The Impact of Employee Personality Types on Customer Orientation

Abstract

The research investigated the impact of employee personality on customer orientation. The study focuses a common management problem of service organizations to reduce expectation gap and to win customer loyalty. The main focus is on work behaviour of employees. It has been found that the personality affects work behaviour of employees and work behaviour determines their customer orientation. Personality of a person is unique. It may change over a period of time. The literature review highlights number of studies done on individual personality. The research is focused on two basic drives possessed by people: the Achievement orientation (n. Ach.) and the Affiliation orientation (n.Aff). The research analyses the varying degrees of n. Ach and n. Aff of different personality types. The research is based on the management problem faced by Seylan Bank Limited with regard to their present level of customer orientation. Researchers believe that customer orientation of employees greatly influence the customer-oriented strategies of the bank. Banking is a professional career. Thus, it is believed that employees who prefer career advancement are more customeroriented than others. Analysis done suggests that achievement orientation and affiliation orientation of employees shape their level of customer orientation. The conceptual model was developed to find out the relationship between the major concepts of the study such as employee personality, achievement orientation, affiliation orientation and customer orientation. It was hypothesized that the employees with high n. Ach and high n. Aff personality types are more customer-oriented than employees with low n. Ach and high n. Aff. personality types. It was also hypothesized that people with high n. Ach and low n. Aff personality types are more customer-oriented than people with low n. Ach and high n. Aff personality types. It was decided to conduct the research among a similar category of employees to ensure the validity data. The customer orientation was operationalized based on common variables and tested using a questionnaire. The feedback of customers were also analyzed through the survey done by the bank. The qualitative approach was given to analyze the different degrees of n. Ach and n. Aff of employees. Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) was used to test employee personality. Unstructured interviews and Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) were used to qualitatively analyze the n. Ach and n. Aff of employees in some personality categories. The paper concludes with recommendations for policy changes with regard to the selection, recruitment, internal job rotation, training and promotion policies of customer service employees, to improve the overall service quality of the bank and other similar organizations to achieve customer-oriented strategies.