Hitler and Stalin Roots of Evil

There are a multitude of methods to which an individual's personality, behavior, and ethical leadership can influence an organization. First, this essay will analyze the distinct leadership characteristics of Hitler and Stalin via various lessons throughout chapter 2 of the textbook. Then, this essay will evaluate the personality traits, motives, and cognitive determinants that were representative of Hitler and Stalin's leadership roles. Next, this essay will examine the significance of influence relating to the moral intensity, moral sensitivity, and organizational situation on these two leaders. This essay will then conclude with a comparable real-life scenario to this analysis.

Lesson 2-1a defines several personality traits which contribute to the successfulness of a leader. While Stalin and Hitler lacked a moral compass, they were tremendously successful in their leadership roles. They shared personal traits and interpersonal behaviors such as self-confidence, enthusiasm, assertiveness, emotional intelligence, and extraversion (Dubrin, 2019, figure 2-1). Stalin and Hitler were mass murderers; contributing to more than 60 million innocent deaths; however, they could inspire millions of people to embrace their horrendous actions as necessities for a better future and world. Through these abhorrent actions, Stalin and Hitler effectively changed the world and will forever be disparagingly memorialized in history. Both Hitler and Stalin did possess high levels of self-awareness when it came to how the masses reacted to Hitler and Stalin's actions. Both men used relationship management to convince the people that they had a calling to serve their people and they believed they were better suited, more than anyone else, to carry out leadership roles.

As to Hitler and Stalin's motives; the video discusses how both men were raised by abusive fathers, had deprived childhoods, and eventually grew to have women issues, suffer from paranoia, and disdain for their physical attributes. These are all attributes that would signify low self-esteem, introversion, and inadequacy; however, these two leaders used these particularities as fuel to advance themselves. Hitler and Stalin became leaders with high power motives (Dublin, 2019, lesson 2-2a). These men clearly possessed personalized power motives; however, they both believed they were following a more socialized power motive. Hitler and Stalin actually presumed that killing those people contributed to the good of their countries. Stalin changed his name because the name Stalin meant man of steel (Emile, 2016). Hitler and Stalin had an insatiable lust to dominate and show everyone how powerful they were. Both men had an achievement motivation drive to reshape their country and deliberately removed any opposing obstacles, whether it be a person, idea, or a physical structure. It is possible the influence from Hitler and Stalin's heredity and surrounding environment may have influenced their abusive, brutal, and paranoid reign; however, there is no denying they were fully aware of how their actions and had no mindfulness or social awareness (Dublin, 2019, 2-1b).

Hitler used his emotional intelligence to determine which aspects of his country's culture he could distort. Germany was ravaged by WW1. People were poor and frustrated. Hitler used this combined with his hatred for Jewish people to mislead the Germans to believe all their financial and country issues stemmed from the inferior Jewish community. The people of his country were despite and needed something to unite them and sadly, this was as good a reason as any. Similarly, Stalin also united the Russian people after the revolution. Stalin rose to power and held a powerful, highly respected position, he decided to assassinate any possible enemiesand even friend who became too popular (Emile, 2016). People became scared of him and would not challenge his actions.

Years ago, my manager was replaced by a Lebanese manager who had never worked in the United States. He worked for our company, which is an international company, for many years and was very good friends with the COO. The COO was of course, best friends with the CEO, which gave both men high status. Unfortunately, he was raised in a very strict home where the women stayed home, had children, went to church, and the men essentially ruled the house and provided (as they saw fit) for the family. He was not thrilled to meet our group which consisted of 4 women and one male. He instantly promoted the male over the rest of us even though he had only been with the company for 3 years and our manager was there for 33 years. She was extremely intelligent and help 2 doctorates. That did not matter to him at all. He proceeded to tell us how things were gonna go and what was expected of us and if we couldn't work late because of children or other obligations, we didn't need to be there. He was ruthless, insulting, and degrading. Two women quite within 6 months and everyone, including the male coworker, filed complaints with HR. That being said, he was extremely smart. He had a great knowledge of the business and when he wasn't being a jerk would explain to me how the different areas of the company were affected by others. For example, how our Texas supply chain group affected sales in Italy or Germany. He helped make our Finance dept. much more efficient and even helped automate several processes. I can't say I respected him or that I liked him even a little, but I was impressed by his knowledge and skill. In a way, I find he was like Stalin and Hitler, albeit, on a much less horrendous scale. He demanded respect, had drive, and great cognitive factors, but he had a personalized power motive, and a serious lack of insight. Successful leadership is difficult and takes many years and skills to acquire.

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