Personality

Concept of Personality
Traditionally, personality referred to how
people influence others through their external
appearances and actions.
But, today personality is regarded as an
interaction of physiological, mental and
psychological characteristics.
To be noted, though psychologists and social
scientists unanimously agree to the importance
of personality, they are unable to come out with
a unanimous definition.

Definitions of Personality
According to S.P. Robbins and S. Sanghi,
Personality is the sum total of ways in which
an individual reacts and interacts with others.
According to Moorhead and Griffin,
Personality is the relatively stable set of
psychological attributes that distinguish one
person from another.
Nature/Characteristics of Personality
It is a sum total feature of an individual.
Different individuals have different personality traits.
It is partly born and partly acquired or developed.
Over time personality traits of an individual can be
changed.
Personality influences an individuals behavior.
Personality determines how an individual interacts
with others.
It is most often described in terms of measurable traits
such as extroversion, agreeableness, emotional
stability etc. that a person exhibits.
Personality Traits/Characteristics
Characteristics that are frequently exhibited in most
situations are called personality traits or characteristics.
Thus, the more consistent the characteristic and the
more frequently it occurs in diverse situations, the
more important that trait is in describing the individual.
Allport and Odbert have found that there are three
thousand to five thousand words that describe personal
qualities and more than fifty different definitions of
personally.
Personality Traits/Characteristics
Reserved vs. outgoing
Less intelligent vs. more intelligent
Emotionally stable vs. Emotionally unstable
Practical vs. Imaginative
Trusting vs. Suspicious
Self-assured vs. Apprehensive
Conservative vs. Experimenting
Relaxed vs. Tense .etc.

Big Five Personality Traits
A century ago personality experts derived
17,953 words that represent individual traits.
They aggregated these traits first into 171
clusters and finally into Big five personality
dimensions.
The Big five model/ five factor model
encompasses the following dimensions.
Big Five Personality Traits
1. Extroversion
People can be extroverts or introverts.
Extroverts people are talkative, sociable,
assertive and outgoing.
They want to interact with people and get
involved in events.
Introverts are reserved, quiet, timid and
sensitive.
They prefer to work independently.

Big Five Personality Traits
2. Agreeableness
This dimension refers to an individuals
propensity to defer/agree to others.
Highly agreeable people are courteous,
cooperative, warm, and trusting.
People who score low on agreeableness are
cold, disagreeable, and antagonistic.

Big Five Personality Traits
3. Conscientiousness
This dimension is a measure of
reliability/conscientiousness.
A highly conscientious person is responsible,
organized, and consistent.
Those who score low in this dimension are
easily distracted, disorganized, and unreliable.
Big Five Personality Traits
4. Emotional stability
This dimension captures a persons ability to
withstand stress.
Emotionally stable people are calm, self-
confident, secure and relaxed.
Emotionally unstable people are nervous,
depressed, anxious and insecure.
Big Five Personality Traits
5. Openness to experience
This dimension addresses ones range of interests and
attraction with novelty.
Extremely open people are creative, curious, and
artistically sensitive.
Closed persons are conventional and find comfort in
the familiar.

It is believed that Big five model is helpful in
predicting the behavior of people at work and thereafter
job performance.
Determinants of Personality
1. Heredity
Heredity refers to those factors that were
determined at conception.
Each parents contributes 23 chromosomes containing
thousands of genes which largely determine physical
status, facial attractiveness, gender, temperament,
muscle composition etc.
Researchers have found that heredity/genetics
accounts for 50% of personality difference and
more than 30% of variation in occupational and
leisure interest.
Determinants of Personality
2. Environment
Overall socio-cultural, organizational and family
environment also shapes an individuals personality.
Heredity sets the parameters or outer limits, but an
individuals full potential will be determined by
environmental factors.
Environmental factors like cultures in which we are
raised, our early conditioning, our family, our
organization, friends, social groups play substantial
role in shaping our personality.

Determinants of Personality
3. Situational differences
Personality, although stable and consistent, does
change in different situations.
So we shouldnt look the personality pattern in
isolation.
For instance, employment interview constrain many
behavior; other situations-- e.g., picnic or get-
together with friends constrain relatively few.

Major Personality Traits/Attributes
Influencing OB
1. Locus of Control (Internal Vs. External)
2. Machiavellianism (High Mach Vs. Low Mach)
3. Self-Esteem(High Self-Esteem Vs. Low Self-
Esteem)
4. Self-Monitoring/Adjusting (High Self-
Monitoring Vs. Low Self-Monitoring)
5. Risk-taking (High Vs. Low)
6. Personality Type( Type A Vs. Type B)

Matching Personality and Jobs
The manager's concern is more towards how to
match the personality and jobs so that both
organization and employees will be relatively
benefited.
For this, John Holland has offered Personality
Job-Fit Theory.
This theory identifies six personality types and
proposes that the fit between personality types
and occupational environment determines job
satisfaction and employee turnover.
Matching Personality and Jobs
Personality Type Personality
Characteristics
Congruent Occupation
Realistic: Prefers physical
activities that require skills,
strength, and coordination
Shy, genuine, persistent,
stable, conforming,
practical
Mechanic, drill press
operator, assembly line
worker, farmer
Investigative: Prefers activities
that involve thinking,
organizing , and understanding
Analytical, original,
curious, independent
Biologist, economist,
mathematician, news
reporter
Social: Prefers activities that
involve helping and developing
others
Sociable, friendly,
cooperative, understanding
Social worker, teacher,
counselor, clinical
psychologist
Conventional: Prefers rule-
regulated, orderly and
unambiguous activities
Conforming, efficient,
practical, unimaginative,
inflexible
Accountant, Corporate
manager, bank teller, file
clerk
Enterprising: Prefers verbal
activities in which there are
opportunities to influence other
and attain power
Self confident, ambitious,
energetic, dominant
Lawyer, real estate agent,
public relations specialist,
small business manager
Artistic: Prefers ambiguous
and unsystematic activities that
allow creative expression
Imaginative, disorderly,
idealistic, emotional,
impractical
Painter, musician, writer,
interior decorator
Matching Personality and Jobs
But, in recent years, interest has expanded to
include the person-organization fit.
Why? because managers today are less
interested in an applicants ability to perform a
specific job than with his or her flexibility to
meet changing situation and the employees
personality fit with the overall organizations
culture.
Personality and Behavior
B = f(P, E)





Though personality and behavior and related, there
are so many factors influencing individual behavior.
Thus, personality is not a sole and consistent predictor
of individual behavior.

The person (P) The environment (E)
1. Key personal biographical factors:
Sex, age, education, abilities,
material status etc.
1. Key environmental factors
Economic conditions, political
situations, Socio-cultural norms
and values, competitive forces etc.
1. Psychological factors:
Attitudes, values, beliefs,
motivation, perception,
personality etc.
2 Organizational factors:
Physical facilities, organizational
structure and design, leadership
styles, reward system etc.