Understanding Organizational Culture Killers: A Conceptual Model of Leadership and Organizational Failures

Abstract

Organizational culture is widely recognized as a vital driver of long-term performance and innovation, yet many organizations remain plagued by toxic, disengaged, and ethically compromised environments. This conceptual article addresses a critical gap in the literature by shifting the discourse from a construction-centric to a destruction-aware perspective. It synthesizes contemporary research to propose an integrative model of "organizational culture killers," active, synergistic processes that erode cultural health. These are categorized into leadership-activated failures (destructive leadership, lack of psychological safety) and organizationally embedded failures (misaligned human resource (HR) architectures, symbolic/perk-centered culture, toxic positivity). Grounded in social exchange theory, psychological safety theory, and agency-institutional theories, the model explains how these killers systematically degrade trust, voice, and value integrity. A key theoretical proposition is that organizational trust moderates the destructive impact of organizational trust. The analysis yields five testable propositions to guide future research and derives urgent practical implications. It argues that leaders and HR must proactively audit for and dismantle these killers, reframing cultural stewardship as a core governance and risk-mitigation imperative essential to ethical and sustainable performance.