SSRG International Journal of Humanities and Social Science (SSRG-IJHSS) – EFES April 2015
Measuring the Role of Personality in Organizational
Development
Dr. Suman Kathuria#1
#
Assistant Professor, GZS PTU Campus, Dabwali Road, Bathinda – 151001, Punjab, India
Abstract: The purpose of study is to present an overview
towards the role of personality inorganizational behavior.
Personality plays a key role in organizational behavior because
the way people think, feel, and behave affects many aspects of
the workplace. People's personalities influence their behavior in
groups, their attitude and the way they make decisions.
Interpersonal skills extremely affect the way the people act and
react to things during work. In the workplace, personality also
affects such things as motivation, leadership, performance and
conflict. The more managers understand how personality in
organizational behavior works, the better equipped they are to
be effective and accomplish their goals.
I.
INTRODUCTION
To study the importance of "personality", and to observe the
circumstances under which it faces and influences an
individual in an organization, one will have to study three
different dimensions: organizational behaviour, personality
and the relationship between these two. This paper will start
by exploring the first two dimensions before illustrating their
relationships. At the end, a conclusion will be drawn based
on what discussed.
II.
OB seeks to emphasize theunderstanding of behavior
inorganizations so as to developcompetencies in foreseeing
how peopleare likely to behave. This knowledge maythen
help in controlling those behaviorsthat are not befitting the
objectives ofthe organizations. Factors likeobjectivity,
replicability and sustainabilityare important while selecting
themethods for this purpose.Questionnaire, interview,
simulation andsurvey are generally used to produceresponses
of individuals located indifferent types of organizations. To
alarge extent their personalities affectthe nature of their
responses.
III.
PERSONALITY
Personality can be defined as the combination of
characteristics or qualities that form an individual's
distinctive
character.
But
there
are
certain
uniformcharacteristics which always emerge ina person on
the basis of which certaininferences can be drawn. Examples
couldbe dominant or submissive nature,aggressiveness or
politeness.
Personalityconsists
of
organization
of
feelings,thoughts, cognitions and visiblebehavior. However
certain patterns ofbehavior are not visible and are knownonly
after proper testing, which leads us to the next part.
ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR
Business Dictionary (Online) defines the organization as a
social unit of people that is structured and managed to meet a
need or to pursue collective goals. Organizational behavior
(OB) on the other hand, is a studyof human behavior within
an organization, the interface between human behavior and
the organization, and the organization itself. Hence, based on
definition, this study can be broadly classified into 3 levels:
(a) Individuals in organizations (micro-level)
(b) Work groups (meso-level)
(c) How organizations behave (macro-level)
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IV.
WHEN PERSONALITY INFLUENCES
EMPLOYEE BEHAVIOUR
How personality can be measured, and when personality
applies its power on people, are integral parts of each other.
We will have to study both dimensions if we are to
understand when it is more likely for employees to
experience the result of their personalities on their behaviours
and attitudes. There are different views on how to measure
personalities; the five scale would be a reliable, basic and
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SSRG International Journal of Humanities and Social Science (SSRG-IJHSS) – EFES April 2015
general way to achieve this. There have been researches to
link each one scale to organizational behaviour and the
performance of individuals at the work place. These
researches show how different personality traits (e.g. sociable
and talkative vs. withdrawn and shy) can and will affect
performance. Personality trait can be linked to O.B. would be
because of the power of personality on our attitudes and
behaviour. It is worth mentioning that almost 30% of changes
in job attitudes could be result of genetic factors, but the rest
(a larger portion) would be because of the situational reasons
and how they and personality react to each other.
V.
THE IMPORTANCE OF PERSONALITY IN O.B
What is the significance of personality in O.B.? As
mentioned, O.B. enjoys an uncertain existence than a black
and white one, as it might not be possible to come to a
concrete conclusion when considering human behaviour.
The origins of personality testing date back to the 18th and
19th centuries, when personality was assessed through
phrenology, the measurement of the human mind, and
physical characteristics, which assessed personality based on
a person's outer appearances. These early pseudoscientific
techniques were eventually replaced with more empirical
methods in the 20th century. One of the earliest modern
personality tests was the Woodworth Personal Data Sheet, a
self-report inventory developed for World War I and used for
the psychiatric screening of new draftees.
There are a plethora of methods, some of which are interrelated, while others exist which may be completely different
in their approach. Some of these methods include, but are not
limited to the following:
1.
There are two types of values governing our behaviours in an
organization: Personal values and the commonly held values
of an organization. We tend to act in accordance with these
values, which in turn will define what is ethical and what it is
not. Notwithstanding, ethics would be the subject of a
different discussion. Personal values define how we act, and
how we behave, they define our personalities and our moods.
Personality is what we believe and values. Our feelings and
behaviours, on the other hand, tend to be easily influenced by
the environment in which we function.One factor which
determines the importance of personality in O.B is
the environment where personality of an individual is being
studied; after all, personality's impact on an organization is
relative and depends on how the organization has been
structured. Weakly structured organizations with loosely
defined roles tend to get the most impact, compared to
strongly structured organizations with more defined roles.
In the light of these thoughts, our personal values and
personalities govern our actions and behaviours and since
organizational behaviour is built upon our personal values, it
is of paramount importance to understand personalities of
employees to make good use of O.B.
VI.
MEASURING PERSONALITY
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2.
Self-Report Measures: The main idea behind these
measures is that they solely rely on the information
presented by the participants about themselves.
Asking people to respond to questions or statements
about whatthey are like or how they behave seems
to be the most preferred method.On the surface, the
fact that obtaining self-reported data is so popular
makes complete sense – if I want to learn more
about somebody, why would I not go directly to that
person? One would expect that the individual
possessing the particular personality traits should be
able to provide the most informative and accurate
information about these constructs.Though there are
many strengths of using self-reports to measure
psychological constructs, there are also a number of
weaknesses. First, the structure of the questions
affects whether the reported information accurately
measures the construct under consideration.
According to Schwarz (1999), “self-reports are a
fallible source of dataand minor changes in question
wording, question format, or question context can
result in major changes in the obtained results”.
Projective Measures: Though personality might be
perceived as pertaining to internal attributes that can
only be accessed by the individual him- or herself,
we do get to know people based on their overt
behaviors and actions.According to Vazire (2006),
although data from informants are a “rich source of
information”, peer reports are often avoided
becausey costs are perceived, in comparison with
self-report measures. For example, most researchers
consider collecting reports from people other than
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SSRG International Journal of Humanities and Social Science (SSRG-IJHSS) – EFES April 2015
3.
the target to be expensive in terms of time and
money. As well, this method is commonly viewed as
being difficult and invalid, in terms of attempting to
recruit uncooperative informants and ensuring that
they do not give correct answers.Furthermore,
though it is advantageous that peers are able to form
their conceptions based on an aggregate of
behaviors across situations, an issue arises: other
people would not be able to report on how their
peers would react in a more specific situation
(Moskowitz, 1986). In that case, it might be better to
consider other types of methods such as behavioral
observation, which will now be addressed.
Behavioral Measures: Another form of measurement
that could be employed is collecting behavioral data.
This is very important because in personality
psychology, traits are openly expressed through
behavior. The fact that there is an option to conduct
behavioral observations in either an artificial or
natural setting is one’s strength. However, there are
different pros and cons associated with this
approach.It might be conceptually difficult to
capture a particular construct by observing behavior
because the link between a specific behavior and a
specific personality characteristic may not be direct.
-
-
-
-
for growth by providingemployee with a complete
unit of work and increased authority.
Flexi Time: The concept of flexi timeis designed to
provide employees somecontrol on their work
schedule. Entirework time is divided into “core
time”and “flexi time”. During core time,
allemployees are compulsorily presentwhile during
flexi time they are free tochoose their own timings.
Empowerment: Empowermentessentially means
providing authority toemployees in their area of
operation forresolving their work related
problemswithout seeking approval from above.
Quality Circles: Quality circles are semiautonomous work groups which meet regularly to
discuss and solve problems related to their specific
area which aims at improving working conditions
and self-development.
Employees Stock Ownership Plan: It has become a
major tool in retaining and motivating employees in
business organizations. It is an organization’s
established benefit plan in which employees are
offered company stock as part of their benefit
package. It makes employees work harder as it
directly affects the performance of the company and
the value of their stock also raises.
VII.
WORK MOTIVATION –THE NEXT STEP
Motivation is a process that starts with physiological or
psychological urge or need. It activates a behavior or a
drivethat is aimed at a goal or incentive. Allindividuals have
a number of basic needs which can be thought as outlets
thatchannel and regulate the flow ofpotential energy from the
reservoir.Most individuals have, within a givensocio-cultural
system, a similar set ofmotives or energy outlets; but
differgreatly in the relative strength orreadiness of various
motives andactualization of motives depends onspecific
situations in which a person findshimself or herself.
-
-
There are several ways in whichmotivation level of
employees can beaugmented and improved. Some ofthese
factors are described as under:
-
Job Enrichment: Jobs must beredesigned to provide
opportunities
forachievement,
recognition,
responsibilityand growth. It comprises of variety
inwork contents, greater use of skills andopportunity
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VIII.
CONCLUSION
Human behaviour is relative. There are different
factors involved in how/when the effect of
personality surfaces, such as the organization and
the individuals themselves. Humans leave deep
impressions in their environments; there is no
question about this. The question is how deep the
impressions might be.
Our personalities, as it was discussed so far,
influence our attitudes at all times. They, even,
influence the behavioural patterns in organizations
in which we function, in some organizations more
than the others. The level of the influence depends
on
how strong our
personalities
and
the
organizations behaviour are.
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[Online]
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from:
http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/organization.html.[
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