Skills and personality traits of the collaborator: a study of state park managers

Though collaboration is praised for its potential and criticized for its difficulty, little is known about how a person’s individual characteristics impact collaboration outcomes. It is the premise of this study that individual characteristics, in particular, personality traits and collaboration skills, play a greater role in collaborative outcomes than is currently assumed. An improved understanding of the link between personality, collaboration skills, and collaboration outcomes, has theoretical and practical implications that can improve the success of collaboration and in turn governmental performance. Using a nationwide sample of state park managers, this study investigated how personality traits and collaboration skills influence the success of collaborations between government and other stakeholders, which are especially important in this policy context. To collect the data for this research, a mixed-methods approach was undertaken in which 17 state park managers were interviewed and 153 were surveyed nationwide. The in-depth qualitative interviews sought to understand how park managers perceive collaboration and how their personal characteristics impact their experiences of collaboration success. Findings from the interviews indicate that park managers have difficulty working with stakeholders at the goal alignment phase of collaboration and that they need formal training in group process skills. The quantitative survey relied on a nationwide random sample of managers of state parks in the US and sought to gauge the relationship among their personality, skills and collaboration success. The survey employed a letter-to-web mode of administration and included established measures for the main theoretical constructs of personality traits, collaboration skills, and collaboration success. Regression analyses and structural equation modeling show that the personality traits “agreeableness” and “extraversion,” along with “group process skills” and “interpersonal skills” were positively associated with successful collaboration. Interestingly, these collaboration skills seem to depend more on underlying personality than on formal education. The analysis also revealed that external factors such as stakeholder and park characteristics are not significant predictors of collaboration success. Thus, although certain group process skills are important to successful collaboration, it is individuals who are predisposed with personality traits that are advantageous in group process situations that have more successful outcomes.Ph.D.Includes bibliographical referencesby Joshua L. Osowsk