The self‐rater's personality and self‐other disagreement in multi‐source performance ratings : Is disagreement healthy?

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine relationships between a priori‐chosen personality traits and the tendency for a manager to rate his/her job performance more favourably than well‐acquainted superiors, peers, and subordinates do. Design/methodology/approach – The job performance of 204 managers was evaluated using multi‐source (i.e. 360E) ratings (self, subordinates, peers, and superiors). Managers also completed personality measures. Relationships between managers' personality and the tendency for managers to rate their own job performance higher than subordinates, peers, and superiors did were analyzed using advanced regression techniques. Findings – The paper finds that self‐superior and self‐peer disagreement in performance ratings (i.e. self‐rating inflation) was associated with high Achievement and high Self‐Esteem. Additionally, self‐superior disagreement (i.e. self‐rating deflation) was associated with high Anxiety. Self‐subordinate disagreement was not associated with self‐rater personality. Research limitations/implications – The paper studied a single sample of financial services managers. Generalization requires cross‐validation with other occupational groups and organizations. Practical implications – Human resources professionals should be informed that self‐superior and self‐peer disagreement (i.e. self‐rating inflation) in multi‐source job performance ratings is potentially beneficial because it is associated with personality traits that can facilitate positive responses to feedback. Peers and superiors should therefore not inflate their ratings of managers in an effort to reduce self‐superior and self‐peer disagreement in ratings. Originality/value – This study improved upon most previous investigations of this topic by using a field setting, considering a wider range of personality variables, using 360( job performance ratings (self‐, supervisor‐, peer‐, and subordinate‐ratings) rather than just a subset of these rating sources, and employing superior statistical procedures.