The SNP’s interim chief executive said there has been “a huge mess” in the party in recent days amid staff layoffs and a row over membership numbers.
SNP President Mike Russell, who has stepped in temporarily to replace the outgoing Peter Murrell, said the party should start in “a fully reset position” once a new leader is elected.
He said that despite the shambles, voting for the next party leader must continue to “restore Scotland’s confidence”.
Nicola Sturgeon’s husband, Mr Murrell, stepped down with immediate effect on Saturday following an argument over party membership.
His departure came shortly after that of media chief Murray Foote, who said there was a “serious impediment” to his role.
Mr Murrell said he took responsibility after misleading information was passed to the media about membership numbers, but said there was no “intent to mislead”.
The party confirmed this week that there had been a significant drop in membership.
And last week, two of the SNP leadership candidates to succeed Ms Sturgeon as Prime Minister: Kate Forbes And Ash Reganquestioned the independence of the electoral process.
Speaking on BBC Scotland’s The Sunday Show, Mr Russell said things had “gone spectacularly wrong” for the SNP in recent weeks.
He said: “I think it’s fair to say there’s a huge mess and we need to clean it up, and that’s the job I’m trying to take on in the short term.”
He insisted that social media played a role in SNP personnel coming under “the most enormous pressure and scrutiny”.
“Some of the things on social media were absolutely outrageous,” he said.
“Our employees have been horribly mistreated.
“I think that’s part of having a competition in the social media age, which we haven’t had before, and I think we need to learn that lesson.”
Russell said the next important step for the party is to have “a fair election process that delivers a clearly accepted result.
“We need to get this done in the next eight days and then – the new leader needs to look at the party and say let’s rebuild this and let’s restore Scotland’s confidence.
“This has not been a constructive process. There has been no contested leadership in the SNP for 19 years, and it shows.
He said a new leader will provide “a great opportunity to get things right and start with a completely reset position”.
On Sunday, leader candidate Ms Forbes said decisions in the SNP are being made by too few people.
Mrs. Forbes, who is on maternity leave from hers Government role as finance minister, faces health minister Why Yousaf and former Secretary of Security Ash Regan in the match.
She told the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg: “I think the crux of this is the fact that decisions within the SNP have been made by too few people.
“I think that is well recognized across the political realm.
“SNP members want to know that our institution is democratic, that they can influence it, that they can shape policy.”
Ms Forbes also said the SNP needs to improve its ability to listen and deliver.
She emphasized that it was not possible to turn the A9 into a fully-fledged four-lane road, as the party had long promised.
Referring to the main road as the “backbone” of Scotland, she said: “We said we would double that, but we haven’t. We need to be able to deliver.”
She also said she would rule out further tax increases if she becomes prime minister.
Ms Forbes said there has been “quite a stunning level of scrutiny and perhaps backlash from some quarters” around her religious views.
She said other believers have held high office in the UK and vowed to make Scotland a “tolerant and pluralistic nation”.
In another interview with Sky’s Sophie Ridge On the Sunday show, which was taped before Mr Murrell’s resignation, she said she had confidence in the integrity of the election process.
Commenting on Sunday’s interviews with Ms Forbes, Scottish Conservative chairman Craig Hoy said: “Kate Forbes is at it again – she claims she is the ‘change candidate’ to right the shortcomings of the SNP government, despite being one of its highest members.
“She had a brassy neck that publicly complained about the SNP’s failure to double down on the A9, as if she were a helpless bystander.
“As a Highlands MSP, she should have been beating the drum for this since 2016; while as a financial secretary she had been in charge of the wallet for the past three years and could have accomplished this if it was that important to her.
“In the same way she talks about the need to keep taxes low, while gleefully ignoring the fact that she has made Scotland the most highly taxed part of the UK.”
Mr Hoy went on to describe Mr Russell as “the most slovenly, disinterested and hands-off party chairman ever”.
He said the “sordid leadership race has exposed a civil war within the SNP”.
“It’s a measure of how bad things have gotten when a high-ranking party loyalist like Mike Russell describes it as a huge mess and admits things went spectacularly wrong,” Mr Hoy continued.
The leadership contest ends on March 27.