No Benefits for Paradox Personalities? Narcissism and Humility in New Work Careers

Abstract

Remarkable contributions have already been made to narcissism and its particular influence on career success, yet the literature to date does not capture the potential impact of paradoxical personalities, especially when considering the role of humility as a complement to a multifaceted constellation of characters. This gap finds additional relevance in light of recent changes in today’s world of work in terms of flexibility and complexity. Therefore, our study examines the relationship between narcissism and humility with objective and subjective career success in new work settings. The research is based on dyadic data from 398 cross-industry U.S. professionals in 199 pairs. Hypotheses are tested using hierarchical moderated multiple and logistic regression analyses. As expected, the interaction between narcissism and humility showed negative effects on a leadership position, project responsibility, and salary. Considering new ways of working in a three-way interaction with narcissism and humility, the effect turned positive for salary. Thus, in the new world of work, the humble narcissist is successful in material terms. Surprisingly, no relations to subjective career success were evident. Our findings contribute to the literature on new ways of working, career success, and paradox personalities by showing that although humble narcissists may generally experience lower levels of career success, they rather succeed in new working environments.