Mindful Leadership Chapter Links Positive Intelligence, Emotional Intelligence to Removing Toxicity

A peer-reviewed chapter published March 17 via IntechOpen makes a pointed case: the antidote to toxic leadership is not a stress-reduction technique or a breathing exercise, but a disciplined integration of mindfulness, emotional intelligence, and what author David Sippio calls Positive Intelligence.

Sippio's chapter, "Removing Toxicity from Leadership: Activating Your Superpowers of Positive Intelligence, Emotional Intelligence, and Mindfulness," appears in the IntechOpen collection "Bullying Today: Power, Pain and Prevention in the Context of the 21st Century" and is available to download for free under the ONLINE FIRST designation. The chapter carries DOI 10.5772/intechopen.1012958 and moved from submission on September 2, 2025, through peer review by September 10, an unusually tight turnaround that underscores the urgency IntechOpen's reviewers apparently attached to the subject.

The chapter's central argument is direct: "Today's leaders need adjustments, especially removing toxicity from themselves and their environment." Sippio frames mindful leadership not as a wellness add-on but as a structural shift in how leaders relate to themselves and others, one that requires searching "deep within for calmness to lead and produce better solutions when working with others."

His definition of mindful leadership draws on an established body of literature. The chapter cites Michael Carroll's "The Mindful Leader" (Shambhala Publications, 2007), Richard Boyatzis and Annie McKee's "Resonant Leadership" (Harvard Business Review Press, 2005), Janice Marturano's "Finding the Space to Lead" (Thomas-Shore, 2014), and a 2020 study by Reitz, Chaskalson, Waller, Olivier, and Rupprecht published in the Journal of Management Development, which found empirical grounding for developing leaders through mindfulness practice. The Reitz et al. study, volume 39, issue 2, pages 223 through 239, is among the more recent empirical anchors Sippio uses to support his framework.

Within the chapter, Sippio defines mindful leadership as "an approach to leadership that incorporates mindfulness practices, emphasizing self-awareness, EI, and being fully present without judgment." The practical payoffs, he argues, are concrete: "clear communication, thoughtful decision-making, and strong interpersonal connections." Mindful leaders, the chapter contends, are "more attentive to their thoughts, feelings, and surroundings, as well as the needs of others," a quality that positions them to interrupt the cycles of workplace harm the broader "Bullying Today" collection is designed to address.

For practitioners in the mindfulness community, the framing around Positive Intelligence is the chapter's most distinctive contribution. Sippio treats PQ, EI, and present-moment awareness not as separate tools but as interlocking capacities, what the chapter's subtitle calls "superpowers," that leaders can activate together to change both themselves and their organizational environments. That framing puts the chapter in direct conversation with the resonant leadership model Boyatzis and McKee developed two decades ago, now updated for a moment when workplace toxicity has become a mainstream organizational concern.

The chapter's full text, including the completion of a truncated section that begins "Mindfulness is not about stress reduction or deep breathing, and it is not a," is accessible without a paywall through IntechOpen.