Values that Shape Hierarchies : Group Culture and Individuals' Status in Organizations

Many status theories propose a link between a group's values and its status hierarchy, whereby individuals who possess characteristics that embody group values are accorded higher status. We tested this idea in three organizations with different task- and social-orientations, relating Big Five personality traits to peer-rated informal status. As hypothesized, Conscientiousness better predicted status than Extraversion in a more task oriented organization, but Extraversion better predicted status in a more socially oriented organization; both traits predicted status in an organization equally task and socially oriented. Further, Neuroticism predicted lower status in a socially oriented group, where presumably, negative emotion was particularly disruptive to social relationships. Taken together, these findings provide the most direct evidence of a link between groups' values and their hierarchies