The psychopath behind the desk

Abstract

Corporate Psychopaths are described by several authors as egocentric people, with no capacity for empathy, unscrupulous,
manipulative, Machiavellian, incapable of remorse, narcissistic, dishonest and deceitful. In certain companies abroad, some
top managers, during their careers, have shown features ascribable to Psychopathy. Their high offices and peculiar personalities
can lead to both economic and company’s public image damages.The aim of this study was to deepen this topic starting
from theory, but without leaving out the empirical data. This is the reason why a lot of foreign studies have been analysed
and the PPI-R test has been administered to some Italian top managers the PPI-R test, in order to identify possible psychopaths
in the companies. Regarding our sample, the scores have exceeded in most cases the values of the average of population,
but any of them met the criteria for prototypical Psychopath Personality.