MGT1OBE Identifying Five Big Personality Dimensions Assessment Answer

Answer :

Organisational Behaviour

Introduction

The purpose of the essay is to explore the personality topic and involve with the literature related to organisational behaviour. The essay involves discussing the big five personality dimensions applying the OB literature. It also uses the example, OB theories and concepts for supporting the discussion. Further, applying the theory, the areas need improvement are identified which can improve work-related or academic performance. Lastly, an overall conclusion is provided.

Identifying and discussing five big personality dimensions  

The five big personality traits include extraversion, openness, agreeableness, neuroticism and conscientiousness. The five-factor theory developed to explain the important traits, which act as the building blocks of personality. The trait openness explains characteristics like insight and imagination. People having high openness have a wider variety of interests. They are interested in the world and people around them. For example, they tend to try new things and focus on dealing with challenges. They are eager to acquire new experience and new things. The standard characteristics of the conscientiousness feature are a good level of impulse control and a high degree of thoughtfulness. For example, they pay more attention to details and focus on finishing tasks on time (Kayiş et al. 2016). As stated by Le Vigouroux et al. (2017), extraversion is featured by sociability, assertiveness, talkativeness, excitability and high level of emotional expressiveness. People, with low extraversion, tend to need solitude and are introverts. For instance, such people give careful thoughts before saying anything and they do not like to be the centre of attraction. People with high agreeableness have attributes like altruism, affection trust, kindness and other prosocial attitudes. People with high agreeableness are likely to be cooperative. For instance, they are empathetic and concerned about others. Neuroticism is the fifth trait featured by moodiness, sadness and emotional instability. People, who are high in this trait experience irritability, mood swings, sadness and anxiety. For example, they become stressful very easily and remain worried about various things.  

Theory X and Y of McGregor suggests that managers assume the behaviour of employees and treat them accordingly. As per theory X, employees are passive, lazy and irresponsible, which restrict them from performing the best work. On the other side, theory Y postulates that people can take responsibility and achieve goals that allow them to perform their job excellently when they get (Majumdar, 2018). When it is applied to the big five traits of personality, it can be seen that the behaviour of employees depends on the extent to which the five major traits are present in them. For example, people with a lower level of openness often struggle with mental thinking. They usually dislike changes and do not like new things. Therefore, they resist any novel ideas. Similarly, people with lower conscientiousness dislike schedule and structures and are very careless about things. 

Adegbite et al. (2018) have highlighted another OB theory that is collegial model, which is focused on teamwork and the idea that people working in collaboration tend to solve problems more efficiently that facilitates building a stronger organisation. People must have high agreeableness and extraversion for understanding other people and working with them effectively. 

Applying the theory of big five personality dimensions for identifying performance improvement areas 

From the big five personality test, it is found that I have a high level of openness to experience, extraversion, agreeableness, emotional stability and a moderate level of conscientiousness. It means I am visionary and knowledgeable with a variety of interests. Further, I am outgoing, talkative and sociable. It means I can work with a range of people with different backgrounds and skills effectively by talking to them and knowing them well. Thus, I can develop a better connection with the people around me. Moreover, I am cooperative, good-natured and accept others that improve my ability to working in a team. Cooperation helps me working effectively with others and achieving good results. Moreover, I am calm that helps me staying stress-free. However, I have some areas, which need improvement and need to work for becoming stronger in my professional life in the future. 

It means the area, where I need to work on is the conscientiousness. The results show that I am not that much organised and reliable, and I become distracted easily. Therefore, for becoming an efficient organisational employee, I need to be more responsible, achievement-oriented and dependable, so that everyone around me can rely on me and give me responsibilities without any hesitation. 

Here, the custodial model can be introduced. The model seeks to produce employee loyalty by offering benefits packages, extremely competitive wages and other perks. It helps to attract new people and retain them (Burrell and Morgan, 2017). Thus, if my employer focuses on improving the benefits and wages for me, I may become more reliable to them and can perform my tasks more responsibly.

Further, I need to work on areas like being more enthusiastic and accepting changes. Stajkovic et al. (2018) commented that being enthusiastic helps people learning new things and bringing innovation to the organisational activities. It also increases their adaptability to the new thing and changes. 

The system model can be introduced here that strive to attain a balance between organisational goals and employee goals. according to this model, forging a relationship of ideas between employees and managers develop the strongest company for all (Chumg et al. 2016). Thus, for improving my interest in acquiring new things and embracing changes positively, my employer plays an important role in developing alignment between my professional goals and the company goals. This will help me learning the new skills with more enthusiasm, as it will be useful for achieving the organisational goals and my personal goals at the same time. 

Conclusion 

The big five dimensions help to define the personality of an individual and give an idea about his/her performance in the origination. The five different dimensions facilitate knowing that person and his/her ability f working in a team, cooperating and talking with others, imagination and level of creativity and so forth. Different organisational behaviour theories help to explain the traits of a person more effectively. I have found that I need to improve my conscientiousness and my ability to accept change for becoming a better organisational person in the future.