Personality, Attitudes, and Work Behaviors 2

Personality and Values



LEARNING OBJECTIVES


1. Identify the major personality traits that are relevant to organizational behavior.
2. Explain the potential pitfalls of personality testing.
3. Describe the relationship between personality and work behaviors.
4. Understand what values are.
5. Describe the link between values and work behaviors.



Personality


Personality1 encompasses a person’s relatively stable feelings, thoughts, and behavioral patterns. Each of us has a unique personality that differentiates us from other people, and understanding someone’s personality gives us clues about how that person is likely to act and feel in a variety of situations. To manage effectively, it is helpful to understand the personalities of different employees. Having this knowledge is also useful for placing people into jobs and organizations.



























1. The relatively stable feelings, thoughts, and behavioral patterns a person has.




Figure 2.3



© The New Yorker Collection 2007 Mick Stevens from cartoonbank.com. All Rights Reserved.




If personality is stable, does this mean that it does not change? You probably remember how you have changed and evolved as a result of your own life experiences, parenting style and attention you have received in early childhood, successes and failures you experienced over the course of your life, and other life events. In fact, personality does change over long periods of time. For example, we tend to become more socially dominant, more conscientious (organized and dependable), and more emotionally stable between the ages of 20 and 40, whereas openness to new experiences tends to decline as we age.Roberts, B. W., Walton, K. E., & Viechtbauer, W. (2006). Patterns of mean-level change in personality traits across the life course: A meta-analysis of longitudinal studies. Psychological Bulletin,
132, 1–25. In other words, even though we treat personality as relatively stable, change occurs. Moreover, even in childhood, our personality matters, and it has lasting consequences for us. For example, studies show that part of our career success and job satisfaction later in life can be explained by our childhood personality.Judge, T. A., & Higgins, C. A. (1999). The big five personality traits, general mental ability, and career success across the life span. Personnel Psychology,
52, 621–652; Staw, B. M., Bell, N. E., & Clausen, J. A. (1986). The dispositional