DEFINITION:
The phrase “achievement striving” refers to the personality trait of being strongly motivated to see tasks successfully through to completion.
Individuals who are strong in achievement striving not only excel at their tasks but also have a desire to outperform others and to exceed their own past performance.
ETYMOLOGY:
The English noun “achievement” is attested from the fifteenth century. The related verb “to achieve” derives—via the Middle English verb acheven and the Middle French verb achever, meaning “to finish”—from the Latin preposition ad, meaning “towards,” and the Old French noun chef, originally meaning “head.” The word chef, in turn, derives from the Latin noun caput, capitis, meaning “head.”
The English gerund “striving” is connected to the verb “to strive,” which is attested from the thirteenth century. “To strive” derives, via the Middle English verb striven, from the Old French verb estriver, meaning “to quarrel” or “to dispute.” Estriver is of Germanic origin, akin to the Middle High German verb streben, meaning “to endeavor,” and the Old English verb stridan, meaning “to stride.”
DISCUSSION:
Individuals with a personality strong in achievement striving are goal-oriented, meaning they are motivated to take whatever actions are necessary for the successful completion of their tasks.
The concept of “achievement striving” is akin to age-old, commonsense personality traits such as “conscientiousness,” “perseverance,” and “stick-to-it-iveness.”
However, nowadays the term “achievement striving” principally refers to a specific form of motivation whose chief characteristic is the motivation to improve oneself.
On this way of understanding personality, self-improvement may be motivated either by the intrinsic satisfaction it affords or by a desire to demonstrate one’s skills to other people as a means of advancement within a company or other social hierarchy.