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The purpose of this paper is to empirically compare managers with employees in other occupations on Big Five and narrow personality traits to identify a distinctive personality profile for managers.

An archival data set representing employees in a wide range of business sectors and organizations was utilized to compare trait scores of 9,138 managers with 76,577 non-managerial employees. Profile analysis (PA) with MANOVA and analysis of covariance was used to compare managers and non-managers on Big Five traits Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Emotional Stability; and narrow traits Assertiveness, Optimism, Work Drive, and Customer Service Orientation.

As hypothesized, compared to non-managers, managers had significantly higher scores across nine traits, all of which correlated significantly with managerial career satisfaction.

Although job tenure and managerial level are not examined, the findings align with managerial competence models, the Attraction-Selection-Attrition model, and vocational theory and raise questions for research on the adaptive value of these traits for managers’ satisfaction and effectiveness.

The results carry practical implications for selection, placement, training, career planning for managers, and particularly for their professional development.

A distinctive personality profile for managers clarifies the occupational identity of managers, which contributes to public and professional understanding of managers and their roles.

This study is original in reporting an empirical, theoretically grounded personality profile of managers that includes both Big Five and narrow traits.

This issue is a selected bibliography covering the subject of leadership.

This chapter analyzes the role of work team personality composition — or mix of individual personality traits — in team-based organizations. It offers a framework for analysis that identifies the key variables and relationships of importance to the TBO practitioner. Within that framework it reviews current, empirical evidence relevant to the links between individual personality and work team effectiveness. Finally, it identifies key, practical issues raised by work team personality composition for staffing in TBO, and proposes a series of best management practices.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between satisfaction with ambient conditions and perceptions of situated learning in knowledge-intensive organizations. The paper argues that satisfaction with ambient conditions facilitates situated learning in open office environments.

A cross-sectional study was conducted on 117 professionals from IT and consultancy companies. Hierarchical linear regression was used to analyze the impact of satisfaction with ambient conditions on perceptions of situated learning.

Learning that occurs in everyday activities on the job is enhanced by satisfying ambient conditions in the physical environments of open offices.

The paper contributes to literature on organizational learning by examining aspects of the physical environment as antecedents of organizational learning, thereby providing insights for design and management of office environments to maximize employee outcomes.

The concept of maximizing “employee voice” is examined in VW66 (see page 51) which looks at the various techniques which organizations use to provide this facility which may take the form, for example, of collective bargaining or a grievance procedure. Installing formal processes for employees to be heard appears to be on the increase, ranging from mandatory work councils which are a feature of many western European countries, to the various voluntary mechanisms which predominate in the USA.

Earlier studies have identified artefacts, but have only to a lesser degree looked at their effects. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how artefacts contribute to organisation.

A trauma team at a university hospital has been observed and its members interviewed.

The trauma team showed itself to be rich on artefacts since it had strong internal driving forces, high legitimacy, and tried to live up to high expectations from the outside. Its members were motivated to be in the forefront of trauma care. Through renewal, the team succeeded in maintaining demarcation. It also succeeded in systemising internal work tasks and made for itself a position in relation to the outside. The team's capacity, however, came to be limited by internal conflicts and battles for prestige.

The study shows that informal logic has a strong influence on teams. Teamwork contributed to the development of organisational structure and motivation for the personnel.

Earlier studies advocate the important role of artefacts in order to communicate, collaborate, negotiate or coordinate activities. The conclusion is that artefacts also have an organising and developing effect on teams in a fragmented and differentiated healthcare.