The effects of job autonomy, customer demandingness, and trait competitiveness on salesperson learning, self-efficacy, and performance

Although self-efficacy has been demonstrated to be positively associated with performance-related variables, few studies have looked at its possible antecedents in the context of personal selling. Applying social cognitive theory, this study posits that while self-efficacy positively affects performance, the salesperson's learning effort directly affects self-efficacy. Furthermore, two task-related factors (perceived job autonomy and customer demandingness) and one individual difference variable (trait competitiveness) are proposed to affect salesperson learning effort and self-efficacy. Two empirical studies show consistent results regarding the positive effects of learning on efficacy and efficacy on performance as well as the influences of three exogenous constructs on learning and efficacy. Implications and future research directions are discussed. Guangping (Walter) Wang is an assistant professor of business at Penn State University at Hazleton. He received his Ph.D. in marketing from Louisiana State University in 2000. His research interests include sales management, relationship marketing, database marketing, and e-commerce. His work has appeared or been accepted for publication in theJournal of Vocational Behavior, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Relationship Marketing, Journal of Global Marketing, and a number of national and international conference proceedings. Richard G. Netemeyer is a professor of marketing in the McIntire School of Commerce at the University of Virginia. He received his Ph.D. in marketing from the University of South Carolina in 1986. His research interests are primarily consumer and organizational-behavior issues. His research has appeared in theJournal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Applied Psychology, OBHDP, JAMS, and others.     

The relationship of job image,performance, and job satisfaction to inactivity-proneness of direct salespeople

This article examines whether the public image of the selling job as perceived by direct salespeople has an impact on their tendency to remain active or become inactive in that selling job. Relationships among job image, job satisfaction, and job performance are also investigated. Salespeople with more negative perceptions of the public image of their job were found to have lower job satisfaction and to be more prone to inactivity, though the strength of these relationships varies somewhat between high and low performers. Implications are provided for researchers and sales managers.     

Examining product managers’ job satisfaction and performance using selected organizational behavior variables

The product management form of organization has been around for quite a while; yet little empirical research has been done on product managers. This article reports a study of product managers and some organizational behavior factors which contribute to their job satisfaction and job performance. These factors include centralization of decision making, job structure, job scope, role ambiguity, and role conflict. Finally, several suggestions are made for creating an environment more conductive to having product managers who are satisfied with their jobs.     

Role conflict,role clarity,job tension and job satisfaction in the brand manager position

One hundred ninety-eight brand managers were examined on four important role decisions: role conflict, role clarity, job tension, and job satisfaction. Role conflict was significantly related to role clarity, job tension, and job satisfaction. Role clarity was related to job tension and job satisfaction at significant levels and job tension was significantly related to job satisfaction. All relationships occurred in the expected directions. Four independent variables were analyzed with these four role dimensions: personal factors, organizational factors, involvement with product decisions, and level of contact with interfaces. Significant relationships were found only for involvement with product decisions and level of contact on the job satisfaction dimension.     

The sales manager as a Role model: Effects on trust, job satisfaction, and performance of salespeople

This study develops a conceptual framework that relates role-modeling behavior of sales managers to a set of key outcome variables and assesses the validity of the framework using a cross-sectional sample of salespeople and sales managers drawn from a variety of business-to-business sales organizations. Findings indicate that salespeople’s perceptions of their managers’ role-modeling behavior relate positively to trust in the sales manager and relate indirectly, through trust, to both job satisfaction and overall performance of salespeople. The study provides empirical validity for practitioner suggestions that sales managers should lead by example, and thus should provide a model of the behavior managers desire their salespeople to enact. His primary research interest is in the application of leadership theory to sales management. His work has been published inPersonnel Psychology andJournal of Business-to-Business Marketing.     

The role of brand communications on front line service employee beliefs,behaviors, and performance

Frontline service employees often vary in their delivery of the brand promise, leaving service firms with less direct control on other stakeholders’ brand perceptions. Internal branding efforts have been suggested as a way to improve employee performance. With this in mind, we develop a two-process model based on identification and internalization theories to explain how internally disseminating brand-relevant information to frontline employees enhances performance. Using multi-source data from the employees, managers, and customers of a business-to-business firm in the hospitality industry, we find that providing brand-specific information directly to frontline employees increases their identification with the brand (as evidenced in perceptions of firm authenticity) and enhances their internalization of brand values. Additional results suggest that firms should make an extra effort to communicate brand-specific information to frontline employees if they desire brand-consistent performance that is observable to managers and customers alike.     

The role of lean launch execution and launch timing on new product performance

There is a substantial literature on the product development process but comparatively little on the impact of lean launch execution and launch timing on new product performance. Given the costs and risks involved in product commercialization, this research gap is surprising. Delays in product launch can lead to poor channel cooperation and coordination, missed market opportunities, and lost competitive opportunities, yet timing of the launch has not been included in many reported studies. In addition, managers at many firms have prioritized supply chain activities such as integration of logistics with other functional areas in order to obtain cost efficiencies and accelerate time to market; the role of lean launch execution in improving new product performance has also received little research attention. In this study, we build a conceptual model in which lean launch, launch timing, and quality of marketing effort are modeled as precursors to new product performance; we assess the role of market orientation and cross-functional integration in lean launch execution as well as indirect and direct effects of launch timing on performance. We empirically test our model with a sample of 183 U.S.-based corporate managers actively involved in new product launch. We find evidence that execution of a lean launch and effective marketing significantly improve new product performance, and that correct launch timing positively moderates the effect of lean launch on performance. These variables therefore should be carefully considered by managers of new product processes.     

Driving organizational citizenship behaviors and salesperson in-role behavior performance: The role of management control and perceived organizational support

Interest in management control approaches and organizational factors associated with higher levels of salesperson performance is reflected in research streams concerned with behavior-based control strategies and organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs). This study makes two distinct additions to the literature relating to control, organizational citizenship behaviors and salesperson performance. First, the study distinguishes between salesperson in-role behavior performance and outcome performance to model in-role behavior performance as a mediator between OCB and outcome performance. Second, the work supports sales manager control as an antecedent to OCB. A second model introduces perceived organizational support (POS) as an additional antecedent to salesperson OCB, and more important, as a consequence of sales manager control. This construct has not been included in prior salesperson OCB studies. Results show sales manage control has a stronger impact on OCB through POS, than directly, and POS has a strong impact on salesperson OCB. Nigel F. Piercy (Nigel.Piercy@wbs.ac.uk) is a professor of marketing in the Warwick Business School at the University of Warwick, United Kingdom. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wales and a higher doctorate (D.Litt) from Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh. His current research interests focus on strategic sales and account management. His work has been published in many journals including theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of International Marketing, and theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science. He is coauthor to David Cravens onStrategic Marketing (8th ed., Irwin/McGraw-Hill, 2006). David W. Cravens (D.Cravens@tcu.edu) holds the Eunice and James L. West Chair of American Enterprise Studies and is a professor of marketing in the M. J. Neeley School of Business at Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas. He has a doctorate in business administration from Indiana University. His areas of specialization include marketing strategy and planning, sales management, and new product planning. His research has been published in a wide range of journals including theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Marketing Research, the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, and theInternational Journal of Marketing. Nikala Lane (Nikala.Lane@wbs.ac.uk) is a senior lecturer in marketing in the Warwick Business School at the University of Warwick, United Kingdom. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Wales and was previously a senior research associate at Cardiff University. Her research interests are focused on gender and ethics issues in sales and marketing management. Her work has been published widely in the international literature and includes articles in theJournal of Management Studies, theBritish Journal of Management, the Journal of Business Ethics, and theJournal of Personal Selling & Sales Management. Douglas W. Vorhies (dvorhies@bus.olemiss.edu) is an assistant professor of marketing in the School of Business Administration at the University of Mississippi. His primary research interests are in the areas of marketing strategy, marketing resources and capabilities, the links between innovation, strategic market management and performance, and professional selling and sales management. His other work has been published in many journals including theJournal of Marketing, Decision Sciences, theJournal of Product Innovation Management, theEuropean Journal of Marketing, and theJournal of Personal Selling and Sales Management.     

Structure in product line management: The role of formalization in service elimination decisions

Formalization is a core structural characteristic of the firm and an important determinant of decision-making efficiency. This empirical paper explores formalization in financial institutions’ product line pruning decisions. The authors develop a set of hypotheses that are empirically tested in a stratified random sample of UK financial institutions. The results demonstrate that the level of formalization in the elimination decision-making process depends on specific organizational and environmental conditions, including overall company strategy, product line length, market orientation, top management attitude toward line pruning, austerity of the regulatory context, and rate of technological change. The results also show that formalization enhances the procedural rationality of elimination decisions, and leads to customer-sensitive implementation strategies. This paper is the first attempt to link service elimination decision-making with structural characteristics of organizational decision-making. The results yield important managerial implications and point at useful directions for future research.     

Customer relationship management and company performance—the mediating role of new product performance

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is widely accepted as an effective approach for collecting, analyzing, and translating valuable customer information into managerial action. However, the potential of CRM has been investigated only in the context of existing products. CRM’s potential to aid in future new product development (NPD) has been neglected. We develop a conceptual framework in which multiple facets of CRM are linked to new product and company performance. We test this model based on a cross-functional sample consisting of 115 R&D and 122 Marketing managers from firms spanning multiple industries. The results provide evidence that CRM has a positive effect on new product performance and further, that this effect is moderated by CRM reward systems but not CRM technology. We also show that new product performance mediates the relationship between CRM and company performance. These findings have important implications for research and practice in both the CRM and NPD areas.     

Selling financial services: the effect of consumer product knowledge and salesperson commission on consumer suspicion and intentions

This research examines how consumers’ subjective product knowledge affects the way they interpret salesperson compensation within the financial services industry. Data from a nationwide panel of consumers show that higher product knowledge consumers become highly suspicious and lower purchase intentions when salesperson commission rates fall outside of the latitude of acceptance (Study 1). Study 2 results, however, demonstrate a reversal of these effects by showing that compensation–recommendation consistency is an important moderator in financial salesperson interactions. In addition, the study describes boundaries of the suspicious mindset that underlies consumer responses to sales information. Theoretical and practical implications of the finding are discussed, as are future research directions.     

The role of satisfaction with territory design on the motivation, attitudes, and work outcomes of salespeople

The primary emphasis of previous research concerning salespeople has been focused on their attitudes and behavior. The relationship between organizational variables and salesperson attitudes and behavior has received very limited attention. Sales territory design is largely uncontrollable by the salesperson, yet is acknowledged by managers and researchers as an important factor enabling salespeople to perform well. The objective is to examine satisfaction with territory design from the perspective of the salesperson. A conceptual model and hypotheses are developed linking the satisfaction with territory design with role ambiguity, intrinsic motivation, job satisfaction, and performance. Role conflict, met expectations, organizational commitment, and intention to leave are also included in the model. Survey results provide strong support for 19 of the 21 hypotheses examined. The findings offer significant insights concerning the role of territory design satisfaction in face-to-face selling and its consequences. Several managerial implications and avenues for future research are discussed. Ken Grant is the deputy head in the Department of Marketing, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. He is a member of the editorial boards of theEuropean Journal of Marketing and theJournal of Marketing Practice: Applied Marketing Science. He has published in theInternational Journal of Research in Marketing, European Journal of Marketing, Industrial Marketing Management, and several other journals. He advises companies on marketing planning, new products, and sales management and conducts research and publishes in these areas. David W. Cravens holds the Eunice and James L. West Chair of American Enterprise Studies at Texas Christian University. His research on sales management and marketing strategy has been published in theJournal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, and other leading journals in marketing and management. Before becoming an educator, he held various industry and government executive positions. He is internationally recognized for his research on marketing strategy and sales management. He has been a visiting scholar at universities in Austria, Australia, Chile, Czech Republic, England, Ireland, Germany, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Singapore, and Wales. His textbook,Strategic Marketing (Irwin/McGraw-Hill 2000), is widely used in strategy and management courses. George S. Low is an associate professor of marketing in the M. J. Neeley School of Business, Texas Christian University. He received a B.A. in advertising from Brigham Young University, an M.B.A. from the Richard Ivey School of Business at the University of Western Ontario, and a Ph.D. in marketing from the University of Colorado-Boulder. His research on the management of integrated marketing communications and brands has been published in theJournal of Marketing Research, Journal of Retailing, Journal of Advertising Research, Marketing Management, Marketing Science Institute’s Working Paper Series, and other journals. William C. Moncrief is a senior associate dean and professor of marketing at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas. He received his B.Sc. in political science and his M.B.A. from the University of Mississippi. He completed his Ph.D. at Louisiana State University in 1983. His work has been published in leading marketing and sales journals, including theJournal of Marketing Research, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, European Journal of Marketing, Journal of Business Research, Industrial Marketing Management, andJournal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, among others. His research interests are in the field of sales management and include topics such as sales deployment, sales contests, international sales, telemarketing, turnover, laptop computers, sales job activities, and quality control. He has taught in Germany, conducted research in Europe, and has most recently consulted in Mexico.     

Resistance to technological innovations: An examination of the role of self-efficacy and performance satisfaction

Technological innovation is seen as the key to survival and success for many firms. Whether intended for internal use or for customers, adoption decisions must consider the response of the final user to such technological alternatives. This paper argues for greater attention to the factors which cause individual resistance to technological innovations. The results of two studies are reported which examined the effects of self-efficacy (Bandura 1977) and performance satisfaction on consumers’ response to technological changes. Results indicate that a person’s perceived ability to use a product successfully affects their evaluative and behavioral response to the product. In addition, the level of satisfaction experienced with an existing behavior increases resistance to and reduces likelihood of adopting an alternative.     

The effects of expertise,end goal,and product type on adoption of preference formation strategy

The global preference formation model identifies several preference formation strategies (i.e., own-based, other-based, or hybrid) that consumers use to select among alternative product offerings. This article examines how consumers’ expertise level (novice vs. expert), their end goals (satisficing vs. optimizing), and product type (search vs. experience product) collectively influence the preference formation strategy likely to be adopted. Results from an experiment indicate that the adoption of a given strategy is influenced by interactions between subjects’ expertise level and their end goals and the product type. Novice satisficers employed a higher proportion of own-based strategies than novice optimizers, but expert satisficers used a lower proportion of own-based strategies than expert optimizers. When compared to novices choosing a search product, novices selecting an experience product used a lower proportion of own-based and a higher proportion of other-based strategies. Similarly, when compared to experts choosing a search product, experts selecting an experienced product used a lower proportion of own-based strategies, but this was accompanied by a higher proportion of hybrid strategies. Implications and directions for future research are discussed. Her current research interests include consumer choice processes, electronic decision aids, and measurement issues in marketing. His research interests include consumer information search, marketing communications, and measurement issues.     

The impact of product market strategy-organizational culture fit on business performance

Drawing on the organization theory literature concerning configuration theory, competing values theory, and fit assessment methodologies, we examine the existence and performance impact of product market strategy–organization culture fit. Specifically, we assess the relationship among three important elements of a firm’s product market strategy and the four cultural orientations that comprise the competing values theory of organizational culture using primary and secondary data from the US trucking industry. Using two different conceptualizations and operationalizations of fit, our results provide the first empirical support for the existence of interrelationships among product market strategy decisions and organizational culture orientations consistent with configuration theory conceptualizations of product market strategy–organizational culture fit. We also find support for theorized but previously untested relationships between product market strategy–organizational culture fit and firms’ customer satisfaction and cash-flow return on assets (CFROA) performance. Since product market strategy is heavily reliant on the input of marketers, and organizational culture has long been recognized as having an important impact on marketing-related decision making, these findings have important implications for marketing strategy research and practice.     

This ad’s for you: the indirect effect of advertising perceptions on salesperson effort and performance

Considerable research explores advertising’s role in influencing consumer perceptions and behavior. However, advertising’s impact on another key audience—the sales force—has been largely overlooked. Drawing from social identity and expectancy theories, and using survey and objective performance data across multiple wholesalers, the authors demonstrate that a salesperson’s perception of brand advertising has a significant effect on salesperson effort and performance by positively influencing the extent to which the salesperson identifies with the brand and his or her expectancy that such effort will generate results. These effects are moderated by internal communications and brand size. Model results suggest that advertising’s role may extend beyond “pull” to “push” by motivating salespeople to exert more effort on behalf of a brand. As a result, firms should take steps to proactively manage salesperson perceptions of brand advertising while also considering this dual role when assessing advertising effectiveness and efficiency.     

The accuracy of brand and attribute judgments: The role of information relevancy, product experience, and attribute-relationship schemata

A multidimensional approach for accuracy of ratings is introduced that examines consumers’ abilities to assess various brands across a set of attributes and attribute performances across a set of brands. A model is presented that addresses the roles of the relevancy of information, attribute-relationship schemata, and consumers’ product category experience on the accuracy of their brand attribute ratings. Study participants were provided either with relevant or irrelevant attribute information for various automobile brands and later asked to rate the attribute performances of brands. The results indicate that the provision of relevant information in the judgment environment increases brand and attribute rating accuracy but does not favorably affect consumers’ brand attribute-relationship schemata. Rather, consumers’ product experience was directly related to their attribute-relationship schemata, which in turn were related to improved accuracy of brand and attribute ratings. Kevin Mason is an associate professor of marketing at Arkansas Tech University. His research interests include consumer information processing and choice strategies. He has published in theJournal of Marketing Theory and Practice, Journal of Consumer Marketing, Central Business Review, Journal for the Association of Marketing Educators, andInternational Advances in Economics Research. Thomas Jensen is professor and Wal-Mart lecturer in retailing in the Department of Marketing and Transportation at the University of Arkansas. His research interests include consumer information processing, advertising and price perceptions, and retail image and patronage. His work has been published in theJournal of Consumer Research, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Psychology and Marketing, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Journal of Retailing, Journal of Business Research, and other journals. Scot Burton is professor and Wal-Mart chairholder in marketing, Department of Marketing and Transportation, University of Arkansas. His research interests include public policy and consumer welfare concerns, survey research measurement issues, and consumer price and promotion perceptions. His work has been published in theJournal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Public Opinion Quarterly, Journal of Applied Psychology, Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, Journal of Retailing, and other journals. Dave Roach is a professor of management at Arkansas Tech University. His research interests include information processing, judgmental accuracy, and organization change. He has published inHuman Relations, Journal of Applied Psychology, International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing, Journal of Information Technology Management, Journal of Consumer Marketing, Central Business Review, andJournal for the Association of Marketing Educators.     

The influence of organic organizational cultures, market responsiveness, and product strategy on firm performance in an emerging market

Organizational culture is a strategic resource that influences a range of activities within firms, and empirical evidence from management and marketing demonstrates that it impacts performance. In this study, we investigate how organic types of organizational culture (i.e., adhocracy and clan) serve as a strategic resource to influence marketing effectiveness and performance in an emerging economy, using an extended form of the resource-based view as our theoretical framework. We posit that organic cultures, which are relatively dominant in emerging-nation firms, serve as antecedents of competitive advantage and superior performance. We selected China as the context to test the veracity of our model and use multiple informants and archival performance data to minimize common method variance. Our results support the proposed model and demonstrate that organic cultures impact market responsiveness, while confirming the critical roles of market responsiveness and product strategy change in producing superior performance. We further demonstrate a direct effect between clan culture and product strategy change, in addition to its indirect effect. Importantly, our results uncover that, although individually either adhocracy or clan culture can significantly improve the firm’s responsiveness, their combined effect does not enhance market responsiveness; that is, their interaction yields a negative coefficient. Additionally, the influence of organic cultures on market responsiveness varies across different industry types. These important differences, along with theoretical contributions and managerial implications of our findings, are discussed, and several avenues for future research are proposed.     

Competence resource specialization, causal ambiguity, and the creation and decay of competitiveness: the role of marketing strategy in new product performance and shareholder value

Marketing strategists should create, maintain, and arrest the decay of causally ambiguous resource competences that lead to competitiveness and thus performance. However, competence causal ambiguity, which helps create competitiveness, is also implicated in competitiveness decay. In this study we test a model of specialization-competitiveness-performance using primary and secondary data from 169 public respondents/firms, to examine the effects of negative internal barriers to replication and adaptation. These barriers develop due to resource lock-in arising from the same specialization processes that lead to the positive barriers to imitation that deter competitors. Results suggest that commitment to learning can mitigate resource lock-in problems with internal competence causal ambiguity, competence causal ambiguity among competitors appears more essential to competitiveness in more competitive markets, competitiveness positively relates to both shareholder value and new product performance, and an increased differential focus on marketing versus operations in the organization strengthens the positive bridge between organizational competitiveness and shareholder return.