Drown or Blossom? The Impact of Perceived Chronic Time Pressure on Retail Salespeople's Performance and Customer–Salesperson Relationships

For retail salespeople chronic time pressure, a perpetual perception of being rushed for time, is a prevalent and pervasive phenomenon in their daily sales jobs. Despite this practical relevance, consequences of perceived chronic time pressure on retail salespeople's selling behaviors, such as adaptive selling, and selling performance are not well understood. Thus, the authors investigate the effect of retail salespeople's perceived chronic time pressure in interactions with customers and its impact on retail salespeople's adaptive selling behavior, customers’ purchase outcomes, as well as salespeople's overall objective performance. Analysis of dyadic data from 291 salesperson–customer interactions from a large B2C furniture retailer revealed an inverse U-shaped curve for the relationship between retail salespeople's perceived chronic time pressure and their adaptive selling behavior. The chronic time pressure–selling outcome relationship strongly depends on the contingencies of retail salespeople's goal orientations and perceived organizational support and has implications for retail research and practice.     

Customer and selling orientations of retail salespeople and the sales manager's ability-to-perceive-emotions: A multi-level approach

Drawing from the mental ability framework and information processing theory, two studies embedded within the B2C retail setting investigate the role of the sales manager's ability-to-perceive-emotions in the complex non-linear relationships between salespeople's customer and selling orientations on one side, and its outcomes (sales performance and customer re-purchase intention) on the other. Using multilevel data from salespeople and their managers, Study 1 tests a theoretical model of salesperson orientation and performance, while Study 2 further verifies the results of Study 1 from the customer's perspective. Both studies find strong empirical support for a curvilinear, inverted U-shaped effect of a salesperson's customer orientation on sales performance and customer re-purchase intention. This effect is, however, reversed for the link between selling orientation and performance/re-purchase intention, where results indicate a U-shaped curvilinear relationship. Furthermore, we show that the sales manager's ability to perceive emotions facilitates the effect of salespeople's customer orientation on sales performance.     

Supervising the Unethical Selling Behavior of Top Sales Performers: Assessing the Impact of Social Desirability Bias

This study measures social desirability bias (SD bias) by comparing the level of discipline sales managers believe they would administer when supervising unethical selling behavior with the level of discipline they perceive other sales managers would select. Results indicate the presence of SD bias; the sales manager respondents consistently claimed that they would be stricter while their peers would be more lenient. Using an analytical technique that takes social desirability bias into account, it appears that sales managers use of discipline is affected by the sales performance of the salesperson being disciplined resulting in more lenient discipline for top sales performers. In addition, the more lenient treatment for top sales performers persists even when there is a pattern of a prior ethical infraction and the existence of an explicit organizational policy proscribing the act in question. Sales managers believe that, like themselves, others would be stricter when an unethical act is committed for the second time but not as strict as they personally would be. A within-subjects interaction effect indicates more SD bias under the condition of the unethical act being committed for the second time.     

When Sales Managers and Salespeople Disagree in the Appreciation for Their Firm: The Phenomenon of Organizational Identification Tension

Marketing literature emphasizes the importance of organizational identification in the sales force. However, empirical research has so far focused on the separate analysis of the consequences of either sales managers’ or salespersons’ organizational identification, largely ignoring their interactive effects. This study seeks to address this research void by exploring the phenomena of organizational identification agreement and organizational identification tension in the sales manager–salesperson dyad. In contrast to organizational identification agreement, organizational identification tension occurs in a sales manager–salesperson dyad if the sales manager and the salesperson differ in the strength of their organizational identification. Analysis of a triadic data set using hierarchical linear modeling supports the authors’ hypotheses that increasing the level of organizational identification agreement is beneficial but increasing organizational identification tension can have severe negative consequences for the satisfaction of a salesperson's customers and the salesperson's performance. The study additionally explores how sales managers’ leadership styles (charismatic vs. transactional), combined with the appropriate control system (behavioral vs. outcome control), can be effective in avoiding organizational identification tension.     

Does transparency influence the ethical behavior of salespeople?

This study introduces the concept of perceived salesperson transparency to the sales literature. It addresses how recent technological developments impact traditional agency theory concerns, while simultaneously creating a conceptual definition of perceived transparency for application on an individual level. Salesperson perceptions regarding managerial use of behavioral information obtained through technological means are empirically found to have a mediating effect on the relationship between managerial access to such information and the likelihood of unethical salesperson behavior. It concludes that salesperson ethical behavior is not influenced by management's ability to obtain behaviorally relevant information, but rather by the use of this information. Further, it is found that the mediating influence of use of information accessed via technology is itself moderated by the salesperson's job performance.     

Imparting negative news to salespeople

Sales managers often are required to give negative information to their sales personnel. Perhaps the salespeople's territories will be reduced, their compensation or expense program decreased, or their positions realigned or eliminated. Although extensive research has examined delivering negative news to sales personnel, no empirical work has yet explored how that inimical information should be disseminated to sales subordinates. Scholars in organizational psychology argue that providing adverse news to employees using interpersonal sensitivity is advantageous for both the individual and the organization. To date, though, this issue has not been investigated in a selling context. Therefore, this article reports the results of an exploratory study that investigated factors that influence whether sales managers provide negative communication to salespeople in an interpersonally sensitive fashion. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Exploring the unintended negative impact of an ethical climate in competitive environments

To attain short-term performance, sales managers must motivate their salesforce to close deals (often through use of intra-firm competition). At the same time, to maintain long-term relationships, they must promote a highly ethical selling environment (which may be incongruent with use of intra-firm competition). The present study examines the interactive relationship between competitive psychological climate and ethical psychological climate in predicting salespeople’s ethical intentions and behaviors toward customers. A unique dyadic data set is used to predict salesperson ethical intentions and actual salesperson ethical behaviors reported by customers. For ethical intentions, an “executive control” perspective predicts improved ethical intentions toward customers. However, a “depletion” perspective predicts reduced ethical behavior during actual customer interactions. This result is provocative as fostering an ethical climate in conjunction with a competitive climate is found to reduce ethical behaviors in the eyes of customers, a finding clearly counter to what managers intend.     

The Influence of Moral Philosophy on Retail Salespeople's Ethical Perceptions

The relatively minimal literature on ethics in a retail selling context indicates that retail sales personnel perceive that their job creates ethical dilemmas. However, what drives those beliefs is virtually unknown. Investigations in non‐retailing venues have found that employees’ moral philosophy (or ideology) influences whether they view a particular situation, action, or behavior as unacceptable (ethically inappropriate). The present study extends previous retail sales ethics research by examining the impact of retail salespersons’ moral philosophy on their perceptions of situations that are potentially ethically troublesome. Findings reveal some evidence that moral philosophy does indeed have an effect on retail salespeople's ethical beliefs. The impact of these results on the consumer is brought out through a discussion of the various implications from the vantage point of consumer welfare.     

The End of Corporate Social Responsibility: Crisis & Critique,by Peter Fleming and Marc T. Jones

ABSTRACT

Purpose: Given the ever-increasing pressure put on sales organizations to improve performance, behave ethically and establish long-term customer relationships, this study seeks to better comprehend ethical leadership’s part in doing so. It proposes that perceived ethical leadership indirectly influences salesperson performance through trust in manager and ethical ambiguity.

Methodology/Approach: A survey of business-to-business salespeople was taken. Hypotheses are tested using structural equation modeling.

Findings: The results show that perceived ethical leadership influences salesperson performance through the mediating roles of trust in manager and ethical ambiguity. Salespeople’s perceptions of their supervisor’s ethical leadership behaviors positively impact their trust in manager and negatively influences their ethical ambiguity. In turn, trust in manager positively influences sales performance while ethical ambiguity negatively influences sales performance.

Research Implications: The results from testing the hypothesized model support mechanisms by which ethical leadership behavior may affect business-to-business salesperson job performance. It appears that ethical leadership works through ethical ambiguity and trust in manager to impact salesperson behavior performance, rather than directly impacting salesperson performance. Importantly the findings add to the literature an important consequence of ethical leadership, ethical ambiguity. This research likewise adds to the literature on role, and more specifically ethical, ambiguity by finding that reducing salesperson ethical ambiguity has a positive impact on salesperson behavior performance.

Practical Implications: This study finds that one important mechanism for reducing ethical ambiguity is for sales supervisors to practice ethical leadership. By reducing ethical ambiguity, sales managers can improve business-to-business salesperson performance. In addition, use of ethical leadership by sales managers can positively influence the business-to-business salesperson’s trust in manager, which subsequently leads to greater sales performance.

Originality/Value/Contribution: The results of this study add to our knowledge of ethical leadership by further developing its consequences. It also sheds light on a vastly under-researched construct, ethical ambiguity. Finally, it further validates the important role that trust in manager plays in the organization.     

Decision making in personal selling: Testing the “K.I.S.S. principle”

The KISS principle (keep it simple, stupid) is often cited as an effective strategy in selling. The premise is that salespeople are more effective when they stick to basics and do not unnecessarily complicate that which is not necessarily complicated. This study tests the KISS principle in the context of salesperson decision making in the prospecting stage of the selling process. Two general research questions are addressed (1) does a simple versus more complex process affect outcomes of decisions made by salespeople, and (2) if so, whom does it affect? The results suggest that process does influence outcome and that lower‐performing salespeople's decisions are most likely to be affected by the decision process used. Higher performers seem to be able to focus on key characteristics of sales prospects regardless of the complexity of the decision task, suggesting that higher performers, at least implicitly, know when to keep it simple. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Impact of employees’ perceived threat of market competition on unethical marketing and selling practices: Moral disengagement and ethical leadership

This study draws on the social cognitive theory to examine the effect of perceived market competition on employees’ unethical marketing and selling practices. The boundary conditions associated with this relationship were examined, and we posit that perceived market competition is related to unethical marketing and selling practices through the mediating mechanism of moral disengagement. We further propose that ethical leadership moderates the relationship between the perceived threat of market competition, moral disengagement, and tendency toward unethical marketing and selling practices. We tested our hypotheses with a sample of 387 employees working in the banking sector in Pakistan. Our results suggest that moral disengagement had a full mediation effect between the perceived threat of market competition and tendency of employees toward unethical marketing and selling practices. Moreover, ethical leadership moderated the relationship between moral disengagement and the tendency of employees toward unethical marketing practices. The research findings indicate that when field employees encounter threat perceptions due to market competition, they have a propensity toward engaging in unethical marketing and selling practices when they can activate moral disengagement. This study also found that ethical leadership negatively moderates the relationship of moral disengagement with employees’ tendency toward unethical marketing and selling practices.     

Antecedents and Performance Implications of a Sales Department's Learning and Entrepreneurial Orientation in SMEs

Existing research on entrepreneurial orientation (EO) has concentrated on the organizational level but neglected the analysis of more fine‐grained effects of EO in organizations. This study applies the concept of EO to the departmental level and investigates the sales department's entrepreneurial orientation (SDEO) and salespeople's learning orientation (SLO) and these orientations' impact on sales performance. Using a survey of 268 small and medium‐sized enterprises, the authors find that SDEO is a key performance lever, whereas SLO only indirectly fosters sales performance through driving SDEO. Furthermore, informal controls and technological turbulence are found to be important drivers of SDEO and SLO.     

How critical events shape the evolution of sales organizations: A case study of a business-to-business services firm

While the literature recognizes that sales organizations evolve as they seek to improve their effectiveness, little is known about this evolutionary process. As a first step toward remedying this important knowledge gap, this case study uses event systems theory to explain the process through which critical events shaped the evolution of a sales organization over the course of a thirty-year period. The results reveal that (1) shifts in the sales organization were prompted by events that focused the unit's attention on the desire for growth or on the need to curb excesses, (2) the primary mechanism for effecting change in the sales organization was the flattening and de-flattening of organizational structures, and (3) a high degree of correspondence exists between shifts in organizational structure and, both, a salesperson's level of social capital and the incidence of unethical salesperson behaviors. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.     

Motivating industrial salesforce with sales control systems: An interactive perspective

This research examines the interactive effects on industrial salespeople's intrinsic and extrinsic (I/E) motivation of outcome control, activity control, and capability control above and beyond their main effects. I/E motivation are disaggregated into their cognitive and affective dimensions. Moderated regressions using a sample of industrial salespeople find that (1) outcome control and capability control have positive interactive effects on task enjoyment and recognition seeking, (2) outcome control and activity control have a positive interactive effect on compensation seeking but a negative interactive effect on task enjoyment, and (3) activity control and capability control have a negative interactive effect on recognition seeking. Moreover, we find that compensation seeking has a stronger positive effect on sales performance when salespeople deal with more new customers whereas the opposite is true for challenge seeking; compensation seeking appears to elevate job satisfaction only when there is a lower percentage of new customers but the positive effect of recognition seeking on job satisfaction is enhanced when salespeople handle a higher number of new accounts. These findings offer important theoretical and managerial implications by providing compelling evidence that sales control interactive effects should be considered when studying relationships among sales control systems, salesperson motivation, and job outcomes.     

Bringing meaning to the sales job: The effect of ethical climate and customer demandingness

Top performing salespeople are attracted to organizations that provide opportunities to make full use of their abilities. Responses from 1450 sales directors from a leading direct selling organization were used to examine salesperson's experienced meaningfulness. Results show that experienced meaningfulness is critical to sales because it impacts salesperson's performance, turnover intentions and felt stress. Further, ethical climate and customer demandingness influence experienced meaningfulness perceptions.     

Power-Base Effects on Salesperson Motivation and Performance: A Contingency View

Purpose: The sales literature shows that motivation is a key determinant of salesperson performance. The literature also suggests that how managers use social power will have an effect on important organizational outcomes, including salesperson performance. This study examines the five bases of social power that sales managers use (reward, coercive, legitimate, referent, and expert) as moderating influences in the salesperson motivation (extrinsic and intrinsic)—salesperson performance linkage.

Methodology/approach: Data was collected from 128 salespeople using a cross industry survey. Eight hypotheses were developed and tested using SmartPLS (partial least squares).

Findings: The authors found support for five of eight hypotheses. Results and significant findings suggest that sales managers can impact sales performance in extrinsically motivated salespeople by using coercive and legitimate power. For intrinsically motivated salespeople, sales managers can impact sales performance by using coercive, legitimate, and referent power.

Research implications: Related to social power theory, the study suggests that salesperson performance is dependent upon a salesperson’s combined motivation orientation and the base of power used by the sales manager. The study also sets the stage for subsequent research on how managerial power can be studied as a moderator for other personal salesperson characteristics (e.g., self-esteem, self-efficacy, locus of control) and salesperson performance. In addition, understanding how these other personal characteristics interact with managerial bases of power to produce other organizational outcomes (e.g., job satisfaction, organizational commitment) are questions that sales researchers may wish to pursue via further study.

Practical implications: For practicing sales managers, the research study can provide guidance as to how they may tailor their use of power to best impact salesperson performance. For a manager to understand the motivational makeup of each salesperson, open communication and dialogue must occur at the onset of their relationship. Having the knowledge of what drives each salesperson, a manager can modify their leadership style (and choice of power base) to suit the situation. Customizing these sales management approaches may also have long-term benefits for the organization as studies show that doing so can lead to reduced levels of turnover as well as increased levels of performance.

Contribution of the article: This study is important to sales research, theory, and practice. The authors contribute to the selling and sales management literature by extending motivation and social power theories into the sales domain by showing that managerial power may be a key moderating determinant between a salesperson’s motivation and his/her sales performance. For practicing sales managers, we provide some insight and guidance for understanding how to throttle or moderate their use of various social power bases when dealing with individual salespeople who may differ in their motivation orientation, age, and degree of selling experience.     

Moral Judgment and its Impact on Business-to-Business Sales Performance and Customer Relationships

For many years, researchers and practitioners have sought out meaningful indicators of sales performance. Yet, as the concept of performance has broadened, the understanding of what makes up a successful seller, has become far more complicated. The complexity of buyer–seller relationships has changed therefore as the definition of sales performance has expanded, cultivating a growing interest in ethical/unethical actions since they could potentially have impacts on sales performance. Given this environment, the purpose of this study is to explore the impact of moral judgment on sales performance and sellers engaging in a customer-oriented selling approach. Specifically, by utilizing a sample of 345 business-to-business salespeople, this study examines the relationships between moral judgment, customer-oriented selling, and outcome and behavior based performance. Results, managerial implications, and opportunities for future research are provided.     

Can sales leaders with humility create adaptive retail salespersons?

Although humility in leadership has been recognized as vital in leading salespeople to cope with unpredictability and unknowability in customers, the role of sales leader humility in promoting sales behaviors has remained underexplored. Our research aims to unfold how and when sales managers’ leadership humility nurtures retail salespersons’ adaptive selling behavior. Grounded on the dataset from managers and employees working in retail shops of a large telecommunication and computer company in Vietnam, the results reveal the role of retail salespersons’ customer knowledge, adaptive self-efficacy, and customer-oriented harmonious passion as the mediation paths for the linkage between sales leader humility and retail salespeople's adaptive selling behavior. The findings further provide evidence for the role of sales managers’ adaptive selling as an enhancer for the impacts of sales leader humility on these mediators.     

Are performance appraisals a bureaucratic exercise or can they be used to enhance sales‐force satisfaction and commitment?

In some sales organizations the performance appraisal is treated as a bureaucratic exercise. As such, sales managers may essentially conduct appraisals in an arbitrary and perfunctory manner. This behavior could be based on the belief that conducting performance appraisals requires considerable amounts of time and effort, generates few rewards, and adds considerably to the manager's level of conflict and stress. The purpose of this research is to examine the relationships existing between performance appraisals, salesperson organizational commitment, and job satisfaction. If various characteristics of performance appraisals that build commitment and satisfaction could be identified, then managers may be more capable of using performance appraisals that yield positive results. A survey of 185 retail salespeople and 58 retail sales managers provided the data required to evaluate the relationship between satisfaction, commitment, and various aspects of performance appraisals. The results of the study indicate that managerially mediated factors may be used to enhance salesperson job satisfaction and organizational commitment. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

On Ethically Solvent Leaders: The Roles of Pride and Moral Identity in Predicting Leader Ethical Behavior

The popular media has repeatedly pointed to pride as one of the key factors motivating leaders to behave unethically. However, given the devastating consequences that leader unethical behavior may have, a more scientific account of the role of pride is warranted. The present study differentiates between authentic and hubristic pride and assesses its impact on leader ethical behavior, while taking into consideration the extent to which leaders find it important to their self-concept to be a moral person. In two experiments we found that with higher levels of moral identity, authentically proud leaders are more likely to engage in ethical behavior than hubristically proud leaders, and that this effect is mediated by leaders’ motivation to act selflessly. A field survey among organizational leaders corroborated that moral identity may bring the positive effect of authentic pride and the negative effect of hubristic pride on leader ethical behavior to the forefront.