How Bipp's (2010) theory may be applied to organizational work environment?

How Bipp's (2010) Theory may be Applied to Organizational Work Environment?

By: Leontes Dorzilme, Doctoral Student

Bipp’s (2010) work may still apply to practical organizational setting because his valuable finding son individual job preference based on openness to experience (O) and Core self- evaluation (CSE) is actual. Because these two dominate personality traits may help to explain preference for a specific job, it may also help in understanding the approach to motivate individual in the workplace by placing the right people to the right position.  Dipp (2010) investigated the preference for job characteristic related both to the job environment (extrinsic) and the job features (intrinsic) levels. The findings suggest that CSE is highly related to intrinsic work factors such as experience, meaningfulness, and autonomy. In fact, Bipp’s (2010) findings are important because it also emphasizes on job characteristics relation to personality traits. Then leadership and organizational strategists have the responsibility to remodel the work environment and the job characteristics accordingly in order to influence employees’ motivation and performance (Kristof-Brown, Zimmermann, & Johnson, 2005). Even though people showing openness to experience may demonstrate higher level of adaptability to change (Huang, 2013), if the organizational structure which constitutes the extrinsic factors prevents the individual from performing as desired, the employee may not be fully satisfied and committed to the organization.

Previous studies had focused either on traits or on job characteristics, or skills. For example, in Sims (1983) table of job demands and individual performance competencies, the equivalence for people with high score in openness (O) would be the symbolically oriented and high score in consciousness as the behaviorally oriented.  Sims’ (1983) study was to demonstrate the person-job interaction based on Kolb’s experiential learning theory. He illustrated the relation between job demands, performance competencies, and learning competencies (Senge, 2006).. In this era of rapid and constant organizational change (Haldeman, 2011), many scholar researches have encouraged leaders to shift in paradigms of their leadership behaviors to a more humanistic approach based on two salient elements participative and consultative (Ismail et al., 2010). That being said, Bipp (2010) confirms that individual presenting a high score of openness (O) may be important resources to lead adaptability to change. However, leadership must be requires to develop a collaborative relationship with them. On the other hand, people with high score on consciousness (C) may constitute a pull of stable performers looking for possibility to demonstrate their competence and to striving to achievement. The latter normally prefers a kind of consultative work environment where their expertise can be used in decision making (Hornickel’s, 2012).

Consciousness and thh Consultant Job

According to Golberg (1990) many work related attitudes and behaviors are related to consciousness as defined as the capacity to demonstrate competency, expertise and to show a high level of need for achievement (Costa & McCrae, 1998). The consciousness level of individuals being implied in consultation jobs may present many advantages in decision making.  According to Honickel (2012) main idea, consultant may be considered as consultative leaders and try to guide organizations or individuals based on the constant desire to expand their own knowledge while tacit knowledge and sum of experience may also guide the decision making process. The Honickel (2012) approach clarifies the need to pursue higher goals-setting than rewards in a sense that consultants, since we have taking this field as sample, may find their higher self or true self by pursuing higher goals than the ones satisfying just the ego. That is, Honickel (2012) suggests that consultant may be seen as people using their power to influence and persuade both others and organizations by being focus on outcomes for a greater good. Indeed, many studies have found a positive association between C dominance with aspects of influence (Berings et al., 2004; Furnham et al., 2005). Consultants are influencing decision making processes.

References

Berings, D., De Fruyt, F. and Bourwen, R. (2004) Work Values and Personality Traits as Predictors of Enterprising and Social Vocational Interests. Personality and Individual Differences, 36, 349–364.

Bipp, T. (2010). What do people want from their jobs? The big five, core self-evaluations and work motivation. International Journal of Selection & Assessment, 18(1), 28-39. Retrieved from https://library.gcu.edu:2048/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=48035056&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Costa, P.T. and McCrae, R.R. (1998) Six Approaches to the Explanation of Facet-Level Traits: Examples from conscientiousness. European Journal of Personality, 12, 117–134.

Goldberg, L.R. (1990) An Alternative Description of Personality: The Big-Five factor structure. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 1216–1229.

Haldeman, J. (2011). The learning organization: From dysfunction to grace. Journal of Management & Marketing Research, vol. 9, 1-9.  Retrieved from https://ehis.ebscohost.com.library.gcu.edu:2048/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=6&sid=36ae3ec5-b8d9-49c5-bd56-811741d6a0f1%40sessionmgr112&hid=107  

Hornickel, J.  (2012). Consultative leadership. Training, 12-14. Retrieved from https://ehis.ebscohost.com.library.gcu.edu:2048/eds/detail?vid=10&sid=6120ee27-d1b3-4ad8-a8f5-e94f70b3197c%40sessionmgr113&hid=7&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWRzLWxpdmUmc2NvcGU9c2l0ZQ%3d%3d#db=bth&AN=76319696 

Huang, J. L. et al. (2013). Personality and adaptive performance at work: A meta-analytic investigation. Journal of Applied Psychology. Retrieved from https://ehis.ebscohost.com.library.gcu.edu:2048/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=12&sid=7b111f6d-5e05-4efe-b983-0227ab6d4859%40sessionmgr198&hid=16

Ismail, A. et al. (2010). Linking participative and consultative leadership styles to organizational commitment as an antecedent of job satisfaction. UNITAR e-Journal, vol. 6(1), 11-26. Retrieved from https://ehis.ebscohost.com.library.gcu.edu:2048/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=6120ee27-d1b3-4ad8-a8f5-e94f70b3197c@sessionmgr113&hid=102

Senge, P. (2006). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. New York, NY: Doubleday.

Sims, R. R. (1983). Kolb's experiential learning theory: A framework for assessing person-job interaction. Academy of Management Review, vol. 8(3), 501-508. Retrieved from https://ehis.ebscohost.com.library.gcu.edu:2048/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=7006e9de-a184-4e83-82be-b0e31454edb9@sessionmgr11&hid=17

Xue, H. B., & Wnag, X. (2012). Face consciousness and decision-making styles: An empirical study of young-adult Chinese consumers. International Journal of China Marketing, vol2 (2), 60-73. Retrieved from https://ehis.ebscohost.com.library.gcu.edu:2048/eds/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=50b2ea28-1f93-49a9-99b5-83aa00fdfed2@sessionmgr113&hid=4208