Personality as a predictor of human resource management strategy among small and medium enterprise owner-managers in South Africa

Abstract

This study investigated personality as a predictor for the choice of human resource strategies among small medium enterprises (SMEs) owner-managers in a district in the Free State Province of South Africa. Small and medium enterprises are regarded as essential and contribute towards a country’s growth; however, most of them fail within the first year or two (2) of inception. While many reasons have been proffered to explain such failures, the issue of human resources management (HRM) has not been given much attention in most South African SME literature and studies. Known studies have attempted to explain SMEs success and survival using personality and motivation, resulting in mixed results, yet, none of the studies done attempted to link personality and human resources (HR) within the SMEs context. The study adopted a positivist philosophical paradigm and was, therefore, quantitative in nature. The design was cross-sectional with a sample size of 180 SMEs owner-managers. Data was collected by means of self-administered questionnaires and analysed using descriptive and logistics regression techniques. The findings show that there is a positive and significant relationship between personality and the selected human resource strategies. The study is a first of its kind study to investigate the two (2) variables in South Africa and thus contributes to the literature on SMEs by providing a platform for profiling SME owners, thereby linking personality characteristics to human resource development and business growth.