Does Personality Influence Employee Citizenship - Research Paper Example

AUTHOR: Hossam Abu Elanain TITLE: Relationship between Personality and Organizational Citizenship Behavior: Does Personality Influence Employee Citizenship? PUBLICATION/Date: October, 2007 PUBLISHER: International Review of Business Research Papers Conceptualizations In order to understand the broader aspect of organizational behavior a research article has been selected. The article by Elanain (2007) studies the relationship between personality and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). The topic of this article can play a significant role in understanding of organizational behavior management in UAE. The reason behind this is that the research basically studies the relationship of personality traits to job performance. This relationship is the essence of organizational behavior as Sims (2002) defines organizational behavior “as the actions and attitudes of people in the organization.” These actions and attitudes of people are greatly shaped by their personality traits and play a significant role in their organizational performance. Similarly, the research article also deals with the advancement of organizational effectiveness. This is done by providing ways to effectively manage the various dimensions of an individual’s personality such as extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability and openness to experience. Elanain’s (2007) article starts with an introduction which discusses previous researches regarding the relationship between personality and job performance. The existing literature indicates a significant relationship personality traits and performance dimensions. The introduction then gives a definition of personality traits as enduring patterns of thought, emotion, and behavior that are not likely to change over time and explain people’s behavior across different situations. It also explains the significant influence of the Five-Factor Model of Personality (FFM) in the field of personality. The introduction also includes a definition of Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB), as discretionary behaviors that are frequently exhibited by employees to help the organization even though they might not directly result in the employees’ benefits. The article further indicates an inconsistency in the personality-performance relationship which is explained by individual variables and situational conditions that encourage or limit the influence of personality attributes on performance, and influence the relationship between personality traits and performance. In order to control the effects on Organizational Citizenship Behavior, an individual dimension (work locus of control) and situational dimension (organizational justice) are used. The introduction ends with an explanation of the purpose of the study which is to examine the relationship between FFM personality traits and OCB after controlling the impact of the control variables (Elanain, 2007). The overall introduction is quite logical and explanatory. It provides readers with the definitions and descriptions of variables involved in the study. Furthermore, the introduction also provides evidence from previous researches that support the existing research paper. On the other hand, the author mentions the purpose of the research at the end of the introduction, but there is no further explanation provided. In addition, there is no section of Problem of the Statement which would have been helped the readers understand the issue under study better (Elanain, 2007). Theoretical Framework/Hypotheses The author then discusses the literature review which is divided into three parts; the Five-Factor Model (FFM) of Personality, the Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB) and predicting OCB from personality. Here the author provides the five dimensions of FFM that include, Extraversion (sociable vs. introverted), Agreeableness (cooperative vs. competitive), Conscientiousness (organized and planful vs. unorganized and careless), Emotional Stability (emotional stability vs. instability), and Openness to Experience (intellectual curiosity vs. preference for routine). The OBC starts with a quoted definition of the concept and then moves onto give the four-dimension model of OCB that includes, interpersonal helping, individual initiative, personal industry, and loyal boosterism. In predicting OCB from personality, the author offers numerous researches that support the relationship between personality traits and job performance. The literature further indicates a positive relation between the five dimensions of FFM and job performance and a significant influence of personality traits on the selection and recruitment process. The author also provides readers with researches that contradict the existing research. At the end, the author summarizes the literature review suggesting that researches regarding individual differences as predictors of OCB provide mixed results because of which the study is carried out (Elanain, 2007). The literature review is short, but it quite comprehensively addresses the two variables involved in the study; personality and organizational citizenship behavior. On the other hand, the author does not provide readers with any existing literature on the two control variables; work locus of control and organizational justice, rather there is no mention of these variables in the literature review. If the author had addressed previous researches related to these variables, it would have helped readers understand the role of these in the research under discussion. Thus, it can be deduced that the literature review does not comprehensively address the variables involved in the study. Furthermore, the article does make use of recent literature to support the research but it also uses literature starting from the early 80s, more specifically, 1983. This is a big drawback for the existing research because the organizational dynamics have changed considerably over the past decade or so due to advancements in technology. Thus, even though these researches help in understanding the concept of organizational behavior in more detail, the researcher should have utilized more recent researches to support the research under discussion (Elanain, 2007). In the hypothesis development section of the article, the author provides five statements that are to be tested. These five statements, or the hypotheses, include the five dimensions of personality in the FFM (Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability, and Openness to Experience) and their relationship with Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB). Not only are the hypotheses clearly mentioned, existing evidence related to each hypothesis is also mentioned. This help in showing the relationship between the five dimensions and OCB and also helps the readers understand the context and the background of the existing article (Elanain, 2007). The author then moves onto the explanation of the control variables and provides evidence regarding individual and situational factors that can limit the extent to which an individual can behave in accordance with his or her personality in the organization. Here the author clearly explains the two control variables; work locus of control and organizational justice and their role in the existing research. There author also gives ample of evidence influence of the work locus of control and organizational justice on the performance of OCB. As previously mentioned, the control variables were not discussed in the literature review. As the author here primarily talks about the literature supporting the two variables, therefore, this section could have been incorporated in the literature review which would have made the whole article more logical and would have continued in a flow (Elanain, 2007). Research Design The methodology and research design section is divided into three sections; participants and procedures, measures and analysis. The participants and procedure section provides information regarding the number of participants, the instruments used and the location and the method in which the questionnaires were administered. It also informs readers about the response rate, the ratio of males and females, the mean and standard deviation of the ages of the participants, the average time period for which the respondents had worked for the organization and average time period in their present job. The measures section explains the standardized instruments used to measure the four variables involved in the study. The Big Five Inventory (BFI) (John & Srivastava, 1999) was used to measure personality; OCB was measured with the 21-item scale developed by Moorman and Blakely (1995); WLOC was measured with the 16-item scale developed by Spector (1988) and to measure organizational justice, the study used the three-dimension scale developed by Niehoff & Moorman (1993). All the four instruments are based on five-point Likert’s scale which makes the statistical analysis easier. The analysis section explains the way in which the collected data will be analyzed using the regression analysis (Elanain, 2007). The methodology and research design section provides readers with the basic information regarding the data collection and analysis of the results. The population and sample size were quite appropriate but there was no mention of the research design to be used in the research. Similarly, the drop-off method employed for data collection has little personal involvement from the researcher which helps in the avoidance of influencing the results, but the researcher is unaware whether the participants responding to the questionnaires fit the criteria or not. The analysis section provides complete information regarding the way the data analysis is to be carried out which is using the regression equation. The regression equation will help the researcher determine whether there five dimensions of the personality predict job performance by controlling two variables. On the other hand, the methodology section makes no mention of the ethical issues involved in data collection which is a significant part of any valid research (Elanain, 2007). Results The results and discussion sections shows the means and standard deviation of the four dimensions of the OCB which were summated to create an overall measurement of OCB. It also gives an overall summary of the reliability estimate and inter-correlation matrix and suggests that there was a strong relationship between openness to experience and OCB. The results section further explains the findings obtained from the regression analysis which indicates the acceptance of the hypotheses that determined the relationship of openness to experience, conscientiousness and emotional stability with OCB. While, the hypotheses testing the relationship of extraversion and agreeableness with OCB was rejected. The discussion section talks about the relationship between the personality traits and job performance. It gives an overall view of the findings of the research and supports them with the literature review (Elanain, 2007). The conclusion derived from the findings is completely aligned with research. The results of the article have huge implication in the field of organizational behavior. This is because the results will help the management understand the personality traits that must be present in individuals when indulging in selection and recruitment. Moreover, it will also help the management understand their employees, enhance job performance and increase the overall organizational effectiveness. On the other hand, the limitations of the research, as mentioned by the researcher him/herself are that the data was collected only from the employees and not the managers. Moreover, the dimensions of OCB were not separately measured in the analysis rather the results were summated to create an overall measure of the OCB. The referencing and the style of the article were quite appropriate. The article flows in a logical manner that helps the readers understand the issue under research (Elanain, 2007). Conclusion In conclusion, the research contributes immensely to the field of organizational behavior because it deals with the different dimensions of personality and how they predict job performance. It also encourages further research in this area of study by suggesting an investigation into the influence of the personality dimensions on the dimensions of OCB. Lastly, it also help in understanding the ways in which the management can achieve the organizational goals and enhance the overall organizational effectiveness. References Elanain, H. A. (2007). Relationship between Personality and Organizational Citizenship Behavior: Does Personality Influence Employee Citizenship? International Review of Business Research Papers, 3(4), 31-43 John, O. P., & Srivastava, S. (1999). The Big Trait Taxonomy: History, measurement, and theoretical perspective, in Pervin, L.A. & John, O.P. (Eds), Handbook of personality: Theory and research, Guilford, New York, pp. 102-138. Moorman, R. H., & Blakely, G. L., (1995). Individualism-Collectivism as an individual difference predictor of organizational citizenship behavior. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 16(2), 127 – 142. Niehoff, B. P. & Moorman, R. H. (1993). Justice as a mediator of the relationship between methods of monitoring and organizational citizenship behavior, Academy of Management Journal, 36, 527-556. Sims, R. R. (2002). Managing organizational behavior. United States of America: Praeger. Spector, P. E. (1988). Development of the work locus of control scale, Journal of Occupational Psychology, 61, 335-340. Read More