Meta-analytic studies suggest that the gender differences in narcissism have indeed been declining over the past few decades, largely because women have become more narcissistic, rather than men becoming less so. This change reaffirms the danger of encouraging women to lean in or act more like men to climb the corporate ladder. We are only inviting them to strengthen a problematic leadership model and augment rather than reduce current incompetence rates.

First, narcissists are significantly more prone to counterproductive and antisocial work behaviors, such as bullying, fraud, white-collar crime, and harassment, including sexual harassment. And, given the contagious nature of these toxic behaviors, their teams and organizations are more likely to engage in these unethical and destructive activities as well.

Second, although narcissists generally perform perfectly well just after their promotion to a leadership role, this usually short honeymoon period is followed by a much bleaker phase. For instance, narcissistic leaders, especially narcissist CEOs, are paid more than their counterparts, and they are also more likely to push their organizations into extravagant acquisitions and other investments without, unfortunately, producing a higher return on investment (ROI).

Narcissistic leaders are notably less coachable, not least because of their stiff resistance to negative feedback. They’re quick to blame others for their own mistakes and to take credit for others’ achievements. In the unlikely event that narcissists do pay attention to criticism, they will usually respond aggressively and retaliate rather than use that feedback to improve. To make matters worse, these tendencies are exacerbated by narcissists’ impulsive nature. Because of their poor self-control, narcissists have trouble sustaining any development or self-improvement initiative.

The effects of humble leadership tend to cascade down to the rest of the organization, turning leaders into genuine role models. These effects have been demonstrated in recent studies by Brad Owens from the Marriott School of Business at Brigham Young University and David Hekman from the Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado. When leaders behave humbly, employees emulate this behavior and display more modesty, admit mistakes, share credit with others, and are more receptive to others’ ideas and feedback. Using data from 607 individuals grouped into 161 teams (both in research labs and in real work environments), the authors demonstrated a social-contagion effect for humble leadership, which enhanced selfless and collaborative behaviors in their followers and, in turn, in team performance.