Your second assignment will be a critical evaluation of a single journal article. The aim is for you to make an academic argument that is evidenced (as opposed to merely expressing your opinion or...

Your second assignment will be a critical evaluation of a single journal article. The aim is for you to make an academic argument that is evidenced (as opposed to merely expressing your opinion or describing the argument and evidence of some recognized authority whom you cite.) You must remember that this assignment isnotan essay, and you are expected to critically and creatively evaluate the target paper that has been selected.


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6 pages(notincluding the title page or end-text reference list), and should be formatted according to APA 7threquirements (Times New Roman, 12 point font, double spaced).

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is Cuppello et al. (2023)


lity and management level: Traits that get you to the top


Personality and management level: Traits that get you to the top Personality and Individual Differences 206 (2023) 112108 Available online 8 February 2023 0191-8869/© 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Personality and management level: Traits that get you to the top Stephen Cuppello a, Luke Treglown a, Adrian Furnham b,* a Thomas International, Marlow, United Kingdom b Norwegian Business School (BI), Nydalveien, Oslo, Norway A R T I C L E I N F O Keywords: Personality Management level Gender Age A B S T R A C T In this study we investigated whether personality traits differ among people at difference management levels, controlling for demographic variables. In total, 10,836 people completed a personality test and provided in- formation about their managerial level. Managerial level was positively associated most with traits Risk Aver- sion, Ambiguity Acceptance and Conscientiousness. Analysis of covariance and regressions indicated that personality traits accounted for around 6.6 % of the variance above the demographic variables, particularly age. Results are broadly in alignment with previous studies in this area, but suggested the importance of two traits that are not explicitly assessed in the Big Five Factor Models: Ambiguity Acceptance and Attitude to Risk (Courage). Implications and limitations are acknowledged. 1. Introduction For well over fifty years differential psychologists have argued that personality traits correlate with, and predict, individual work perfor- mance, satisfaction, and success, as assessed, in part, by promotions to senior positions (Judge & Bono, 2000; Kajonius & Carlander, 2017; Nieß & Zacher, 2015; Richardson & Norgate, 2015). There is also a literature on dark-side personality and management level that demonstrates that sub-clinical personality disorders are differently associated with seniority in managers (Gøtzsche-Astrup, 2018; Palaiou & Furnham, 2014; Winsborough & Sambath, 2013). It has therefore been suggested that understanding an individual's personality profile is important for both the selection and training of successful middle and senior man- agers, and business leaders (Ling et al., 2019; Spark et al., 2021; Sutin et al., 2009). Research in this area could also be used to answer the very important questions about leadership effectiveness vs emergence (Con- ard, 2020), as well as whether personality traits change much as a function of experience (Roberts et al., 2006). One way of validating a theory of talent/potential is to evaluate people at different managerial levels controlling for factors such as sex, age, ethnicity and education, given that leaders still seem to be pre- dominantly older males, with better educational qualifications. The assumption is that certain traits like Adjustment (low Neuroticism) and Conscientiousness are both seen to be, and actually are, determinants of many work-related behaviours that make people better leaders and managers in any, and all, organisations (Pendleton et al., 2021). The assumption is that personality factors play an important role in “climbing the organizational ladder”, sometimes called the “greasy pole” (Ahmetoglu et al., 2010; Gøtzsche-Astrup et al., 2016). Thus, we would expect the trait profile of leaders to be different from those who do not attain that level. Indeed, this is the focus of this paper. It is, of course, possible that success, as measured by promotion, changes people (Hirschi et al., 2021), though there is less evidence for this, or that the effects are very strong. One highly relevant issue for this study is the stability of personality over time. Researchers agree that there is evidence of both stability and change. From these studies Furnham and Sherman (2023) drew the following conclusions: (1) personality seems most stable between the ages of 30 and 60 years, particularly using established Big Five measures to assess it, (2) there are modest increases in Emotional Stability and Agreeableness over this period with Extraversion and Neuroticism showing least change (both with a slight decline) and Conscientiousness showing most change (an increase), and (3) males seem more stable than females. There is less work however about changes in intelligence and specific abilities. Thus, while there may be some reciprocal influence it is assumed that stable personality traits in part account for success and promotion at work and the latter have a relatively minor impact on personality structure or functioning (Furnham & Cheng, 2015). While most organisations believe in both the importance of selection and training of managers, they tend to identify traits that are associated with leadership and the learning of those skills (Gøtzsche-Astrup, 2018; Pendleton et al., 2021). Clearly there are a number of factors that relate to climbing the * Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected] (A. Furnham). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Personality and Individual Differences journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/paid https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2023.112108 Received 4 October 2022; Received in revised form 31 December 2022; Accepted 25 January 2023 mailto:[email protected] www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/01918869 https://www.elsevier.com/locate/paid https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2023.112108 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2023.112108 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2023.112108 http://crossmark.crossref.org/dialog/?doi=10.1016/j.paid.2023.112108&domain=pdf Personality and Individual Differences 206 (2023) 112108 2 managerial ladder, though personality remains an important one, and which is the focus of this paper (Conard, 2020). For instance, networks or particular groups (based on beliefs, education or expertise) attempt and succeed to get “their people” promoted to positions of power irre- spective of their abilities and temperament. Equally in some organisa- tions it is experience, that is how long one works in an organisation, that is the primary determinant of promotion meaning essentially that age is the most powerful predictor of managerial level. 2. Traits and management level Around half a dozen studies in different countries and using very different personality measures have used management level (junior, middle, senior) as a criterion to try to understand what factors lead promotions and hopefully thence success in the role (Ahmetoglu et al., 2010; Bucur, 2011; Furnham et al., 2007; Ion et al., 2019; Treglown & Furnham, 2022). Studies in this area have used different measures such as the Firo-B, Hogan Development Survey, MBTI, NEO-PI, and TEiQ (Furnham et al., 2007; Furnham & Crump, 2015; Moutafi et al., 2007; Treglown & Furnham, 2022). Most confirmed their hypotheses based on the trait model, focusing particularly on Conscientiousness and Neuroticism. In an important recent study, Asselmann et al. (2022) examined personality differences between leaders and non‑leaders as well as personality changes before and after becoming a leader. They found “leaders-to-be” were more Extraverted, Open, Emotionally Stable, Conscientious, and willing to take risks, felt they had greater control, and trusted others more than non‑leaders. They also found personality changed in emergent leaders: they became less Extraverted, less willing to take risks, and less Conscientious but gained self-esteem. In this study, based on a large international data set, we were able to explore trait correlates of managerial level using a new personality test specifically designed to assess behaviour at work (MacRae & Furnham, 2020). 3. Controlled variables It is clearly the case that management level is related to age, as people with more experience tend to be promoted. Similarly educational level often relates to management level particular in some sectors which require considerable technical expertise and university level education (Pendleton et al., 2021). There is also a growing literature on sex and managerial level, which suggests, for various reasons, that females are under-represented at senior levels either because of their choice not to apply or else they are not chosen (Davies et al., 2017). We expect that these three variables will account for a significant amount of variance in explaining managerial level, hence we attempt to control for them, which has not always been done in previous studies. We also had data on the ethnicity of the participants which we used in the final regression. However, we did not have data on their employment history such as how long they took to be promoted, or their success in the role, which is very desirable but unavailable. 4. This study In this study we used the High Flyer Trait Inventory (HPTI) (MacRae & Furnham, 2020) which was particularly designed for personality assessment at work. The test measures six traits, four of which are well established in the Big Five: Conscientiousness, Adjustment (low Neuroticism), Curiosity (Openness), Competitiveness (low Agreeable- ness), Ambiguity Acceptance, Courage or Approach to Risk. Four of these variables are associated with the Big Five, while there are two variables that are not covered by that model. A number of papers have used the HPTI (Furnham & Impellizzeri, 2021; Furnham & Treglown, 2018, 2021a, 2021b; Furnham & Tre- glown, 2021a, 2021b). The psychometric properties of the measure have been reported (MacRae & Furnham, 2020) of which the most relevant is the study by Teodorescu et al. (2017). Their results indicated HPTI personality traits relate to subjective and objective measures of success, with Conscientiousness being the strongest predictor. However, Teo- dorescu et al. (2017) found Approach to Risk and Ambiguity Acceptance was most related to self-assessed success at work, which we believed would differentiate in management level in this study. Ambiguity Acceptance (or Tolerance of Ambiguity) assesses how an individual or group processes and perceives unfamiliarity, ambiguity or incongruence. It is a well-established individual difference variable also knows as Uncertainty Avoidance (Furnham & Marks, 2013). Those who are tolerant of ambiguity perform well in new or uncertain situations, adapt when duties or objectives are unclear, and are able to learn and function in unpredictable times or environments (Herman et al., 2010). They tend to embrace, rather than avoid, ambiguity. Given the nature of many senior management positions we assumed that Tolerance of Am- biguity would be related to management level with most senior man- agers being more comfortable and confident when faced with ambiguity and uncertainty (de Vries, 2021). Approach to Risk or Courage is the ability to combat or mitigate negative or threat-based emotions and broaden the potential range of responses. Courage is the ability to combat or mitigate negative or threat-based emotions and broaden the potential range of responses. Hannah et al. (2007) suggest the courageous individual uses the positive emotion, courage, to mitigate fear of interpersonal conflict or reprisal to confront the behaviour.. Unchecked fear restricts the potential range of responses, and typically leads to behaviours like avoidance or contrived ignorance. Whereas Courage is exhibited as the willingness to confront difficult situations and solve problems in spite of adversity. Again, we expected this to be related to management level with the highest man- agers scoring highest on this factor. Studies on the Big Five and leadership/managerial have consistently identified two factors, namely Conscientiousness and Neuroticism, and to a lesser extent Openness, to be associated with managerial success (Furnham, 2018). Similarly, the studies on management level have identified these factors when assessed (Asselmann et al., 2022). We assumed we would find the same results in this study: more senior people would be better Adjusted as well more Conscientious and Open. Based on the previous literature we predict management level would be related to all six factors, such that those who scored high on all six factors would be most likely to be associated with more senior man- agement positions. 5. Method 5.1. Participants In all 10,836 participants were assessed in the UK by a well- established British psychometric test publisher, with participants tak- ing cognitive ability and emotional intelligence assessments as a part of selection and development programmes (41 % female, 59 % male). Participants who had taken both assessments were included in the overall sample. The mean age of the sample was years 41.9 years (SD = 12.14 years). They were all in full-time employment. Data on the highest level of education achieved was also collected, with the three most frequent educational levels being that 24 % of participants having a postgraduate degree, 61.2 % with bachelor's degrees and 20.2 % with school completion certificates. Participants were primarily White- British (88.1 %). There were also 608 Asians (5.7 %), 207 Blacks/Afri- cans (1.9 %), 59 Chinese (0.5 %), 223 Mixed Race (2.1 %) and 176 “Other” (1.6 %). There was a range of managerial levels in the sample; 21.8 % (n = 2362) being non-managers, 14.8 % (n = 1602) being first line managers, 26.7 % (n = 2898) being middle managers, and 30.8 % (n = 3338) being executive or senior managers. S.