Escaping toxic leaders: how dark leadership fuels entrepreneurial dreams

Purpose This study aims to explain why some employees respond to toxic supervision by intending to found new ventures, whereas others remain locked in their wage-jobs. Design/methodology/approach Drawing on the Theory of Planned Behaviour and causal-complexity scholarship, this study analyse survey data from 317 Greek wage-earners who personally experienced dark leadership (manipulative, narcissistic or abusive managerial behaviour). Constructs were calibrated and assessed with fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), including robustness checks via percentile recalibration and a 1,000-run Monte Carlo noise perturbation. Findings No single factor is necessary for entrepreneurial intent, confirming conjunctural causality. Three equifinal paths combine dark leadership with low job satisfaction and high psychological resilience, low satisfaction plus high risk tolerance and financial slack or high resilience with financial slack. Conversely, dark leadership coupled with low satisfaction, low resilience and low finances forms a sufficient recipe for the absence of intent, underscoring asymmetry. Research limitations/implications Generalisability is constrained by the single-country context and the focus on intentions rather than realised start-ups. Practical implications Organisations should monitor resilience–satisfaction profiles to predict talent flight; policy makers might target financing and mentoring at high-risk-tolerant employees trapped under toxic bosses. Originality/value This paper repositions dark leadership as a conditional catalyst: it triggers entrepreneurial thinking only when “push” (dissatisfaction) and/or “resource” (resilience, capital) conditions are present. In doing so, the study contributes to push–pull and necessity/opportunity theories of entrepreneurship by conceptualising dark leadership as a conditional push factor whose effect depends on complementary pull resources. By integrating leadership failure with entrepreneurial-intention research through fsQCA, the study advances configurational theorising in management.