chapter 3

Personality

What Is Personality?

 Personality is a dynamic concept describing the growth and development of a

person's

whole psychological system.

 Personality as the sum total of ways in which an individual interacts to and

reacts with

others.

 The most important reason managers need to know how to measure

personality is that

research has shown personality tests are useful in hiring decisions and help
managers

forecast who is best for a job. (Seeking diversity and seeking fit)

 The most common means of measuring personality is through self-reporting

and observer

ranking. Self-reporting is how individuals evaluate themselves on a series of

factors and

observer ranking is what other people are telling what they sec.

 While narcissism seems to have little relationship with job performance, it is

fairly

strongly related to increased counterproductive work behaviors and is linked to

other

negative outcomes.
A study found that while narcissists thought they were better leaders than their

colleagues, their supervisors rated them as worse.

Personality Determinants

- An early argument centered on whether personality was the result of heredity or

environment.

- Personality appears to be a result of both influences.

Heredity refers to those factors that were determined at conception. (Ex: facial
features, gender,

temperament, energy level)

The heredity approach argues that the ultimate explanation of an

individual's personality

is the molecular structure of the genes, located in the chromosomes.

Researchers have studied thousands of sets of identical twins that were separated
at birth

to better understand the role of heredity in determining personality.

Personality traits

i. Enduring characteristics that describe an individual's behavior include shy,

aggressive, submissive, lazy, ambitious, loyal, and timid. These are personality
traits.

ii. Early efforts to identify the primary traits that govern behavior often resulted in
long

lists that were difficult to generalize from and provided little practical guidance to

organizational decision makers.

Environment refers to situation.

Personality is not determined by any single gene, but rather by the actions of
many genes

working together. There is no "IQ gene" that determines intelligence

and there is no "good

marriage-partner gene" that makes a person a particularly good marriage

bet. Furthermore, even

working together, genes are not so powerful that they can control or create our
personality. Some

genes tend to increase a given characteristic and others work to decrease that
same characteristic

— the complex relationship among the various genes, as well as a variety of

random factors,

produces the final outcome. Furthermore, genetic factors always work with
environmental

factors to create personality. Having a given pattern of genes doesn't

necessarily mean that a

particular trait will develop, because some traits might occur only in some
environments. For

example, a person may have a genetic variant that is known to increase his or her
risk for developing emphysema from smoking. But if that person never smokes,
then emphysema most likely will not develop.

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator

One of the most widely used personality frameworks is the Myers-Briggs Type
Indicator (MBTI)

Individuals are classified as:

a. Extroverted or Introverted (E or I).

b. Sensing or Intuitive (S or N).

c. Thinking or Feeling (T or F).

d. Perceiving or Judging (P or J ).(pic)

The Big Five Personality Model

- An impressive body of research supports that five basic dimensions underlie all
other

personality dimensions. The five basic dimensions are:

a. Extraversion. Comfort level with relationships. Extroverts tend to be gregarious,

assertive,

and sociable. Introverts tend to be reserved, timid, and quiet. (good at team
oriented cultures)

b. Agreeableness. Individual's propensity to defer to others. High

agreeableness people

cooperative, warm, and trusting. Low agreeableness people cold, disagreeable,

and antagonistic.

(good at supportive organizational cultures)

c. Conscientiousness. A measure of reliability. A high conscientious person is

responsible,

organized, dependable, and persistent. Those who score low on this dimension
are easily

distracted, disorganized, and unreliable. (the best predictor to job performance)

d. Emotional stability. A person's ability to withstand stress. People with

positive emotional

stability tend to be calm, self-confident, and secure. Those with high negative
scores tend to be

nervous, anxious, depressed, and insecure. (tend to have higher job satisfaction)

e. Openness to experience. The range of interests and fascination with novelty.

Extremely open
people are creative, curious, and artistically sensitive. Those at the other end of
the openness

category are conventional and find comfort in the familiar. (better with
innovation)

- How do the Big Five traits predict behavior at work?

a. Research has shown relationships between these personality dimensions and

job performance.

b. Employees who score higher, for example, in conscientiousness develop higher

levels of job

knowledge.

c. Conscientiousness is as important for managers as for front-line employees.

i. The study found conscientiousness—in the form of persistence, attention to

detail, and

setting of high standards—was more important than other traits.

ii. These results attest to the importance of conscientiousness to organizational

success.

d. Although conscientiousness is the Big Five trait most consistently related to job
performance,

there are other traits that are related to aspects of performance in some
situations.
The five personality factors identified in the Big Five model appear in almost all
cross-cultural

studies.

a. These studies have included a wide variety of diverse cultures such as China,
Israel. Germany,

Japan, Spain, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, and the United States.

b. Generally, the findings corroborate what has been found in U. S. research: of

the Big Five
traits, conscientiousness is the best predictor of job performance.

The Dark Triad

With the exception of neuroticism, the Big Five traits are what we call socially
desirable,

meaning we would be glad to score high on them. Researchers have found that,
three other

socially undesirable traits, which wore we all have in varying degrees, are relevant
to

organizational behavior.

- They are: Machiavellianism, narcissism, and psychopathy.

- Owing to their negative nature, researchers have labeled these three traits the
"Dark

Triad."

Machiavellianism

- An individual high in Machiavellianism is pragmatic, maintains

emotional distance and believes that ends can justify means.

- High Machs manipulate more, win more, are persuaded less, and

persuade others more.

- Machiavellianism does not significantly predict overall job performance.

Narcissism

- Narcissism describes a person who has a grandiose sense of self-importance. -

They

"think" they are better leaders. (tendency to be arrogant, require

excessive admiration,
and have a sense of entitlement)

- Often, they are selfish and exploitive. (require employees to like him, you have
to like

me otherwise you will face some consequences) (maximum time people act that
way but

don’t say it)

Psychopathy

- In the OB context, psychopathy is defined as a lack of concern for others, and a

lack

of guilt or remorse when their actions cause harm.

Measures of psychopathy attempt to assess the person's motivation to

comply

with social norms; willingness to use deceit to obtain desired ends and the

effectiveness of those efforts; impulsivity; and disregard, that is, lack of empathic

concern, for others.

- The literature is not consistent about whether psychopathy or other aberrant

personality traits are important to work behavior.

- Organizations wishing to assess psychopathy or other aberrant traits need to

exercise

caution.

Approach-Avoidance

- The approach-avoidance framework has cast personality traits as motivations.

- Approach and avoidance motivation represent the degree to which we react to

stimuli;
approach motivation is our attraction to positive stimuli and avoidance motivation
our

aversion to negative stimuli.

Other Personality Traits Relevant to OB

Core self-evaluation (self-perspective)

- People who have a positive core self-evaluation see themselves as effective,

capable,

and in control.

- People who have a negative core self-evaluation tend to dislike themselves.

- Some can be too positive. In this case, someone can think he or she is capable,
but he or

she is actually incompetent.

Sell1-monitoring

- This refers to an individual's ability to adjust his or her behavior to

external, situational

factors.

- Individuals high in self-monitoring show considerable adaptability. They are

highly

sensitive to external cues, can behave differently in different situations, and are
capable

of presenting striking contradictions between their public persona and their

private self.

Proactive personality
- Actively taking the initiative to improve their current circumstances while others
sit by

passively.

- Proactives identify opportunities, show initiative, take action, and persevere.

Personality and Situations

Increasingly, we are learning that the effect of particular traits on organizational

behavior

depends on the situation. Two theoretical frameworks help explain how this
works.

- Situation strength theory proposes that the way personality translates into
behavior

depends on the strength of the situation.

By situation strength, we mean the degree to which norms, cues, or standards

dictate appropriate behavior.

- Research suggests that personality traits better predict behavior in weak

situations than

in strong ones.

- Researchers have analyzed situation strength in organizations in terms of four

elements:

i. Clarity, or the degree to which cues about work duties and responsibilities arc
available

and clear.

ii. Consistency, or the extent to which cues regarding work duties and
responsibilities are
compatible with one another.

iii. Constraints, or the extent to which individuals' freedom to decide or act

is limited by

forces outside their control.

iv. Consequences, or the degree to which decisions or actions have important

implications for the organization or its members, clients, supplies, and so on.

- Some researchers have speculated that organizations are, by definition, strong

situations

because they impose rules, norms, and standards that govern behavior. These
constraints

are usually appropriate.

- Trait Activation Theory (TAT)

i. TAT predicts that some situations, events, or interventions

"activate" a trait more than

others.

ii. Exhibit 5-3 shows jobs in which certain Big Five traits are more relevant.

Values

- Values represent basic convictions. (what is right, good or desirable)

- A specific mode of conduct or end-state of existence is personally or socially

preferable to an

opposite or converse mode of conduct or end-state of existence. They have both

content and

intensity attributes.
- An individual's set of values ranked in terms of intensity is considered
person's value system.

- Values have the tendency to be stable.

The Importance and Organization of Values

- Values lay the foundation for the understanding of attitudes and motivation.

- We enter an organization with preconceived notions of what

"ought" and "ought not" be.

These notions are not value-free; on the contrary, they contain our
interpretations of right

and wrong and our preference for certain behaviors or outcomes over others.

- Values cloud objectivity and rationality; they influence attitudes and behavior.

Terminal Versus Instrumental Values

- How can we organize values?

a. Terminal Values—refer to desirable end states. (how the world should be)

b. Instrumental Values—refer to preferable modes of behavior. (how we get

there/ the actual

situation)

(how one look at his/her value system is really very important)

Generational Values

- It is to compare generational differences in values and identify the dominant

values in

todays’ workforce.

- Contemporary work cohorts: researchers have integrated several recent

analyses of
work values into four groups that attempt to capture the unique values.

- Though it is fascinating to think about generational values, remember these

classifications lack

solid research support.

- Generational classifications may help us understand our own and other

generations better, but

we must also appreciate their limits.

Linking an Individual's Personality and Values to the Workplace

The Person-Job Fit

This concern is best articulated in John Holland's personality-job fit theory.

Holland presents six personality types and proposes that satisfaction and the
propensity to leave a

job depends on the degree to which individuals successfully match their

personalities to an

occupational environment.

The six personality types are: realistic, investigative, social, conventional,

enterprising, and

artistic.
a. Vocational Preference Inventory questionnaire contains 160 occupational titles.

Respondents indicate which of these occupations they like or dislike; their

answers are

used to form personality profiles.

i. The key point of this model is that people in jobs congruent with their

personality should be more satisfied and less likely to voluntarily resign than

people in incongruent jobs.

The Person-Organization Fit

The person—organization fit essentially argues that people are attracted to and
selected by

organizations that match their values, and they leave organizations that are not
compatible with

their personalities.

International Values

Hofstede's Framework for Assessing Cultures:

Five value dimensions of national culture:

- Power distance: the degree to which people in a country accept that power in

institutions and organizations is distributed unequally. (power distributed

unequally)

- Individualism versus collectivism: individualism (Ex: USA) is the degree to which

people in a country prefer to act as individuals rather than as members of groups;

collectivism (Ex: Asian cultures) emphasizes a tight social framework in which
people

expect others ill groups of which they are a part to look after them and protect
them.

- Masculinity versus femininity (Ex: Russia): masculinity (Ex: German & Hong
Kong)

is the degree to which the culture favors traditional masculine roles such as
achievement,

power, and control, as opposed to viewing men and women as equals.

- Uncertainty avoidance: the degree to which people in a country prefer

structured over

unstructured situations.

- Long-term versus short-term orientation: long-term (Ex: China) orientations look

to

the future and value thrift and persistence. In a short-term (Ex: France and United
States)

orientation, people value the here and now; they accept change more readily and
don't see

commitments as impediments to change.

Hofstede's research findings

- Asian countries were more collectivistic than individualistic.

- United States ranked highest on individualism.

- German and Hong Kong rated high on masculinity:

- Russia and The Netherlands were low on masculinity.

- China and Hong Kong had a long-term orientation.

- France and the United States had short-term orientation.

Hofstede's culture dimensions have been enormously influential on OB

researchers and

managers, but his research has been criticized.

- First, although the data have since been updated, the original work is more than
30 years

old and was based on a single company (IBM).

- Second, few researchers have read the details of Hofstede's methodology

closely and are

therefore unaware of the many decisions and judgment calls he had to make (for

example, reducing the number of cultural values to just five).

Despite these concerns, Hofstede has been one of the most widely cited social
scientists ever,

and his framework has left a lasting mark on OB.

Summary and Implications for Managers

- Personality matters to organizational behavior. It does not explain all behavior,

but the stage.

- Emerging theory and research reveal how personality matters more in some
situations than

others. - The Big Five has been a particularly important advancement, though the
Dark Triad and

other traits matter as well.

 Moreover, every trait has advantages and disadvantages for work behavior.

 There is no perfect constellation of traits that is ideal in every situation.

- Personality can help you understand why people (including yourself!) act, think,
and feel the

way we do, and the astute manger can put that understanding to use by taking
care to place

employees in situations that best fit their personality.

- Why is it important to know an individual's values?

 Values often underlie and explain attitudes, behaviors, and perceptions.

 So, knowledge of an individual's value system can provide insight into

what makes the

person "tick."

As a manager, you are more likely to appreciate, evaluate positively, and allocate
rewards

to employees who fit in, and your employees are more likely to be satisfied if they
perceive they

do fit in. Plan to objectively consider your employees' performance

accordingly.

Consider screening job candidates for high conscientiousness—as well as the

other Big

Five traits—depending on the criteria your organization finds most important.

Other traits, such

as core self-evaluation or narcissism, may be relevant in certain situations.

You need to evaluate your employees' jobs, their work groups, and your
organization to
determine the optimal personality fit. Consider employees' situational
factors when evaluating

their observable personality traits, and lower the situation strength, to better
ascertain personality

characteristics.