Fake Leadership in HEIs: Mitigation, Removal, and Prevention Strategies Implementation

This chapter examines the crisis of fake leadership in higher education institutions (HEIs) and proposes a comprehensive, stage-based cycle for mitigating its destructive effects on organization, removing fake leaders from the organization, and preventing future occurrences of such leadership in the organization. Building on empirical findings that only academic values and fair election procedures directly mitigate fake leadership, while other strategies merely enable employees to survive its impact, this chapter defines fake leadership as a form of organizational crisis. Drawing on Mitroff’s five-stage crisis management model, it first outlines defensive strategies to mitigate damage caused by fake leadership in HEIs, including reinforcement of academic values, implementation of fair electoral processes, presence of legitimate authority figures, and individual survival strategies such as alliance building or procedural compliance. Next, it describes resolution strategies focused on evidence-based awareness raising, collective empowerment, corrective audits, and both short- and long-term reconstruction measures aimed at restoring institutional integrity within HEIs. Finally, it presents prevention and detection strategies, such as rigorous 360° leader selection and assessment, ethics codes, horizontal governance structures, climate surveys, and robust whistle-blowing channels, which may be used as early-warning mechanisms within HEI and there is a need for their establishment in order to limit the possibility of fake leadership reoccurrence. By extending the Toxic Triangle Framework into HEIs contexts and contributing to Crisis Management Theory, this chapter delivers a strategic blueprint for safeguarding HEIs against the multifaceted threat of fake leadership.