Is experience in the public sector associated with Big Five personality aspects?

Abstract

The hypothesis that employees with experience in the public sector differ in personality aspects from those with less or no experience, suggested by the concept of personorganization fit, was tested among 711 participants in executive extension courses of a Peruvian university who filled-in the Big Five Aspect Scales. Whereas significant differences in various personality aspects were observed along age and between males and females, public sector experience only predicted greater Openness. Women outperformed men in Openness and a significant gender x time in public sector interaction revealed that prediction of Openness from the public-sector experience was more pronounced among men. The findings suggest that, in the population studied, little personality differences are attributable to experience in the public sector. Studies are needed to evaluate the external validity of the findings.

Personality and Public Sector Employment

“…However, there is only little evidence on the links between higher-order personality traits and employee selection into the public and private sectors. The few studies that have explored this dimension of occupational sorting have found that women in the public sector tend to be more open (in the Big Five sense) than women in the private sector (León, 2017) and that public sector employees may be more extroverted (Maczulskij, 2017).…”

Análisis psicométrico de la Escala de Cinismo Organizacional en trabajadores de la ciudad de Arequipa, Perú

“…In addition, it would be convenient to work on a modified version of the Organizational Cynic Scale because the content of the items and their underlying structure may not reflect the wide range of manifestations of organizational cynicism, such as sabotage, errors regarding coalitions, and power groups, lowering the pace of work, among others (Saravia, 2015). Likewise, more studies on organizational cynicism should be carried out concerning variables such as personality (León, 2017) and values (Sinha et al, 1993) in order to promote an improvement in the performance of labor, and work well-being, based on organizational behavior (Bravo et al, 2020).…”

Personality and public sector employment in Finland

“…Much less is known on the links between higher‐order personality traits and employee selection into the public and private sectors. The few studies that have explored this dimension of occupational sorting have found that females in the public sector tend to be more open (in the Big Five sense) than those in the private sector (León, 2017) and that teachers in the public sector report lower levels of conscientiousness and higher levels of openness to new experiences (Dohmen & Falk, 2010).…”