Psychopathic CEOs Are Rife In Silicon Valley, Experts Say (theguardian.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: There is a high proportion of psychopathic CEOs in Silicon Valley, enabled by protective investors and weak human resources departments, according to a panel of experts at SXSW festival. Although the term "psychopath" typically has negative connotations, some of the attributes associated with the disorder can be advantageous in a business setting. "A true psychopath is someone that has a blend of emotional, interpersonal, lifestyle and behavioral deficits but an uncanny ability to mask them. They come across as very charming, very gregarious. But underneath there's a profound lack of remorse, callousness and a lack of empathy," said forensic and clinical psychologist Michael Woodworth, who has worked with psychopathic murderers in high security prisons, on Tuesday. According to recent studies there's a high prevalence of psychopathy among high-level executives in a corporate environment: 4-8% compared with 1% in the general population. This makes sense, according to Silicon Valley venture capitalist Bryan Stolle because "it's an irrational act to start a company." "You have to have a tremendous amount of ego [and] self-deception to embark on that journey," he said. "You have to make sacrifices and give up things, including sometimes a marriage, family and friends. And you have to convince other people. So they are mostly very charismatic, charming and make you suspend the disbelief that something can't be done." However, the positive attributes are accompanied by manipulation. "One of the main things that makes them extremely difficult to organizations is their willingness to manipulate through deception," said Jeff Hancock, a Stanford social scientist who studies psychopathy. "Psychopaths will handpick people they can use as lackeys or supporters, such as someone in HR they can have in their wheelhouse," said Woodworth.

Comments

Leadership

[Anonymous Coward]

Sort of explains Trump...

Re:hmm...

[fish_in_the_c]

no the main problem with Clinton is that she believed in supreme court justices who like to engage in 'creative interpretation' of the law and who would rather 'read a modern meaning' into the laws and constitution rather then actually interpret them to mean what they were intended to mean by the people who wrote them or would have been reasonably understood to mean at the time of the writing.

So, instead of allowing and expecting the actual legislative process to change laws that need changing , they simply 'read what society means today' becoming petty dictators who usurp the authority of the legislative branch.

Other problems I had with her include her normalization of religious persecution for people who espouse ideas about morality she didn't like.
Especially since I'd be on the receiving end of such.

Basically I knew what Clinton would deliver and didn't want any of the package being sold.
I figured trump would be a terrible president but if he might feel like 'keeping face' by actually doing many of the things he had promised to do.
Including securing our boarders, ( I'm very pro LEGAL immigration , but illegal immigration creates a sub class of persons who cannot seek help from the police when a crime is committed against then).
Clinton never even suggested trying to solve the problem.

The worse characteristics of trump is anti-environmental, conspiracy theory bent.

However, I'd rather the country be destroyed then allowed legalized abortion and gay marriage to continue unchecked.

Basically I'm a pro-technology, pro-small business, pro-states right, pro-immigration, pro-life, pro-environment so either way I have to pick which candidate will deliver the things I consider most important , but in general democrats are anti-small business, anti-state rights, and anti-life, so unless I figure there is good chance of someone starting a nuclear war the republican would get my voice.

I used to be a pro-life democrat until all such people who were sincerely so were basically driven from the party.