INDIVIDUAL PERSONALITY AND ITS EFFECT ON TEAM PRODUCTIVITY

(A CASE STUDY OF SIMBA INDUSTRY LIMITED)

BY

MARIA TIJANI OLUWATOSUIIN

DEPAR MENT OF

GATEWAYPOLYTECHNIC SAAPADE

JANUARY 2022
 ABSTRACT
This research seeks to inquire into the effect of the personality of individual team members on
the performance of the team.

Personality is one of the major psychological factors affecting the human behavior. It is
important in the work place. In psychology, the five personality traits are five broad domains or
dimensions of personality. Personality traits have an important role in enhancing the efficiency
and effectiveness of team performance. The findings states that Personality traits positively
correlated with Job performance and Conscientiousness is having attributes that directly relates
to Job performance of employees with highest weights. Conscientiousness, Extraversion,
Openness to experience, Agreeableness have positive and significant impact on Job performance
of employees and Neuroticism has negative and significant impact on Job performance of
employees.

This study examines the five factor model of personality applied to employees of simba
industries limited, and finds their impact on team performance. The five factor model consists of
extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness to experience and neuroticism
INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

Employees’ personality is very important to every organization. In psychology, the five

dimensions of personality provides a clear conceptual and measurement framework for
research into personality and that are used to describe human personality. The greatest
achievement of firms does not only depend on employee’s skills and capability but also on
the different personality traits. Traits are fundamental building blocks of any personality.

The Personality traits are Conscientiousness- hardworking, careful, thorough, responsible,

organized, persevering; Extraversion- sociable, talkative, gregarious, assertive, active,
ambitious and expressive; Agreeableness- courteous, flexible, trusting, good natured,
cooperative, forgiving, soft hearted, and tolerant; Neuroticism- anxious, depressed, angry,
embarrassed, emotional, worried, and insecure; and Openness to experience- imaginative,
cultured, curious, original, broad minded, intelligent and artistically sensitive. Those have
been found to consistently describe personality of employees (Barrick & Mount, 1991)

With increase in global competition, survival of an entity is a very pertinent question in

business arena. In such a competitive environment performance is the key to success. It can
differentiate one company from other. That’s why in today’s competitive business
environment companies want maximum from their employees. It is seen that many
companies recreated their work through use of team in recent years (Barrick et.al 2007). The
complex nature of modern work environment has created the utilization of the team and
requirement of job-fit as a necessity for
companies wanting to stick & survive at the edge of competition.
In a team all members are mutually accountable for the results. Members in a team are
interconnected with each other. They know that quality of their collective performance will
determine the success or failure of that team. So team has synergy which is absent in group.
Team performance is much greater as compared to individual’s performance. That’s why
now a day’s organizations are focusing on using teams rather than individual’s to achieve
maximum output which is necessary for their survival.
Team is a specialized form of work structure, which has shared responsibility, strong
interdependence, and sovereignty (Guzzo & Dicksen 1996). Teams are increasingly used in
various organizations with affirmative results. Most of the organizations have increased their
dependence on team so that all team members could work effectively to achieve
organizational goals.
Teams become with individuals and individuals have different personalities. So personality
profiling of individuals, who are supposed to work together as a team is important to study
and determines the optimal team composition. The greatest achievement of teams does not
only depend on individual’s skills and capability but also on the different personality traits.
 Traits are fundamental building blocks of any personality. They show the stable pattern in
which the individual, think, feel and behave. (Pervin et al., 2005).
Personality is primarily a combination of emotional reactions, attitudes and behaviors.
Personality comprises on different element of thoughts, feelings and actions that make a
person distinctive.
So individual’s personalities have effects on team performance (Barrick et.al 2007)
Frederick et. al. 2005). It is also seen that employ engagement was interlink with
performance (Truss et al 2006). Engagement is attentiveness of employees to their work,
deep and emotional connection towards their work place. Employees who are engaged can
perform better as compare to those who are not engaged. There are several organizations
which believe that employee engagement is a source of competitiveness so they are more
focusing on this aspect (Macey and Schneider, 2008; Macey et al., 2009). It was also
reported by many organizations that employee engagement brings positive output and
increase organizational productivity as well as performance. That’s why it is important to
explore how personality affects team performance while engaging with their work place.

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

It can be found that lots of factors have influenced on Job performance of employees.
Among them, dispositional factors especially Personality traits have significantly impact on
Job performance. Lower personality of employees will lead to lower job performance of
employees which normally leads to the lower performance of the organization. Different
people have different personalities that contribute to the organizational performance that
occurs in the organization.

The skillful and efficient human resources are the most valuable wealth of each country.
Regardless of the many natural resources owned by communities, who might have lack the
proficient employees and have no ability to utilize their facilities (Shekarkan, 1997).

The economists also believe that the human resources of a company are the main factors in
developing the economics and social topics. The human resources aggregate the funds,
exploit the natural resources, create economic and social and political organizations and
finally increase the national development. The country in which the skills and knowledge of
the individuals are not developed, the national economy is not capable of efficient
exploitation.

Personality is that pattern of characteristic thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that

distinguishes one person from another and that persists over time and situation (Phares,
1991).
1.3 OBJECTIVE OF STUDY

Research objectives are statements that the research project will attempt to achieve. They
provide the guidelines for establishing research agenda of activities necessary to
implement the research process. (Hair et al, 2006; 663).
This study focuses to find the effects of personality traits on team performance, to
examine how agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness to experience, neuroticism, and
extroversion affect the outcomes of team.
The primary objective of this study is

1. To find out the level of personality traits of employees exist in Simba Industries Limited
2. To examine the level of job performance of employees in Simba Industries Limited
To ascertain the relationship between personality traits and job performance of employees in
Simba Industries Limited.

1.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY

This study will be an effort in promoting workplace harmony in organizations. It will help
learners and trainers to make good composition of team while keeping in mind different
personality characteristics to fulfill organizational objectives. Efficient teamwork and good
performance of workforce will lead to competitive edge for any organization.
Present study will help to open new avenues in future for the researches on the subject of
personality composition for team performance.

1.5 SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The study is carried out within number 31 Ize Iyanmu street, Oregun, Ikeja, Lagos, Nigeria. The
study focuses organization in Nigeria generally but only covers Simba Industries Limited.
The sampling objects used in the study are employees and customers of Simba Industries
Limited, It was presumed that this group of people could provide more information in response
to the questions contained in the questionnaire – individual personality and its effect on team
productivity

this study will investigate that how significantly personality traits relates and effect team
performance in the organization and how significantly employee engagement moderates the
impact of personality traits on performance of a team.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
Intense global competition and need for responsiveness depend on personality traits of
employees. Personality refers to the relatively stable pattern of behaviors and consistent
internal states that explain a person’s behavioral tendencies (McShane & Von Glinow,
2006).
Job performance of employees is considered as an important aspect in management of
human resources. It comes under the aspect of encouragement acquisition development
care etc. Performance dependent on several among which some of they are productivity,
efficiency, effectiveness, commitment, absenteeism and turnover. So the Personality
traits are the important factor and best predictor to the Job performance of employees.

The Concept of Personality

According to Allport (1961), “personality is the dynamic organization within the

individual of those psychophysical systems that determine his unique adjustments to his
environment”. Manavita (2002) defines personality is “an individual’s habitual way of
thinking, feeling, perceiving, and reacting to the world”. Robbin (2001) describes
Personality as “the conducts and ways in which people responds and cooperates with
another”.
Personality traits are social and personal lasting pattern of perceiving, relating to, and
thinning about environment and oneself. According to Goldberg, (1990) and Hogan
(1996), researchers agree to big five personality dimensions which include all the
personality traits. The dimensions of the five-factor model of personality are
Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness to Experience, Agreeableness, and
Conscientiousness.
Neuroticism is a dimension of normal personality indicating the general tendency to
experience negative effects such as fear, sadness, embarrassment, anger, guilt and
disgust. High scorers may be at risk of some kinds of psychiatric problems. A high
Neuroticism score indicates that a person is prone to having irrational ideas, being less
able to control impulses, and coping poorly with stress. A low Neuroticism score is
indicative of emotional stability. These people are usually calm, even-tempered, relaxed
and able to face stressful situations without becoming upset (Hough, 1990).
Extraversion dimension captures one’s comfort level with relationships. Extraversion
includes traits such as sociability, assertiveness, activity and talkativeness. Extraverts are
energetic and optimistic. Introverts are reserved rather than unfriendly, independent
rather than followers, even-paced rather than sluggish. Extraversion is characterized by
positive feelings and experiences and is therefore seen as a positive affect (Clark &
Watson, 1991).
Openness to experience dimension addresses an individual’s range of interests and
fascination with novelty. Openness to Experience includes active imagination, aesthetic
sensitivity, and attentiveness to inner feelings, a preference for variety, intellectual
curiosity and independence of judgment. People scoring low on Openness tend to be
conventional in behavior and conservative in outlook. They prefer the familiar to the
novel, and their emotional responses are somewhat muted. People scoring high on
Openness tend to be unconventional, willing to question authority and prepared to
entertain new ethical, social and political ideas. Open individuals are curious about both
inner and outer worlds, and their lives are experientially richer. They are willing to
entertain novel ideas and unconventional values, and they experience both positive and
negative emotions more keenly than do closed individuals (Hamilton, 1988).
Agreeableness dimension refers to an individual’s propensity to differ to others.
According to Tett (1991), Agreeableness person is fundamentally altruistic, sympathetic
to others and eager to help them, and in return believes that others will be equally helpful.
The disagreeable/antagonistic person is egocentric, skeptical of others’ intentions, and
competitive rather than co-operative. The people with high agreeableness can more easily
control their negative emotions.
Conscientiousness dimension is measure of reliability. Conscientiousness refers to self-
control and the active process of planning, organizing and carrying out tasks (Barrick &
Mount, 1993). The conscientious person is purposeful, strong-willed and determined.
Conscientiousness is manifested in achievement orientation (hardworking and persistent),
dependability (responsible and careful) and orderliness (planful and organized). On the
negative side, high Conscientiousness may lead to annoying fastidiousness, compulsive
neatness or workaholic behavior. Low scorers may not necessarily lack moral principles,
but they are less exacting in applying them.

The Concept of Job Performance

Job performance is defined as function of knowledge, skills, abilities, and motivation

directed at role-prescribed behavior (Campbell, 1999). According to Rothman & Coetzer
(2003), job performance is described as achievement of the goals and targets which are
set by organization. According to Boshoff, Arnolds, Wright, Kacmar, McMahan &
DeLeeuw (1995), Job performance is influenced by aptitude, need for achievement, self-
regard, locus of control, affective temperament, and the interaction between these
constructs.
The dimensions of job performance of employees are task performance and contextual
performance.
Task performance is the efficiency of individual work that indicates the degrees of
completion of assignments under organizational expectations. It is the proficiency of an
official job that contributes to the technological core of an organization (Borman &
Motowidlo, 1993; Borman & Motowidlo, 1997).Task performance which refers to the
activities appears in the Job Description of Employees.
Task performance can be defined as the proficiency (i.e., competency, 1999) with which
one performs central job tasks (Campbell, 1999). Other labels sometimes used for task
performance are job-specific task proficiency, technical proficiency or in-role
performance. In Murphy’s framework, the first dimension, labeled task behaviors, could
be considered task performance. Campbell himself stated that his first two dimensions,
job-specific task proficiency (core job tasks) and non–job-specific task proficiency (tasks
not specific to a given job, but expected of all employees), represent task performance
(Viswesvaran, 2000). Viswesvaran’s first three dimensions, productivity, quality, and job
knowledge, could be considered task performance. Later developed individual work
performance frameworks all included one dimension to describe task performance.
Contextual performance means that individuals have the willingness to perform
organizational activities, which are unofficially regulative and the earnest to persist in the
accomplishment of organizational assignments as well as cooperate and keep good
relationship with coworkers to achieve better Contextual performance signifies that
employees will help organizational operations by free will without any internal system to
regulate or control. This kind of performance can intensify an organization’s or a group’s
efficacy and further affect job performance (Crant, 1995).
Contextual performance can be defined as individual behaviors that support the
organizational, social, and psychological environment in which the technical core must
function (Borman & Motowidlo, 1993) Several labels exist for this dimension, such as
non–job-specific task proficiency, extra-role performance (Bakker, 2008; Demerouti,
2006), organizational citizenship behavior (Viswesvaran, 2000) or interpersonal relations.

The Relationship between personality traits job performance of employees

Personality characteristics mainly describe and predict human behavior, not behavioral
changes or development (Liao & Lee, 2009). One’s personality may have very little
impact on the quality of work being done or other job performance indicators. Big five
personality traits play a very significant role in developing employees’ performance
which results in increased organizational output. Those are extraversion,
conscientiousness, agreeableness, openness, and neuroticism.
Neuroticism is the most important characteristic that affects the employability of
candidates. Neuroticism is composed of few negative attributes as stressed, nervous and
anxious personality. In a recent study Judge, Higgins, Thoresen and Barrick (1999) found
that Neuroticism is inversely related to job performance of employees.
Extraversion is characterized by positive feelings and experiences and is therefore seen as
a positive affect (Clark & Watson, 1991). Extraversion has proven significant and
positive predictor of job performance of employees especially in the jobs where
interpersonal in jobs where communications and interactions are high. Johnson (1997)
found a positive relationship between extraversion and job performance of employees.
Conscientiousness must be directly related to the job performance of employees because
of the nature attributes it possess responsible, organized, well-Planned, disciplined and
goal achiever. There Barrick and Mount (1993) found conscientiousness trait of
personality can predict performance of employees in number of different nature of
contextual performance of employees jobs. With few exceptions, majority of the studies
confirm that conscientiousness is valid predictor of performance.
Agreeableness can be a best predictor of performance of employee’s personnel and
managerial level because agreeableness trait contains attributes as cooperative, tolerant
and courteous with others. Judge, Higgins, Thoresen and Barrick (1999) concluded that
agreeableness trait is a good predictor of employees’ performance of the jobs requires
teamwork and these findings are also confirmed by Neuman and Wright (1999). So
overall researchers are on consensus that agreeableness can positively and significantly
predict the job performance of employees.
Openness to experience trait refers to personality characteristics as curious, creative,
broad minded, intelligent and imaginative. These characteristics lead individuals toward
active participation in learning opportunities as training development programs (Barrick
& Mount, 1993; Rothman & Coetzer, 2003). Few researchers are on opinion that
openness to experience trait can predict the performance in jobs where communications
and interactions are high among the employees (Hamilton, 1988). So there is abundance
of literature that confirms a positive and significant relationship in openness to
experience and job performance of employees.