Personality Traits that Affects How Managers Think, Feel and Behave

By: Karina Jean D. Tan

Managers are a person that is responsible for controlling or monitoring the organization on the employees. The managers values, attitudes and emotion captive experiences in their jobs as individuals. The manager’s personality reflects on how he/she manage his/her subordinates in the organization. It is important to understand manager’s personality because it influences his/her behaviour and approach in the management.

Simmering(2016) defined the five-factor model it is concept of personality captured in sixteen personality factor questionnaire or 16PF, 16 factors that can combined to express five global factors:(1) emotional stability are person involves ability to remain stable and balanced; (2)conscientiousness, person’s ability to dependable, organized, punctual and to persist in face setbacks;(3) agreeableness describe in two categories: high indicates person is warm, friendly and tactful, and low are cold, abrasive and unfriendly;(4)extraversion is how outgoing and social person is; (5)openness to experience refers to how open-minded person is. Five –Factor Model can be used for development and team-building in organization. More than 15,000 words describing personality have been identified but five dimensions seemed too emerged, and these explain much of variation in our personalities. Big Five are the openness which is curious, original, intellectual, creative and open to new ideas; conscientiousness which is organized, systematic, talkative, sociable and enjoy being in social situation; agreeableness which is affable, tolerant, sensitive, trusting, kind and warm; and neuroticism which is anxious, irritable, temperamental and moody. It is a unique configuration of how high/low person rates on some traits. (Schmitz, 2012). They have some the same factors that have different meaning that can help to describe the managers personality in the organization, that can also help to us some background on managers supposed to be emotions.

Everyone has their unique pattern of feelings. Thoughts and behaviours which formed fairly stable combination of personality traits. Five basic dimensions that can be used to describe differences n cognitive, effective and conditional control: (1) neuroticism is the measure of affect and emotional control. (2) extraversion-introversion dimension contrast outgoing characters withdrawn nature.(3) openness to experience measure the depth, breadth and variability in persons imagination and urge of experiences.(4) agreeableness a scale linked to altruism, nurturance and emotional support versus competitiveness, hostility and indifference.(5) conscientiousness, measures of goal-directed behaviour and amount of control impulses. (Heinstrom, 2003). And according to Bauer and Erdogen (2016) aside from the Big Five traits, most often personality assessment is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). In MBTI, people grouped and objectives using four dimension:(1) Extraversion, derived energy with other people and objective,(2)Sensing, rely on their five senses to perceive the extent environment,(3)

Thinking who use logic to arrive at solutions, and (5) Judgement, those who organized, systematic and like to have clarity and closure. This personality trait sets the tone in the work atmosphere. The authors have different basis in how they describe manager’s personality in an organization to be more effective. Different basis but have same objectives, to have an appropriate manager in the organization by identifying their personality.

Personality dimensions can be distilled into Big Five Model, Goldberg’s Five Personality Traits: (1) Extraversion or Surgency, traits such as talkative, energetic and assertive.(2) Agreeableness, traits like sympathetic, kind and affectionate.(3) Conscientiousness are tend to organized, thorough and planning.(4) Emotional Stability, traits like these are moody and anxious. (5) Openness to New Experiences, include having wide interest and being imaginative. (Alkahatani, Et, Al, 2011). The five-factor mode (Conscientiousness, agreeableness, Neuroticism, openness and extraversion) with job performance and other job-related activities. Motivation, deviation, absences, and job satisfaction are related to the five factors. Conscientiousness and agreeableness appear to be positively correlated with productivity in a team environment among peers and are more likely to aid in being selected for a job. Neuroticism and agreeableness are negatively correlated with leadership capabilities. Individuals who score high on conscientiousness tend to perform well at work, whereas individuals lacking conscientiousness and having neuroticism tend to perform poorly at work. (Neubert, 2004). The effectiveness of the model are really great for the manager or who wants to be a managers

The Five-Factor Model is the one who commonly use in describing manages personality traits, they use different names but still it has the same meaning. The Openness to Experience, Agreeableness, Extraversion, Neuroticism and Conscientiousness are the common personality traits used in describing the managers.

References:

Alkahtani,A.H.Dr.,Et.al.(2011).The impact of personality and leadership styles on leading change capatibilty of Malaysian managers. 1(2).Retrieved from: www.ajbmr.com/articlepdf/ajmbmr_vo1no2_06.pdf

Bauer, T and Erdogan, B(2016). Oragnizational Behaviour.v.1.0.Retieved from: catalog.flatworldknowldge.com/bookhub/3?e=bauer-ch03_s02

Heinstrom, J.(2003). Five Personality Dimensions and their Influence on information behaviour.9(1).Retrieved from: www.informationr.net/ir/9-1/paper165.html

Neubert,S.P.(2004). The Five –Factor Model of Personality in the Workplace. Retrieved from: www.personalityresearch.org/papersneubert.html

Schmitz,A.(2012).Personaity, Attitudes and Work Behaviours.=Retrieved from: 2012books.lardbucket.org/books/management-principles-v10/so6-personality-attitudes-and-work.html/

Simmering,M.J.(2016).Personality and Personality Tests. Retrieved from: www.referenceforbusiness.com/management/or-Pr/personality-and-personality-test.html