But what is good leadership? A conceptual critique of defining leadership through psychological safety and trust

Abstract

Recent efforts to distinguish toxic leadership from incompetent leadership aim to clarify theoretical boundaries and improve organizational responses to leadership failure. Ducheyne and De Fruyt ’ s (2026) recent focal article provides a thoughtful and practically motivated framework for differentiating these constructs, particularly by emphasizing intent, repetition, and follower perceptions. I concur that distinguishing between forms of poor leadership is both necessary and valuable. However, a more fundamental conceptual issue underlies the proposed distinction: The focal article implicitly defines leadership effectiveness in terms of its relation to outcomes (i.e., psychological safety and follower trust). A central premise of the focal article is that “ to be effective as a leader : : : contemporary leaders need to bring two critical psychological conditions in the workplace, that is (a) creating a safe psychological environment and (b) develop a climate of trust by being trustworthy themselves ” (Ducheyne & De Fruyt, 2026, p. 286). These constructs are then used to distinguish incompetent, toxic leadership, and, by proxy, effective leadership. Within this conceptualization, incompetent leadership reflects a lack of ability or skill, whereas toxic leadership involves harmful, self-serving, or unethical behavior that actively undermines others, regardless of leader competence. Psychological safety and trust play a key role in distinguishing the two; incompetent leaders may still be trusted and maintain some degree of psychological safety, whereas toxic leaders erode trust and create psychologically unsafe environments. Ducheyne