
If we are in a good attitude and always want to have positive things for return, then we should practice good leadership style to encourage a healthier competitive world, otherwise it will go to the opposite side.

Bad Leadership in a Moral Way
Herman, Manager, South Africa
Hi, I read the comments on your question. I would like to warn upon becoming so theoretical that we use sight of what happens in practice.
I agree that we can see bad leadership styles in our businesses, maybe even more today than ever before.
But to have certain qualities that can be identified as 'good' leadership qualities does not mean that I am a 'good' leader! Take the quality of influencing. I can influence people to commit a crime and 'lead' them effectively along a road of destruction.
Would you identify the leader of such a gang as good or bad?
Take another example. Corruption is something that the whole world battles with - the leadership style of some-one that is corrupt - is it good or bad?
The question that I have is "What is the role of morality in leadership styles?"
Personally, I don't think that leadership style training is helping us a lot if we do it in isolation from moral principles.