Leadership and Mental Health
7 Patterns Differentiating Authentic Leaders from Fake Ones
A comparison between authentic and fake leaders using seven psychological patterns based on decades of experience in leadership field
Purpose of the Article
Since 2019, I have written several leadership articles on this platform, which many people enjoyed. They received substantial views and brought me many subscribers.
Since then, many readers have kept asking me interesting questions related to the leadership domain. One of the frequently asked questions from subscribers was about recognizing phony leaders confusing followers.
In this post, I provide key leadership patterns from my years of studies and practice in the leadership discipline to answer this specific question.
My definition of a fake leader is having power and influence over a group of people but does not add value to them. Counterfeit leaders are just the opposite of authentic ones.
Fake leaders cause stress and anxiety, affecting our mental health. However, authentic leaders can lower tension by creating excellent outcomes giving hope to people, and resulting in a better mental state.
Leveraging my research findings in the leadership domain, I provide a high-level view of recognizing fake leaders by comparing them to authentic ones. Some caused severe problems in my circles, and some affected many people, misleading and disappointing them.
This article is for information, inspiration, and awareness purposes. It does not include professional advice.
Seven Patterns to Distinguish Fake Leaders from Authentic ones.
In this section, I offer seven patterns using the characteristics of fake leaders, comparing them with authentic leaders.
I created the headings by highlighting the patterns of fake leaders as I focused on the genuine leaders in previous posts that I linked in the following sections.
As these topics are broad, I only focus on the key points.
Pattern 1: Fake leaders create unnecessary anxiety and misery.
One of the key traits of leaders is uplifting followers despite situations and circumstances. Authentic leaders have an optimistic outlook within realistic boundaries.
Leaders’ main goal is to inspire and encourage people to change from a negative position to a positive one. Authentic leaders are emotionally mature. Fake leaders lack emotional intelligence.
Authentic leaders create hope, but fake leaders cause despair.
Pattern 2: Fake leaders divide unity for their own benefit.
Authentic leaders connect individuals and help them form a unity for common goals.
Fake leaders harshly judge and blame people for their failures.
They push followers away from unity causing the teams to divide and malfunction.
Pattern 3: Fake leaders project insecurities.
Fake leader reflects their insecurities by accusing others. Their motive is to hide their weaknesses and failures.
Fake leaders are afraid of showing their mistakes, hiding behind their egos. They don’t take personal responsibility. They micromanage and even bully followers reflecting no empathy and compassion.
Authentic leaders talk and act from the higher self with empathy and compassion. They trust followers and delegate appropriately. Consequently, they are confident with humility, modesty, and vulnerability.
Pattern 4: Fake leaders create allegations using misinformation.
Fake leaders create allegations leveraging false information from unreliable sources. They reflect their assumptions and spread rumors without confirming them.
Therefore, this false approach of fake leaders misleads followers, creates unnecessary dilemmas, and causes confusion.
Authentic leaders use credible sources for evaluating situations. They cite references from the established body of knowledge in their communication.
Pattern 5: Fake leaders have a scarcity mindset.
Fake leaders act with a scarcity mindset. They envy the success of others and desire them to fail. They stick their nose in the business of other people. They hide information from others.
Authentic leaders have an abundance mindset aiming for everyone to benefit from resources and provide equal opportunity. Authentic leaders admire the success of others. They generously share information.
Fake leaders focus too much on disadvantaging and selfish competition. However, authentic leaders pay attention to collaboration by creating win-win positions.
Pattern 6: Fake leaders act unethically and illegally.
Fake leaders act unethically. They try to find holes in laws and regulations to create a competitive advantage.
Fake censor ideas hide the truth. They act in sneaky ways to create unfair opportunities. They might even attempt illegal acts secretly.
Fake leaders take things out of context to mandate their position to followers. Rather than creating their own resources, fake leaders try to steal the resources of other organizations.
Authentic leaders adhere to ethics and comply with laws. They do the right things in the proper context, following rules and regulations.
Pattern 7: Fake leaders use double standards.
Fake leaders use double standards by saying one thing and doing just the opposite of them.
For example, fake leaders ask followers to follow a principle but don’t follow it themselves to gain an unfair advantage.
Authentic leaders walk their talk by being role models for followers. They inspire people with integrity. Thus, they gain the trust of followers.
Pivotal Traits of Distinguished Leaders
In a previous article, I introduced the critical characteristics of distinguished leaders. I summarize their characteristics as takeaway points for this article.
1. Demonstrate extensive knowledge and unique expertise
2. Produce creatively
3. Articulate with precision
4. Depict supportive behavior
5. Embrace change with agility and optimism
6. Learn and deliver rapidly
7. Recognize the greatness of others
8. Bring people together
9. See the Invisible
10. Measure the progress with diligence
11. Influence people by bridging gaps
12. Transform goals into outcomes
Interested readers can check the details in an article titled. Here’s How to Recognize Distinguished Leaders.
Conclusions and Takeaways
Genuine leadership plays a pivotal role in society and the progress of humanity. Authentic leaders set the vision and strategy. Being role models, they influence the followers to achieve better collectively.
Unfortunately, fake leaders do just the opposite of authentic leaders. They divide people and misuse resources to gain selfish benefits. Consequently, they cause unnecessary stress and fail the goals of teams.
Authentic leaders produce sustainable solutions. In contrast, fake leaders focus on short-term solutions, which leads to disaster in the long term.
In a previous article published in January 2020, I introduced 26 characters of excellent leaders based on my observations of them in ethnographic settings.
So, if a leader does the opposite of these characteristics listed in the previous article, we must be careful with their motives.
Leadership is extra critical in these challenging times. People need hope to change the hostile economic climate to a positive one. I documented my perspectives in an article titled Six Tips to Filter Noise for Keeping Sanity in These Enigmatic Times.
I hope my perspectives and these positive and negative patterns can give you valuable insights into recognizing authentic and fake leaders. I’d love to read your perspectives in the comments section.
Thank you for reading my perspectives. I wish you a healthy and happy life.
In addition to leadership, I write about health and well-being. As a new reader, you might check out my holistic health and well-being stories reflecting on my reviews, observations, and decades of sensible experiments. Here are sample health improvement articles for new readers:
Dementia, Depression, Anxiety, Brain Health, Brain Atrophy, Heart Disease, Strokes, Type II Diabetes, Fatty Liver Disease, Metabolic Syndrome, Liver Cancer, Lungs Health, Pancreas Health, Kidneys Health, NCDs, Infectious Diseases, Cardiovascular Health, Neonatal Disorders, Skin Health, Dental Health, Bone Health, Leaky Gut, Leaky Brain, Brain Fog, Nervous Breakdown, Autoimmune Conditions, Chronic Inflammation, Insulin Resistance, Elevated Cortisol, Leptin Resistance, Anabolic Resistance, Cholesterol, High Triglycerides, Metabolic Disorders, and Major Diseases.
I wrote about valuable nutrients such as:
CoQ10, PQQ, NADH, TMG, Boron, Urolithin, taurine, citrulline malate, biotin, lithium orotate, alpha-lipoic acid, n-acetyl-cysteine, acetyl-l-carnitine, creatine, choline, digestive enzymes, magnesium, hydrolyzed collagen, nootropics, pure nicotine, activated charcoal, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B1, Vitamin D, Vitamin K2, Omega-3 Fatty Acids, N-Acetyl L-Tyrosine, and other nutrients that might help to improve metabolism and mental health.
I write about health as it matters. I believe health is all about homeostasis.
Disclaimer: Please note that my posts do not include health or professional advice. I document my reviews, observations, experience, and perspectives only to provide information and create awareness.
I publish my lifestyle, health, and well-being stories on EUPHORIA. My focus is on metabolic, cellular, mitochondrial, and mental health. Here is my collection of Insightful Life Lessons from Personal Stories.
You might find more information about my professional background. I write about health as it matters. I believe health is all about homeostasis.
If you are a writer, you can join Medium, Vocal Media, and NewsBreak as a writer and monetize your content while inspiring a large audience. Repurposing your content on these platforms can save you time and increase your income.
You may also check my blog posts about my articles and articles of other writers contributing to my publications on Medium. I share them on my website digitalmehmet.com. Here is my professional bio. You can contact me via weblink.
You can join my six publications on Medium, contributed by 20K+ writers, as a writer requesting access via this weblink.
