THE JOINT EFFECTS OF CONSCIENTIOUSNESS AND SELF‐LEADERSHIP TRAINING ON EMPLOYEE SELF‐DIRECTED BEHAVIOR IN A SERVICE SETTING

This field investigation examined the effects of conscientiousness and self-leadership training on employee self-direction. Conscientiousness correlated significantly with supervisor evaluations of self-direction for employees working in a hotel/resort. Self-leadership training was then conducted for a group of the employees. Gain score analysis failed to detect an overall effect for training on self-direction. However, conscientiousness was found to moderate the effect of self-leadership training in that training group employees who initially scored low on conscientiousness improved their behavior more than their high conscientiousness coworkers. Implications of these findings for the practices of employee training and selection are discussed.

[1]  L. R. Goldberg.  THE DEVELOPMENT OF MARKERS FOR THE BIG-FIVE FACTOR STRUCTURE , 1992 .

[2]  E. Sadalla,et al.  The Search for Predictable Settings. Situational Prototypes, Constraint, and Behavioral Variation , 1985 .

[3]  Charles C. Manz,et al.  An Integrated Perspective of Self-Control in Organizations , 1987 .

[4]  Charles A. O'Reilly,et al.  Working Smarter and Harder: A Longitudinal Study of Managerial Success , 1994 .

[5]  N. Schmitt,et al.  THE INFLUENCE OF TRAINEE ATTITUDES ON TRAINING EFFECTIVENESS: TEST OF A MODEL , 1986 .

[6]  Gary P. Latham,et al.  Application of social learning theory to employee self-management of attendance , 1987 .

[7]  L. Cronbach,et al.  How we should measure "change": Or should we? , 1970 .

[8]  David A. Cole,et al.  Statistical Power of Training Evaluation Designs. , 1985 .

[9]  F. Lord.  A paradox in the interpretation of group comparisons. , 1967, Psychological bulletin.

[10]  Jeffrey R. Edwards,et al.  Problems with the use of profile similarity indices in the study of congruence in organizational research. , 1993 .

[11]  G. Stewart,et al.  Personality dimensions and domains of service performance: A field investigation , 1995 .

[12]  R. Noe.  Trainees' Attributes and Attitudes: Neglected Influences on Training Effectiveness , 1986 .

[13]  Gene V. Glass,et al.  The Effect of Experimental Mortality on the Internal and External Validity of the Randomized Comparative Experiment. , 1971 .

[14]  Mary Jo Bitner,et al.  The Service Encounter: Diagnosing Favorable and Unfavorable Incidents: , 1990 .

[15]  Ann Marie Ryan,et al.  The Big Five in Personnel Selection: Factor Structure in Applicant and Nonapplicant Populations , 1993 .

[16]  D. Funder,et al.  Profiting from controversy. Lessons from the person-situation debate. , 1988, The American psychologist.

[17]  John M. Jermier,et al.  Substitutes for leadership: Their meaning and measurement , 1978 .

[18]  Greg L. Stewart,et al.  Attaining Flexible Stability by Integrating Total Quality Management and Socio-Technical Systems Theory , 1997 .

[19]  G. Latham,et al.  Self-management training for increasing job attendance: A follow-up and a replication. , 1988 .

[20]  Sylvia Downs,et al.  Learning and the prediction of performance: Development of trainability testing in the United Kingdom. , 1979 .

[21]  Fred Luthans,et al.  A Social Learning Approach to Organizational Behavior , 1980 .

[22]  Murray R. Barrick,et al.  Conscientiousness and performance of sales representatives: Test of the mediating effects of goal setting. , 1993 .

[23]  Jeffrey R. Edwards,et al.  On the Use of Polynomial Regression Equations As An Alternative to Difference Scores in Organizational Research , 1993 .

[24]  D. McAdams,et al.  The five-factor model in personality: a critical appraisal. , 1992, Journal of personality.

[25]  L. Cronbach,et al.  Time-limit tests: Estimating their reliability and degree of speeding , 1951, Psychometrika.

[26]  John E. Hunter,et al.  Development of a Causal Model of Processes Determining Job Performance , 1992 .

[27]  H. P. Sims,et al.  Behind the Mask: The Politics of Employee Appraisal , 1987 .

[28]  Murray R. Barrick,et al.  Autonomy as a moderator of the relationships between the Big Five personality dimensions and job performance. , 1993 .

[29]  David Rogosa,et al.  A growth curve approach to the measurement of change. , 1982 .

[30]  A. Tellegen,et al.  An alternative "description of personality": the big-five factor structure. , 1990, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[31]  Murray R. Barrick,et al.  Validity of observer ratings of the big five personality factors , 1994 .

[32]  H. P. Sims,et al.  Self-Management as a Substitute for Leadership: A Social Learning Theory Perspective , 1980 .

[33]  Greg L. Stewart,et al.  Job analysis and the sociotechnical approach to quality: A critical examination , 1996 .

[34]  Murray R. Barrick,et al.  THE BIG FIVE PERSONALITY DIMENSIONS AND JOB PERFORMANCE: A META-ANALYSIS , 1991 .

[35]  Charles C. Manz.  Self-Leadership: Toward an Expanded Theory of Self-Influence Processes in Organizations , 1986 .

[36]  Newell K. Eaton,et al.  Criterion-related validities of personality constructs and the effect of response distortion on those validities , 1990 .

[37]  J. Hunter,et al.  Validity and Utility of Alternative Predictors of Job Performance , 1984 .

[38]  D. A. Kenny,et al.  A quasi-experimental approach to assessing treatment effects in the nonequivalent control group design. , 1975 .