Three Personality Trait Combinations for Agile Employees: The Relationship Between the Big Five and Agile Mindset

Agile IT projects need employees who not only follow agile structures but have a specific attitude called the agile mindset. While the relevance of the agile mindset is clear, findings on when it can be developed, are very limited. Stable personality traits, like the big five, influence attitude. Providing how these traits interact with the agile mindset gives orientation regarding in which cases an agile mindset is more trainable than in other cases. To investigate these relationships, we conducted an online survey with 327 students of a project management lecture. As a result of our SEM and QCA analysis, we found three combinations of personality traits that influence the agile mindset including different extents of conscientiousness, openness, agreeableness and neuroticism. We deepen and extend the theory around the agile mindset and enable practitioners to choose data-driven cases for development activities. Limitations and future research based on these results are given.