Chapter 2
Personality &
Values
1
Individuals & Personality
Personality: Sum total of ways people react
and interact with others (set of psychological
traits that make each person different).
• Ques. 1: What are its dimensions?
• Ques. 2: How is it measured?
• Ques. 3: What is its value for
management
and business applications?
2
Ques. 1: What Are Its Dimensions?
Answer 1: The “Big Five”
• Most scientifically established and empirically
tested framework of personality in the world
• Individuals vary across five dimensions:
– Emotional stability
– Extraversion
– Openness to experience
– Agreeableness
– Conscientiousness
3
4
Ques. 1: What Are Its Dimensions (cont.)?
Answer 2: The MBTI
• Most popular and widely used in the world
• Individuals are classified as:
–
Extroverted or Introverted (E or I):
• Outgoing, sociable, and assertive, vs. quiet, “shy,” and draw energy and
strength from within
–
Sensing or Intuitive (S or N):
• Practical and prefer focusing on details vs. relying on unconscious
(intuitive) processes and look at the big picture
–
Thinking or Feeling (T or F):
– Use reason and logic to handle problems vs. rely on their personal values
and emotions
–
Judging or Perceiving (J or P):
– Like their world to be ordered, structured and controlled vs. flexible and
spontaneous
5
Ques. 1: What Are Its Dimensions (cont.)?
Answer 3: Some additional misc. facets:
• Core Self Evaluation: Degree of one’s self liking or disliking.
• Self-Monitoring: Sensitivity to situational cues and the capacity
to modify or adapt one’s behavior as appropriate.
• Locus of Control: Propensity to actively take initiative, and to
identify and pursue (even create) new opportunities.
• Risk Propensity: Willingness and comfort in taking chances.
• Machiavellianism: Tendency to manipulate and maintain
emotional distance to achieve one’s aims.
• Type A/B Personality: Type A is aggressive, impatient and
incessantly struggling to achieve more (while B is opposite).
6
Ques. 2: How Is Personality Measured?
Answer: Typical methods for measuring:
• Self-report inventories (most common):
–
–
–
–
NEO PI-R
CPI
MBTI
many others....
• Clinical evaluations:
– MMPI
• Projective tests:
• TAT (similar to “ink blots”)
7
Ques. 3: Business and Mgmt. Applications
The more typical business applications:
• Employee development and coaching
• Making hiring decisions:
– What personality facets should be used?
– What job performance criteria?
– Interaction with job and contextual elements?
• job requirements
• organization’s culture
• situation cues (“strong” vs. “weak” situations)
• What is “predictive success” of using personality?
8
Individuals and Values
• Values defined as:
•
•
•
•
–
Stable, long-lasting beliefs and preferences about
what is worthwhile and desirable
–
A mode of conduct or end state that is personally
or socially desirable (what is right or good).
Values can be classified (e.g., Rokeach)
Values vary by cohort groups
Values vary by cultural identity
Knowledge about personality and values
can help improve an employee’s “fit”
9
Personality-Job Fit:
Holland’s Hexagon
• Job satisfaction and turnover depend on
congruency between personality and task
– Fields adjacent are similar
– Field opposite are dissimilar
• Vocational Preference
Inventory Questionnaire
10
Person-Organization Fit
• It appears more important
that employees’ personalities
fit with the organization’s
culture than with the specific
characteristics of a given job.
• A good fit helps predict job
satisfaction, organizational
commitment and turnover.
11
From the
Rokeach
Values
Survey
Source: M. Rokeach, The Nature of Human
Values (New York: The Free Press, 1973).
12
From the
Rokeach
Values
Survey
Source: M. Rokeach, The Nature of Human
Values (New York: The Free Press, 1973).
13
Dominant Work
Values by Cohort
Groups
Source: Based on W. C. Frederick and J. Weber, “The Values of
Corporate Managers and Their Critics: An Empirical Description and
Normative Implications,” in W. C. Frederick and L. E. Preston (eds.)
Business Ethics: Research Issues and Empirical Studies (Greenwich,
CT: JAI Press, 1990), pp. 123–44.
14
Contemporary Work Cohorts
Cohort
Entered the
Workforce
Dominant Work Values
Veterans
1950s or early
1960s
Hard working, conservative, conforming;
loyalty to the organization
Boomers
1965-1985
Success, achievement, ambition, dislike
of authority; loyalty to career
1985-2000
Work/life balance, team-oriented, dislike
of rules; loyalty to relationships
2000 - present
Confident, financial success, self-reliant
but team-oriented; loyalty to both self
and relationships
Xers
Nexters
15
National Culture and Values
Artifacts of
Culture
Core of
Culture
Rules, Laws
Stories of Heroes
Language, Food
Physical Structures
Rituals/Ceremonies
Norms
Beliefs
Values
Assumptions
16
Hofstede’s Framework
for Assessing Cultures
• Power distance
• Individualism vs. collectivism
• Achievement vs. nurturing
• Uncertainty avoidance
• Long-term vs. short-term orientation
17
Exh. 2-6
18
“GLOBE” Studies Framework
for Assessing Cultures
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Assertiveness
Future Orientation
Gender Differentiation
Uncertainty Avoidance
Power Distance
Individualism/Collectivism
In-Group Collectivism
Performance Orientation
Humane Orientation
19
Importance of Values
• Help us make sense of attitudes, motivation,
and behaviors.
• Influence our perceptions of the world.
• Give us answers about right and wrong (and
thus have implications for business ethics)
• Values, by definition, mean some behaviors or
outcomes are more preferred than others.
20