Politician personality, Machiavellianism and political skill as predictors of perfomance ratings in political roles

This paper conceptualizes politicians as political workers. It describes a multimethod study with two aims: (1) to determine whether politicians share a latent mental model of performance in political roles, and (2) to test hypothesized relationships between politician self-rated characteristics (i.e. extroversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, Machiavellianism and political skill) and received performance ratings from political colleagues and officers. 231 local politicians provided self-ratings on a political performance questionnaire developed following a role analysis, and standardized measures of personality. 185 also received performance ratings from colleagues (n = 749) and officers (n = 729). Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses of self- and received performance ratings revealed five latent factors: Resilience, Politicking, Analytical Skills, Representing People and Relating to Others. Regression analyses found that neuroticism and conscientiousness contribute to received ratings of Resilience, and neuroticism contributes to received ratings of Analytical Skills.