"When in Rome, live as the Romans do: when elsewhere, live as
they live elsewhere."
~St. Ambrose (c. 339-97)
The advice, given by the Bishop of Milan to St. Augustine in the
4th Century, may seem an esoteric tangent to the issue of employee
performance in organizations. However, as we try to refine our approach
to understanding the relationships between individuals and their
performance outcomes in organizations, the context of such interactions
should not be underestimated. Although examination of direct linkages
between employee personality dimensions and performance outcomes is
receiving increasing support (Hurtz and Donovan, 2000; Motowidlo and Van
Scotter, 1994; Van Scotter and Motowidlo, 1996), what remains less clear
is the interaction and influence of the context or place on this
relationship. Are dimensions of personality directly responsible for
employee success in organizations, or do preferences employees have for
factors in their work environment play a more significant role in the
relationship? Although selecting employees on the basis of individual
dispositions may have a positive impact on employee attitudes and
performance, personality-based employee selection processes are
notoriously inaccurate (Arthur et al., 2001). And considering the
increasingly large spans of control and reduced contact between
employees and managers in work situations (De Meuse et al., 2001;
Henricks, 2001), an over-reliance on employee selection processes as a
means of improving performance and commitment may be a less effective
approach than effectively managing work environments. In addition, many
managers do not have much flexibility in their staffing patterns in the
short-term, and managers must "deal with the hand they are
dealt." In such situations, controlling the work environment is
often the most feasible short-term option, beyond skill training, for
improving outcomes.
The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between
personality, work environment preferences, and the outcome variables,
performance and commitment. We develop hypotheses for and test the model
presented in Figure I. In developing our model, we begin with a
discussion of the relationship between personality and performance,
followed by a literature review of the relationships between Big Five
personality factors, work environment, and employee performance and
commitment. We then develop and test hypotheses suggesting that the
personality-employee outcome relationship is mediated by work
environment preferences.
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Personality, Work Environment, and Performance
According to Schneider (1987), "the people make the
place," and people are differentially attracted to, differentially
selected, and differentially leave organizations. Costa, McCrae, and
Holland (1984) assert that people begin this process by selecting into
vocations that match their personalities. Similarity between a job
applicant's values and the values of recruiters and employees
within organizations has been shown to result in improved work attitudes
and increased performance after organizational entry (Judge and Cable,
1997; Chatman, 1991). Research by Cable and Judge (1994) and Judge and
Cable (1997) provides evidence that applicants pro-actively choose such
organizational environments based on individual preferences, as they
found that job candidates seek organizations with reward systems and
cultures that fit their personalities. Of even greater significance is
the possibility that the relationship between personality
characteristics and specific work environments may influence performance
(Hurtz and Donovan, 2000).
The general trend in the research has been towards increased
optimism regarding the utility of personality tests in personnel
selection with the goal of ultimately enhancing job performance
(Behling, 1998; Hogan et al., 1996; Hurtz and Donovan, 2000; Mount and
Barrick, 1995). The general consensus has been that personality holds
utility as a predictor of job performance, specifically the
conscientiousness dimension (Behling, 1998). Research has also provided
evidence of linkages between personality dimensions with narrower facets
of performance. Research by Motowidlo and Van Scotter (1994; Van Scotter
and Motowidlo, 1996) suggests that personality has a larger impact on
contextual (as opposed to task-oriented) dimensions of performance;
specifically, extraversion and agreeableness were more strongly related
to interpersonal facilitation. Hurtz and Donovan (2000) found that
emotional stability and agreeableness were also significant predictors
of interpersonal facilitation, and emotional stability was a predictor
of task performance.
However, a number of different studies have begun to illustrate
that the effects of personality on performance may be more indirect than
bivariate. Recent research indicates the intervening effects of
performance expectancies, self-efficacy, and goal-setting on the
relationship between conscientiousness and performance (Barrick et al.,
1993; Gellatly, 1996; Martocchio and Judge, 1997). These studies
illuminate a significant gap in the literature--that the research to
date has disproportionately focused on the direct linkage between
personality and performance, and "... if we are to truly understand
the relationship between personality and job performance, we must move
beyond this bivariate relationship and toward specifying the intervening
variables that link these domains" (Hurtz and Donovan, 2000: 877).
Although specific personality traits like conscientiousness (Behling,
1998) have been linked to a variety of employee outcomes, what remains
unclear is the nature of the relationship between personality, work
environment preferences, and such outcomes. It is possible that
personality is primarily expressed in individual preferences for work
environments, and that the direct effects of personality on workplace
outcomes are fully or partially mediated by such preferences. Thus, we
may find that specific work environment preferences may be more
substantial predictors of employee outcomes in organizations than Big
Five personality factors.
This study utilizes Barrick and Mount's (1991) Big Five
factors of personality, and Moos' (1994) conceptualization of work
environments as the theoretical bases for the constructs of personality
and work environments. Barrick and Mount's (1991) Big Five factors
represent a widely accepted approach to conceptualizing personality, as
meta-analyses consistently support the construct validity of this
approach (Mount and Barrick, 1995; Salgado, 1997; Tett et al., 1991).
The Big Five factors consist of an individual's openness to
experience (proactive seeking, toleration for and exploration of the
unfamiliar), conscientiousness (thorough approach, hard-working,
organized), extraversion (the need for stimulation, desire for activity
levels with interpersonal interaction), agreeableness (cooperative
nature, likeability), and emotional stability, (calm and secure, low in
anxiety).
According to Moos (1981), work environment preferences can be
measured using three dimensions of work environment settings: system
maintenance, goal orientation, and relationship dimensions. System
maintenance refers to how orderly and organized the work setting is, how
clear it is in its expectations, and how much control it maintains. Goal
orientation assesses the degree to which an environment encourages or
stifles growth through providing for participation in decision making
and autonomy, maintaining a task orientation, and providing job
challenge and expectations for success and accomplishment. The
relationship dimension measures the degree of interpersonal interaction
in a work environment, such as the social communication exchanges and
cohesion among workers, and the friendship and support provided by
co-workers and management. These work environment preferences have been
shown to affect individuals' personal functioning at work (Billings
and Moos, 1982). Examination of work environment preferences can help
identify organizational factors that may be problematic, and can guide
interventions aimed at reducing employee stress in a variety of work
settings.
THEORY AND HYPOTHESES
For the reasons which follow, we believe that the personality
factors--conscientiousness, agreeableness, and extraversion--will work
specifically through goal orientation and relationship work environment
preferences on their way to influencing job performance and commitment.
The personality factors openness to experience and emotional stability
will manifest themselves in relationship and system maintenance work
environment preferences, and through their influence on such preferences
will affect job performance and commitment.
Conscientiousness, Agreeableness, Extraversion and Employee
Performance
Conscientiousness is the personality trait most strongly linked to
performance outcomes. Two recent meta-analyses provide strong linkages
between conscientiousness and employee outcomes. Salgado (2003) found
that, of the Big Five dimensions, conscientiousness was the strongest
predictor of job performance. Judge and Ilies (2002) also found that
conscientiousness was a strong and consistent predictor of performance
motivation. Conscientious individuals are more likely to be orderly and
decisive, be autonomous in goal-setting behavior, show greater ability
to cope with time management issues and stress, and generally strive for
continuous performance improvement (Judge and Ilies, 2002; Thoreson et
al., 2004). Conscientiousness has been shown in individual studies to
predict performance in such diverse settings as student GPA (Nguyen et
al., 2005), sales outcomes (Thoresen et al., 2004), and performance in
manufacturing teams (Morgeson et al., 2005).
However, the potential influence of the mediating effects of work
environments on the conscientiousness-performance relationship has been
hinted at in several recent empirical studies. Research by Witt, Burke,
Barrick, and Mount (2002) and Witt and Ferris (2003) found that low
levels of social skill on the part of conscientious employees removed
the significant relationship with performance. This result indicates the
potential importance of the interpersonal interaction-oriented
relationship dimension of work environments as a mediator in the
conscientiousness-performance relationship.
The importance of the goal achievement dimension and maintaining a
task orientation in work environments on the
conscientiousness-performance relationship has been indicated in
research by Stewart, Fulmer, Barrick, and Hollenbeck (2005), whereby
conscientious employees were shown to focus on task role behavior in
their pursuit of team performance outcomes. The relationship between
conscientiousness and increased commitment also seems to have a goal
achievement mediator, as Moon (2001) found that conscientiousness
operationalized through achievement-striving was associated with an
escalation of commitment.
The relationship between the personality dimension of agreeableness
and performance has also received some recent support. Agreeableness may
lead to enhanced customer contact and interactions, and improved
relationships and communication with managers. Agreeable employees may
be viewed as more trustworthy, and as possessing higher levels of
integrity, which can aid them in customer relationships and in access to
valued information (Costa and McCrae, 1995; Sackett and DeVote, 2001).
Hogan and Holland (2003) report the meta-analytic validity of
agreeableness to specific job criteria performance outcomes to be
significant (.34).
An employees' agreeableness represents an interpersonal
orientation of likeability and cooperativeness that would likely prefer
environments with an emphasis on relationships. Nikolaou's (2003)
study of 227 employees indicated that agreeableness was related to
performance in occupations that had high levels of interpersonal
interaction in the work environment, and Stevens and Ash (2001) found
that agreeableness was related to an employee's preference for
participative styles of management. The importance of
relationship-oriented work environments has also been demonstrated by
LePine and Van Dyne's (2001) research, whereby agreeableness was
more strongly related to cooperative behavior than to task performance,
and by Witt, Kacmar, Carlson, and Zivnuska (2002) whose results showed
that the interaction between agreeableness and politics explained a
significant amount of variance in contextual performance. Agreeableness
has also been positively associated with employee commitment, predicting
expatriates' termination decisions (Caligiuri, 2000).
Extraversion, characterized by personalities with a need for
stimulation and high externally-oriented activity levels, was found to
be the most important correlate of predicted job performance of all the
Big Five personality dimensions in a study of managers from both the
United States and Japan (Robie et al., 2005). The levels of
assertiveness, positive emotionality, activity and sociability among
extraverted employees can be beneficial in terms of performance
outcomes. Further, extraverts are often motivated by external rewards
and recognition in the form of status and rewards at work that can lead
to improved performance outcomes (Barrick et al., 2002). Hogan and
Holland's (2003) meta-analysis supported a relationship between
extraversion and performance on specific job criteria of .35.
The work environment dimension of goal achievement may play a
significant mediating role in the relationship between extraversion and
employee outcomes. In examining the ratings of performance in a sales
job, Barrick et al. (2002) found that an individual's striving for
status and accomplishment mediated the extraversion-performance
relationship. And Barry and Stewart (1997) noted that extraverts induce
perceptions of their contributions to group outcomes by focusing on
providing task-related inputs. Such task- and accomplishment-oriented
efforts indicate the importance to extraverts of goal
achievement-oriented work environments.
Extraverts also may seek out work environments with high levels of
relationship orientation as a result of their craving for interpersonal
interactions. Research by Van Vianen and De Dreu (2001) demonstrated
that high levels of extraversion contributed positively to social
cohesion, and did not directly affect team performance. Similarly,
LePine and Van Dyne's (2001) results indicated a stronger
relationship between extraversion and cooperative behavior than task
performance. And the relationship between extraversion and employee
commitment and intention to remain was indicated by Caligiuri (2000).
In summary, our review of the literature suggests that the
personality factors conscientiousness, agreeableness, and extraversion
manifest themselves in preferences for goal- and relationship-oriented
work environments, which in turn affect employee performance and
commitment. As a result, we propose the following hypothesis:
H1: The significant, positive relationship between
conscientiousness, agreeableness, and extraversion with employee
performance and commitment will be partially mediated by work
environment preferences for relationship and goal orientation.
Openness to Experience and Employee Performance
Openness to experience has been described as an employee's
desire to be intellectually curious, imaginative, and open to
possibilities. We often hear of business coveting employees who can
"think outside the box" or can adapt and change to solve
complex problems in a continuously evolving work environment (Burke and
Witt, 2002). It appears that the research on the openness to
experience-performance relationship has reinforced the idea that dynamic
work environments in which learning and adaptation are required tend to
enhance the openness-performance link. Bing and Lounsbury (2000) found
that openness predicted variance in job performance above and beyond all
of the other dimensions of the Big Five. However, the sample consisted
of employees in U.S.-based Japanese manufacturing firms, of whom a large
amount of employee training, adaptability, and change were required.
Generally, "the research indicates strong linkages between openness
to experience and enhanced performance in such learning and
adaptation-oriented environments as decision making (LePine et al.,
2000; Colquitt et al., 2002) and training proficiency (Salgado, 1997).
This may indicate a negative relationship with the mediating work
environment dimension of system maintenance, which emphasizes control,
order, and organization. An impatience with highly structured systems
among highly open employees was indirectly indicated in research by
Kickul and Neuman (2000) who found that openness to experience was not
directly related to performance, but was predictive of emergent
leadership behaviors in teams.
Employees with high levels of openness to experience may also
benefit from highly relationship-oriented work environments, as Nikolaou
(2003) found that openness to experience was related to performance only
for occupations involving higher levels of social interaction. The
relationship between openness to experience and employee commitment may
also be mediated by relationship dimensions of work environments. In a
three-wave longitudinal study of employees, openness was associated with
higher levels of proactive socialization behavior and relationship
building, which were related to employee commitment outcomes of turnover
intentions and actual turnover (Wanberg and Kammeyer-Mueller, 2000).
H2: The significant relationship between openness to experience and
employee performance and commitment will be partially mediated by work
environment preferences for higher levels of relationship, and lower
levels of system maintenance.
Emotional Stability and Employee Performance
People with high levels of neuroticism (representing the negative
pole of emotional stability) have been described as depressed, insecure,
and anxious. These are traits which would not facilitate effective job
performance, and Barrick and Mount (1991) have argued that such
individuals are often selected out of the labor pool altogether. It
should not be surprising that in the Judge and Ilies (2002)
meta-analysis, emotional stability was the strongest and most consistent
correlate of performance motivation. A similar result was obtained in a
meta-analysis of European data (Salgado, 1997). Emotional stability has
also been shown to positively and significantly predict academic
performance (Nguyen et al., 2005) and turnover intentions (Caligiuri,
2000). Further, a meta-analysis conducted by Frye (2001) suggests that
neuroticism is the latent construct underlying lower levels of
self-esteem, lower self-efficacy, an external locus of control, and
lower job satisfaction.
The impact of emotional stability/ neuroticism seems to be related
to the ability to form and maintain positive relationships in one's
work environment. Van Vianen and De Dreu (2001) found that high levels
of emotional stability contributed to social cohesion in teams, and high
levels of neuroticism predict anger and neglect in relationships (Barta
and Kiene, 2005). We hypothesize that the relationship between emotional
stability and employee performance and commitment is mediated by the
relationship work environment dimension.
H3: The significant, positive relationship between emotional
stability and employee performance and commitment will be partially
mediated by work environment preferences for relationship dimensions.
METHODOLOGY
Sample
Subjects consisted of employees of eight different organizations,
representing financial analysts, direct-sales representatives,
telemarketers, information systems specialists, customer service
personnel, and stock clerks. The subjects were chosen using quota
sampling, as every employee in the position analyzed within each
organization was included as a subject. All subjects were located in the
western United States. A total of 115 subjects participated in the
study, and a response rate of 92% yielded 106 usable responses. Of the
subjects who responded to the study, 56% were male, 86% Caucasian, 40%
were married, and they possessed an average tenure of 2.88 years with
the organization. A wide range of organizations and positions were
chosen by the authors to provide greater heterogeneity in both job
context preferences and personalities in the sample. All of the surveys
were administered under the supervision of the authors and completed by
subjects while they were at work, which improved the response rate.
Managers were provided a summary of the results of employee perceptions
of the work environment to encourage participation in the research.
Data Collection and Measures
The data collection procedure consisted of two surveys. The first
survey was administered to the direct supervisor or manager of the
employee to collect ratings of each subject employee's performance.
The performance measure used was the Minnesota Satisfactoriness Survey
(MSS) (Gibson et al., 1977). The strength of the MSS is its broad
definition of performance, including assessments of the quality and
quantity of an employee's work, and their overall dependability and
promotability. The twenty-eight item instrument asks managers to rate
each employee's efforts and outcomes in comparison to the rest of
the work group. Studies indicate that the reliability coefficients for
the MSS range from .69 to .95, with a median of .87, and the MSS has
demonstrated validity in longitudinal examinations of tenure and
promotions across a variety of occupations (Gibson et al., 1977).
The second survey, administered to the employees, included three
instruments. The first was the Work Environment Scale (WES) (Moos,
1994), which was used to measure subjects' perceptions of their
ideal work environment. The WES was chosen to measure work environment
preferences as it utilizes a broad approach to defining work
environments in three distinct dimensions: system maintenance (referring
to how orderly and organized the work setting is), goal orientation (the
degree of job challenge and task orientation), and relationship
dimensions (desired levels of social interaction, support and cohesion
among workers). The WES has shown validity in predicting outcomes with
employees in health care, military, and correctional facility
environments (Moos, 1994). The WES consists of ninety statements such as
"The work is really challenging" and "People take an
interest in each other," which subjects rate as either true or
false in representing their work environment preferences. Reliabilities
of the WES (using Cronbach's Alpha) have varied from .69 to .83 on
the various subscales (Moos, 1994).
The second instrument in the employee survey, the NEO-FFI Form S,
represents the Big Five personality measure (Costa and McCrae, 1991).
Validity of the NEO-FFI's five factors has been indicated across a
large number of studies (Costa and McCrae, 1995; McCrae and Costa,
1987). The third measure in the employee survey examined employee
commitment. O'Reilly and Chatman's (1986) psychological
attachment instrument was used, as it provides a parsimonious measure of
overall commitment that has been effectively used in research linking
individual preferences with organizational attitudinal outcomes.
RESULTS
The results of the data analyses provide support for the importance
of goal-orientation on the personality-performance relationship. Table 1
provides the means, standard deviations, and correlation matrix for the
study variables. SPSS hierarchical/ stepwise multiple regression was
used to test the hypotheses. The process for detecting mediated
relationships in hierarchical regression recommended by Baron and Kenny
(1986) was used to test the hypothesized relationships, including the
role of mediators, as specified in Figure I. As a result, our analytical
approach proceeded under an assumption of linearity of the relationships
between the variables. Table 2 includes the results of the three
regression models that examined each of the three hypotheses. The first
model examined the relationship between the independent variables, the
Big Five personality dimensions, and the mediators (the work environment
preference dimensions of relationship, goal orientation, and system
maintenance). A separate regression equation was used for each work
environment dimension. The second regression model looked at the
relationships between the independent variables (the Big Five factors)
and the outcome variables of employee performance and commitment. The
third regression model examined the relationship between the Big Five
independent variables and the outcome variables of performance and
commitment in the presence of the work environment mediating variables.
[FIGURE I OMITTED]
The results of the first model regressions indicated that three of
the Big Five factors were significant predictors of work environment
preferences (see Table 2). Extraversion, conscientiousness, and
emotional stability were all significant predictors of a goal
orientation preference, and agreeableness was a significant predictor of
a preference for system maintenance. The second model regressions
indicated significant and positive relationships between two of the Big
Five personality factors and the outcome variables. Conscientiousness
was a significant predictor of employee performance, and extraversion
indicated a significant relationship with employee commitment. In the
third model, where both the personality and work environment dimensions
were included to assess mediating effects, the work environment
dimension of goal orientation was the only variable that maintained a
significant relationship with employee performance and commitment. All
of the personality dimensions were nonsignificant for both outcome
variables when the work environment measures were included in the
equation.
The results of these analyses provide partial support for
hypotheses 1-3. Although the system maintenance and relationship
dimensions of work environments were not significant factors mediating
the personality and performance/commitment relationships, goal
orientation was a significant outcome of all three hypothesized
personality dimensions (extraversion, agreeableness, and
conscientiousness). Goal orientation was also the only significant
predictor of performance in the full (third) model, and fully mediated
the effects of conscientiousness on performance. In addition, the
effects of extraversion on commitment were non-significant when the goal
orientation dimension of work environments was included in the analysis.
DISCUSSION
To more fully understand the degree to which the "people make
the place," this study examined the relationship between individual
personality, work environment preferences, and performance and
commitment in organizations. The results suggest that a specific
"place" variable--an employee's work environment
preference for goal orientation--plays a predominant role in performance
and commitment outcomes. Goal orientation fully mediated the significant
direct relationship between conscientiousness and performance, and the
significant direct relationship between extraversion and commitment was
removed when preferences for goal-oriented work environments were
included in the analyses. Agreeableness was significantly related to
both goal orientation and system maintenance, but these relationships
did not translate into either performance or commitment. Neither the
personality characteristics openness and emotional stability, nor the
work environment preference for relationships had a significant effect
on performance and commitment.
The results suggest that agreeableness, extraversion, and
conscientiousness may combine to form a preference for work environments
that offer high levels of goal orientation. Thus, the effect of
personality on performance and commitment has a situational context; it
does not occur in a vacuum. Challenging goals may communicate high
levels of confidence in the abilities of employees and increase
self-efficacy (and performance), and these positive feelings may also
manifest themselves in enhanced employee commitment (Whittington et al.,
2004). If managers provide goal-oriented work environments to
individuals with these desirable personality characteristics, they
should reap the benefits of enhanced performance and commitment.
The ability to attract, keep, and motivate high-performers is
becoming increasingly important in today's competitive
organizational environments. The results of this study indicate that an
over-reliance on employee selection processes may be misguided, and the
development of goal-oriented work environments may be a more effective
means of improving employee performance and commitment. This may be
particularly relevant in work environments where managers have very
large spans of control which restrict them from frequent and direct
contact with employees. Strickland and Galimba (2001) found that goals
provide structure to ambiguous situations, reducing the effects of
cognitive interference on task performance. Work environments can
provide social cues to organizational members on how to act
appropriately, and employees tend to conform to such expectations to
receive social approval from their peers (Salancik and Pfeffer, 1978;
Schneider, 1975). Thus, if a work environment develops a strong goal
orientation, employees are more likely to align their individual goal
orientations with the norms of the work environment to maintain harmony
with their surroundings (Neal et al., 2000). As climate scholars
generally identify managers as the primary architects of group member
climate perceptions (e.g., Naumann and Bennett, 2000), the results of
our research indicate the potential importance of leaders in focusing on
the development of goal-oriented work environments to achieve enhanced
performance and commitment. Whittington et al. (2004) found that goal
setting enhanced the direct relationship between transformational
leadership and employee commitment and performance, and concluded that
goal-oriented environments provide clarification, direction, focus, and
longer-term perspective needed to translate transformational leadership
effectively into performance. Future research could examine the specific
influence of leaders in the form of behavioral modeling and
leader-member exchange on the personality--work environment--performance
relationship.
The results of this study also have implications for managing
employee attitudes. Given the consistency of employees' job
attitudes, the significant relationship between goal-oriented work
environments and commitment enhances the argument that employers should
do more to try to structure work environments in a positive way so that
work is a more satisfying and rewarding experience. Although selecting
employees on the basis of favorable and relatively stable individual
dispositions may have a favorable impact on employee attitudes and
performance, work situations are within the control of most managers.
Our research suggests that unfavorable work situations can directly
impact employee performance regardless of personality predispositions,
whereas the development of supportive work environments can have a
direct and positive affect on employees. Following the recommendations
of research by Luthans and Sommer (2005) and Tata and Prasad (2004),
future studies should examine the effectiveness of human resource
departments functioning as strategic partners in creating
performance-oriented work climates and team self-management contexts to
aid in the adaptation towards increasing worker autonomy and larger
spans of control in contemporary work environments. Future research
could also provide useful information regarding the role of personality
and goal-setting work environments on a more comprehensive set of
dependent variables that have been linked to personality, such as
organizational citizenship behaviors (Neuman and Kickul, 1998),
satisfaction (Staw and Cohen-Charash, 2005), and turnover (Jenkins,
1993). It would be helpful to determine if the omission of potential
mediators or moderators of the relationships between personality
variables and employee performance outcomes in past research has served
to enhance the importance of personality relative to
contextually-oriented variables.
Potential limitations of this study include the relatively small
sample size and the cross-sectional nature of the data in this
exploratory study. As a result, generalizeability of the results may be
limited. This research also relied on self-report surveys to measure
employees' perceptions of their personality, commitment, and work
environment preferences, which raises the potential for common method
variance. Although the performance outcome measure was collected from
managers, future research could utilize multiple rating sources for many
of the variables, such as using friends or co-workers to rate
personality.
In summary, the primary contribution of this research was the
examination of the unique variance contributed by personality and work
environment preferences in determining employee performance. The results
of this study indicate that the relationship between personality, work
environment, and employee outcomes is interrelated and in need of
further examination. The significance of employee goal-orientation
preferences in fully mediating the relationship between personality and
workplace outcomes provides further evidence to support the contention
that the relationship between personality and performance may not be
bivariate, and that intervening variables play a substantial role.
Future research should examine the dimensionality of both personality
and outcomes in the workplace to understand the complexities of the
relationship.
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James W. Westerman
Associate Professor of Management
Appalachian State University
Bret L. Simmons
Assistant Professor of Management
University of Nevada, Reno
Table 1
Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations
M SD 1 2 3 4
1. Extraversion 45.98 6.37
2. Openness 41.32 6.86 .34 *
3. Agreeableness 45.91 7.22 .34 * .16
4. Conscientiousness 46.39 6.76 .29 * .06 .43 *
5. Emotional Stability 34.52 7.73 .40 * .07 .41 * .38 *
6. Relationship 23.80 3.32 .29 * .16 .27 * .27 *
7. Goal Orientation 19.32 3.20 .23 * .05 .21 * .20 *
8. System Maintenance 27.05 3.43 .21 * .04 .34 * .22 *
9. Performance 63.34 11.99 .08 .03 .12 .40 *
10. Commitment 51.93 11.73 .23 * .18 .13 .12
5 6 7 8 9
1. Extraversion
2. Openness
3. Agreeableness
4. Conscientiousness
5. Emotional Stability
6. Relationship .24 *
7. Goal Orientation .14 .46 *
8. System Maintenance .17 .55 * .47 *
9. Performance .14 .14 .31 * .16
10. Commitment .01 .07 .36 * .11 .08
* p < 0.05
Table 2
Regression Analyses: The Mediating Effects of Work Environment
Preferences on Personality and Employee Performance (a)
Model 1: DV = Mediators
Goal System
Relationship Orientation Maintenance
Beta Sig. Beta Sig. Beta Sig.
Extraversion .140 .214 .228 .043# .094 .409
Openness .101 .327 .039 .702 .037 .723
Agreeableness .114 .310 .345 .002# .281 .015#
Conscientiousness .157 .158 .250 .025# .073 .516
Emotional Stability .073 .512 .087 .433 .005 .967
Goal Orientation
System Maintenance
Relationship
Adj. R-sq. .103 .114 .081
F 3.32 .008# 3.59 .005# 2.79 .021#
Model 2
Performance Commitment
Beta Sig. Beta Sig.
Extraversion .119 .264 .208 .050#
Openness
Agreeableness .078 .489 .041 .713
Conscientiousness .209 .048# .047 .667
Emotional Stability
Goal Orientation
System Maintenance
Relationship
Adj. R-sq. .016 .031
F 1.562 .203 2.07 .110
Model 3
Performance Commitment
Beta Sig. Beta Sig.
Extraversion .174 .116 .178 .110
Openness
Agreeableness .226 .085 .110 .403
Conscientiousness .122 .284 .016 .892
Emotional Stability
Goal Orientation .307 .021# .295 .029#
System Maintenance .139 .292 .015 .911
Relationship .080 .523 .107 .400
Adj. R-sq. .081 .077 .030
F 2.49 .028# 2.44 .030#
(a) Numbers in bold indicate p < .05.
Note: Numbers in bold indicated with #.