Personality Styles
My personality and communication style
My personality and communication style is what Taylor (2010) would describe in "five factor" terms (447) as moderate extrovert, which implies significant introvert; moderate conscientious, which means that I can tolerate some deviation from form if content dictates; high on agreeability and openness, and low relative to the norm on neuroticism. My communication style is verbal, accomodative but not infinitely so, solution-oriented and not Machiavellian or vindictive (Taylor, 2010, p. 447), and I at least intellectually seek what Kotchemidova (2010) calls "egalitarian friendliness" (209).
Interactions with differing styles cause difficulties at work
This causes episodic difficulties and stress for me at the restaurant where I work as pantry chef, with some employees with different traits and communication styles. These are the minority however, and other co-workers provide examples that are free of conflict even though our character endowments and communication styles differ. Jeff is one waiter among twenty who I would diagnose as high-neurotic, non-verbal, low on agreeability and openness, and highly conscientious. From this behavior, Taylor (2010) might locate Jeff's "Locus of Control" (448) as external, because he uses nonverbal, affective behavior to discourage deviation from accepted structures, holds grudges through sullenness and reprisal, and becomes argumentative when procedure deviates from rigid hierarchies. When an order comes up before his, he becomes confrontational in a non-verbal way, hoarding orders and delivering them in a batch instead of a flow; haggling about presentation, and grumbling about kitchen service among the rest of the floor staff in a Machiavellian attempt to turn them against us and each other.
She is extroverted, overly verbal, helpful and encouraging to a point Kotchemidova would call "impulsive...and frivolous" (210), disrupting the kitchen by trying to 'help' and encourage, which often ends up as confounding rather than solving problems. This creates conflict when I am trying to provide service to the line cooks; salads to the floor staff, or assist the dishwasher's order of operations. Elizabeth's overly expressive and assertive "can do" attitude also comes into opposition with Connor the line cook's incessant joking, which might be funny in other contexts (Mitchell, Graesser and Louwerse, 2010), but disrupt operations usually at the time when they are least useful and aggravate other teammates' communication differences. Connor would probably rank high-verbal, low-conscientious but high-neurotic and with a locus of power centered in a structure he does not like, so his interjections end up more sarcastic than funny. He retreats from confrontation upon verbal opposition, which would indicate agreeability, but in a negativistic presentation.
This is all balanced by task-oriented and high-verbal Rita, the expediter, whose locus of control (Taylor, 2010) is by designation internally centered as authorized by the General Manager, being the facilitator of all these conflicting communication and personality styles. Rita commands rather than negotiates, because both wait staff and cook line, including myself, have a stake in the smoothest possible performance, and we recognize Rita has a stake in the highest possible output. Rita is highly verbal and open, but low-agreeable, assertive but I would say low-to-moderate neurotic at the same time as strongly conscientious (Taylor 2010). Rita sets the norms, mediates conflict and regulates the "emotion culture"…
