Abstract:  Proactive personality, a special trait, refers to a disposition toward taking personal initiatives to influence one’s environment. Employees with high proactive personality are more likely to identify and seek opportunities, and stick to their goals. By systematically reviewing and integrating the existing literature on proactive personality, this study summarizes proactive personality’s origin and concept, measurements, consequences, mediating mechanisms and moderating mechanisms, and the moderating effects of Chinese indigenous culture. We identify the trends of future research and point out that future research should focus on improving concept, developing new measurement that fits to cultural and economic background, and expanding research levels and consequences.

Key words:  proactive, proactive personality, mediating mechanisms, moderating mechanisms, Chinese organizational context