Conclusions and recommendations

Considering the fact that currently majority of managers are not familiar with Personality and Traits theories and another fact that personality is taken into account when assigning a task and making a hiring/dismissal decision, we recommend to use MBTI for the former case and Big Five Model for the latter due to the theories’ relative simplicity in application (test) and future usage.

Kazakhstan’s can be described as a relationship oriented, where informal relationships are very much valued in the society which is supported by collectivistic mentality. However, in organizations the primary focus in on official qualifications, status and symbols, and people are measured by personal characteristics, skills and abilities, and competency in the second place.

In Kazakhstani organizations personality is perceived to be one of the important performance factors, which contributes to organizational behavior in general. Managers take into account personal characteristics of employee in the first place when assigning tasks and also when making a hiring/dismissal and promotion/demotion decision – and in these cases personal characteristics is among top 5 important employee evaluation criteria that managers consider. Thus, we recommend to use MBTI and Big Five Model to enhance the effectiveness of these decisions. Usage of these models could help managers enhance the effectiveness of their decisions of hiring/dismissal and in case of MBTI help managers assign tasks that could be performed by employees that could handle them better. The other advantage of using these theories is that they are simple to apply (a test) and straightforward in terms of decision making (manager evaluates criteria and makes a decision). Managers in Kazakhstan possess an adequate educational background in the area of management, however, they do not widely practice or apply managerial theories and models and Personality and Traits theories as well, so the simplicity and low time consumption of these models can prove to be really valuable and convenient for Kazakhstani organizations. Potential disadvantages could be that managers in Kazakhstan do not widely practice any theories and may feel reluctant to change. Another risk could be not correct application of the proposed models which will cause managers to refuse to use them in future because they were not effective. However, the biggest disadvantage towards the use of the theories is that there is no clear means of how to motivate managers to use these theories or how to educate them – managers have to be initiative to learn how to apply these theories, but they must be motivated to do this and most of the time in Kazakhstan managers work as they are used to and do not rely on theory or experiment or broaden their managerial skills.

The advantages and disadvantages of application of Personality and Traits theories in Kazakhstan are summarized in the table below:

Table 2 – Advantages and Disadvantages of application of Personality and Traits theories in Kazakhstan

Despite the disadvantages and potential obstacles for usage of Personality and Traits theories in Kazakhstan, they have many advantages and Kazakhstani managers express their interest and desire to implement the theories if they are effective, which means that there is a lot of potential for application the theories if they are given due attention and practical guidance.