The story of Chris Gardner, a man with vision, a role model to his son and a classical example of how a homeless man with a child can exert himself from being poor to become one of the most outstanding man who successes, and go above and beyond what people think of him. In describing Chris Gardner personality traits, I would say it consist of the fact that he very aggressive ambitious and loyal to his son. Referring to Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, his physiological thirst was become a stock broker to improve his living condition.
In providing his child with a safety place to bathe, sleep and eat. Chris knows that he poor therefore, he accepted himself for whom he is. His self-actualization is that do better for himself and his son is drive to achieve the goal that he established for himself. From reviewing the interview and movie he seems to be a person that doesn’t give up. He works extremely hard to get to where he needs to be. An example being raped by other men or being abused by his step father doesn’t stop or causes him to give up.
Chris Gardner is determined to succeed as he quoted “you can beat me down, but I could read and I’m going place”. With the responsibility of supporting himself and his son he made a pact to himself that he would not abandon his son like his father has done. Thru thick and thin, both will work together to get through the obstacle that arises. Using the big five personality mode, I think that Chris is a very extraversion individual in that in order for him to work as a sale men or become a stock broker he need to show that his a very gregarious and sociable person. He need to have the willingness o be open minded.
One of the trait of become a sale person is that to make sales, he need to be outgoing, talkative and confidence of his ability to make the sales. Chris is a very conscientiousness person because he shows that he a responsible and dependable person and a persistent individual. He doesn’t give up easily. Chris proves that he is responsible because most men like his father, for example, would bail out on their kids. But for Chris he choose to fight the battle and obstacle that he faces from being homeless, to barely having nothing to eat to find a way out for him and his son.
His emotional stability is that he doesn’t allow anyone or anything to deter and bring him down. As the saying goes “If there is a way, there is a will”. His ability to with stand stress and face obstacle proven to him that nothing can stop you if you don’t give up. His openness to experience is that he took a chance to ask the men in the red Ferrari what the man does for a living and how he goes about doing it. When the individual reply back, he was amaze and that when he realizes that he took want to make that much money and become a stock broker himself.
By being upfront, open minded and curious Chris is able to open himself up to seek the opportunity and go about challenging himself. Some of the core evaluation that applies to Chris would be that he is a Machiavellianism individual. He is aware that becoming a stock broker he needs to separate and maintain his balance emotional distance from personal value and work. Chris knows that in order for him to be in the same level as the guy in the red Ferrari, “he has to prepare to do whatever he needs to get ahead” (pg 112 chapter 4 Personality and Values).
With many obstacles that Chris faces he is considered to have a proactive personality in that he is patience, show initiative strive and waited for the right moment to present itself. He tends to have positive outlook in life. In self-efficacy theory; the more effort Chris put into his work, the more he is able to sell his. What motivates Chris to become the person that he is, his son, setting a role model for his child. Being raped by other men and abused by his step father pushes him to charge forward and look back. He is an optimistic person.
Where he would turn a negative comment into a positive feedback and use that to make him stronger and pushes himself further. Chris is an extraverted person whom is very enthusiastic, with lot of ambition and energy. Because of his ability to act and perform, he is able to adapt sociable as an individual. He has great people skill and is very people oriented. A job that is time-consuming and stressful but have and ending of satisfying a person motivation by presenting them with challenge, commitment, day to day routine changes and opportunity cost.
Is a job that will cause the person to strive for more? All of the phone call Chris makes gives him a positive job satisfaction. He will go beyond the call of his duty, job requirements, seek to help other and has positive outcome for their organization. The turnover that they receive could consist of pay raise and commission. A job that provides challenge, stimulation, along with the ability to make judgment decision and controlling give an employee a lot of job satisfaction over a job that is predictable and routine.
In conclusion, I would describe Chris as having a proactive personality. He set high standard for himself and go about in getting it. He is the type of individual that if you look down on him, or say that he cannot do it. He has the ability to see things from a different and whole perspective and is always eyeing the big picture. Chris know to treat people with respect, he is very upfront and say what is on his mind. The one quote that he stated was “It’s not what I do, or what I do is not who I’m, it the journey. I wouldn’t take nothing from my journey now. ” (Maya Anglo).
