Article

How Leaders’ Motivation Transfers to Customer Service Representatives

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Abstract

Motivating customer service representatives (CSRs) to their highest performance levels is a major task of service unit managers. However, previous studies focused on the impact of leader behavior on follower motivation, while the influence of leader motivation on follower motivation has not been investigated yet. Thus, the authors develop and test a multilevel framework for the motivation spillover principle, which holds that the three components of Vroom’s motivation theory transfer from managers to CSRs. The authors apply this framework to the context of service technology adoption and test it with a matched multilevel sample of 387 service unit managers, 1,018 CSRs, and objective company records. The results support the notion of a motivation spillover from managers to CSRs, which exists incrementally beyond the direct effect of manager’s adoption behavior on CSR’s adoption. However, not all motivation components transfer unconditionally but are contingent on charismatic leadership and manager-CSR similarity——a finding that implies for researchers that an undifferentiated view of motivation in multilevel settings might not suffice. For organizations, the findings suggest that managers are important multipliers of motivation and thus organizations should direct their motivation efforts toward middle-level managers, as they might turn into serious roadblocks to CSR motivation.

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... Various researchers, such as Longstaffe (2005) (2002), supported these findings. Inspiring and motivating leadership qualities often stem from the ability to communicate a vision and anticipate future needs (Conger & Kanungo, 1998;Piccolo & Colquitt, 2006;Shamir et al., 1993;Wieseke et al., 2011), emotional intelligence (Chopra & Kanji, 2010), and a willingness to be receptive to the ideas of FLEs (Detert & Burris, 2007). ...
... With the help of FLE inspiration, global discounters can encourage proactive attitudes, behaviors, and active involvement in tasks that enhance FLEs' readiness to support organizational change (Cadwallader et al., 2010;Wieseke et al., 2011) and may spark creative ideas that improve retailers' efficiency and effectiveness. Content retailers could enhance FLEs' capacity due to their inspiration to recognize and share new cues from their surroundings (e.g., emerging customer needs and market trends) (Gebhardt et al., 2019), which might effectively differentiate their offerings and make them more compelling to customers. ...
... To promote structural empowerment, global discounters can provide FLEs with greater autonomy in their work, set challenging goals, and foster teamwork while building a supportive service culture (Monje-Amor et al., 2021). In this case, FLE inspiration may help global discounters accelerate proactive attitudes, behaviors, and active involvement in tasks that enhance FLEs' readiness to support organizational change (Cadwallader et al., 2010;Wieseke et al., 2011) and spark creative ideas that improve retailers' efficiency. ...
Thesis
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Delivering excellent service offerings is critical to physical retailers’ long-term success. In this context, frontline employees (FLEs) have become the key players in creating value for customers and represent a key opportunity, particularly for service-focused retailers, to strengthen the future of physical retail. Facing changing consumer behaviors due to the aftermath of COVID-19 and increasingly fierce competition from established offline and new online competitors, physical retailers struggle to stay competitive without cutting payroll expenses for FLEs. In response to this dilemma, scholars recognized the importance of FLEs customizing their services to customer needs to enhance service interactions at the physical point of sale (POS) in so-called adaptive service offerings. Understanding the factors that affect adaptive service offerings, specifically in retail, is important because physical retail is heavily disrupted by the progressive shift from product to customer experience. As a result, retailers must educate FLEs on why and how to adapt service offerings and provide the right work settings. Consequently, physical retailers need to reengage with their customers by positioning themselves as providers of inspiring shopping experiences to increase their share of wallets, cross-selling, and profitability. FLEs are one important source of such inspiring shopping experiences. This dissertation contributes to a better understanding of how retailers can promote FLE inspiration by extending Wilder et al.’s (2014) study and testing a more comprehensive framework of adaptive service offerings that considers psychological mechanisms, namely FLE inspiration. My findings can help physical retailers train their FLEs more effectively. Building on the qualitative data from 293 FLEs in the DACH region (Study 1), two online survey studies were conducted, in the UK (Study 2) with 248 FLEs, and with 525 FLEs from the German-speaking DACH area (Study 3) to test this new model. The findings showed that FLE inspiration significantly mediates the effect of retailers’ perceived service climate and FLEs’ structural empowerment on three FLE variables, namely empathy, anticipation, and creativity. These three FLE-level variables precede adaptive service offerings. Most importantly, the combined findings of the three studies provide strong support for FLE inspiration mediating the relationship between FLEs’ immediate work environment and their attitudinal and behavioral outcomes. These findings offer managers practical insights into how they can inspire their FLEs and improve service offering adaptation.
... 1 We deduce our hypotheses from social learning theory (Bandura 1971) and the contingency leadership perspective (Den Hartog and Belschak 2012). First, drawing on social learning theory, prior literature finds evidence that salespeople are likely to adopt their leaders' attitudes and behaviors (e.g., Chakrabarty et al. 2013;Lam et al. 2010), particularly if leaders are transformational (e.g., Mullins and Syam 2014;Rich 1997;Wieseke et al. 2009Wieseke et al. , 2011; see bottom of Fig. 1 as well as Table 1 for details). Drawing on these notions, we deduce from social learning theory that the degree to which salespeople defend prices may depend on sales leaders' role modeling, that is, the degree to which sales leaders defend prices themselves. ...
... First, our study is the first to reveal that sales leadership strongly influences salespeople's intensity of price defense, thus providing insight into this important research void (see Fig. 1). Specifically, as deduced from literature on salespeople's adoption of their leaders' behaviors (e.g., Lam et al. 2010;Mullins and Syam 2014;Wieseke et al. 2009Wieseke et al. , 2011 and empirically shown in our study, salespeople tend to adopt their leaders' intensity of price defense, especially if leaders are transformational. Second, significantly extending prior literature, our study caters to calls for research on contingencies of the efficacy of leadership behavior (e.g., Avolio 2007;Hunter et al. 2007;Podsakoff et al. 1996). ...
... Social learning theory has been previously applied to the sales context and proved useful to understand sales leader-salesperson relationships (see Table 1 for an overview of respective literature). For instance, salespeople have been found to imitate their managers' technology acceptance behavior (Homburg et al. 2010), market orientation (Lam et al. 2010), work motivation (Wieseke et al. 2011), psychological climate (Martin and Bush 2006), and even adopt their leaders' organizational identification ). ...
Article
Salespeople assume a key role in defending firms’ price levels in price negotiations with customers. The degree to which salespeople defend prices should critically depend upon their leaders’ influence. However, the influence of leadership on salespeople’s price defense behavior is barely understood, conceptually or empirically. Therefore, building on social learning theory, the authors propose that salespeople might adopt their leaders’ price defense behavior given a transformational leadership style. Furthermore, drawing on the contingency leadership perspective, the authors argue that this adoption fundamentally depends on three variables deduced from the motivation–ability–opportunity (MAO) framework, that is, salespeople’s learning motivation, negotiation efficacy, and perceived customer lenience. Results of a multi-level model using data from 92 salespeople and 264 salesperson–customer interactions confirm these predictions. The first to explore contingencies of salespeople’s adoption of their transformational leaders’ price negotiation behaviors, this study extends marketing theory and provides actionable guidance to practitioners.
... companies (e.g. Hackman and Oldham 1976) or service-oriented companies such as telecommunication (Gwinner et al. 2005), travel agencies (Wieseke et al. 2011) or retail stores (Grandey, Goldberg, and Pugh 2011). Employee motivation in the specific context of PSS provision has not been studied to date. ...
... Supervisors can facilitate motivation spill-overs, i.e. the 'transfer of different components of motivation from the service unit manager to [service employees]' (Wieseke et al. 2011, 215). For example, Wieseke et al. (2011) found that these motivation spill-overs play a strong role in facilitating employee motivation. Colleagues can also influence the overall group emotions and mood (Kelly and Barsade 2001). ...
... Work-life balance can increase motivation through flexibility in working hours and extra-time (armstrong 2012, 72) collective Company perception in terms of alignment between organisational and individual values of the employee facilitates motivation through affiliation (Mcclelland 1965;Suh et al. 2011) Supervisor feedback can be a source of inspiration and motivation (Wieseke et al. 2011) in terms of appreciation and recognition of individual contribution to meeting targets (Hanna, Burns, and Backhouse 2000) Relatedness to the work environment to facilitate the feeling of acceptance and understanding (alderfer 1972; Whitman, Van rooy, and Viswesvaran 2010) ...
Article
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This research investigates how intrinsic and extrinsic motivation factors contribute to employee motivation in providers of product-service systems (PSS). Employee motivation determines the quality of the delivered service and is thus an area of great importance for PSS providers. We present rich case-based data collected through semi-structured interviews, a survey and secondary sources. The analysis showed the particularly high importance of intrinsic and individual motivation factors such as the fulfilling nature of the work and skill development showing the ownership and pride service employees took in their work. Further, the organisation needs to set the context of high employee motivation by enabling flexibility and performance feedback. Our research contributes to the literature by providing a first empirical study of employee motivation in PSS providers and thus providing important insights on the implementation of a servitisation strategy.
... Balancing the act: the implications of jointly pursuing internal customer orientation and external customer orientation Introduction The recognition that adopting and implementing both an external customer orientation and internal customer orientation enhances organisational performance and customer satisfaction is well documented in prior research (see Dabholkar & Abston, 2008;Lings & Greenley, 2005, 2010Oakley, 2012;Tadajewski & Hewer, 2012). Whilst customer orientation has attracted a lot of attention from both marketing researchers and practitioners, the major focus has been on the external customer (Stock & Hoyer, 2005;Wieseke, Kraus, Alavi, & Kessler-Thones, 2011). Literature suggests that internal markets are just as vital as external customers for an organisation's success (Conduit & Mavondo, 2001;Ehrhart, Witt, Schneider, & Perry, 2011;Oakley, 2012;Wieseke et al., 2011). ...
... Whilst customer orientation has attracted a lot of attention from both marketing researchers and practitioners, the major focus has been on the external customer (Stock & Hoyer, 2005;Wieseke, Kraus, Alavi, & Kessler-Thones, 2011). Literature suggests that internal markets are just as vital as external customers for an organisation's success (Conduit & Mavondo, 2001;Ehrhart, Witt, Schneider, & Perry, 2011;Oakley, 2012;Wieseke et al., 2011). The recognition that value creation takes place when there is interaction between the customer and the supplier puts a focus on internal markets (Grönroos, 2011). ...
... An internal customer orientation encourages managers and employees not only to focus on the needs of the final customers but also to regard other employees as internal customers (Dabholkar & Abston, 2008). Thus, a focus on the needs of internal customers should be an immediate objective of marketing programmes as it contributes to the satisfaction of external customers (Wieseke et al., 2011). ...
Article
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Current marketing paradigms recognise a need for organisations to create value for both internal and external customers. However, jointly pursuing an internal and external customer focus has been argued to be both synergistic and contradictory. Using cluster analysis, this paper develops a typology on the basis of employees’ perceptions of their organisation’s joint pursuit of internal and external customer orientation. This allows an examination of the joint implications of these strategic postures on organisational processes, including information generation, information dissemination, training, communication and human resource practices. The results suggest that employees have the most positive perceptions of organisational processes when they perceive the organisation pursues a strong internal orientation, followed by those organisations that are jointly strong on internal and external customer orientation.
... The results show that salespeople working for different companies exhibit significant betweengroup variance in VBS. The intraclass coefficient (ICC) and the design effect for VBS further support this result, in that their values exceed the respective minimum levels of .05 and 2 (Muthén and Satorra 1995;Snijders and Bosker 1999), indicating a meaningful proportion of betweengroup relative to total variance in VBS (Wieseke et al. 2011). ...
... We followed a hierarchical procedure to build our multilevel path model (Wieseke et al. 2011). First, we set up a path model with all predictors and controls on the individual salesperson level, to explain inter-individual differences in VBS and selling performance (see Table 4, Model 1). ...
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Modern business-to-business firms focus increasingly on understanding and selling value, as a strategic priority and to achieve marketing and sales excellence. Yet many companies struggle to implement their value orientation, without sufficient knowledge of how to translate it into sales practice. This study therefore examines value-based selling (VBS) as an implementation of value-based marketing at the sales force level. The proposed motivation–opportunity–ability framework integrates individual- and organizational-level antecedents, outcomes, and moderators in an attempt to explain the adoption and performance outcomes of VBS in business markets. Multilevel path modeling with cross-sectional survey data from 944 salespeople and managers in 43 sales organizations confirms the prediction that VBS enhances salespeople's performance, beyond that achieved with established selling approaches. However, firms need specific types of salespeople and dedicated organizational support for effective VBS implementation. A salesperson's learning orientation and networking competencies emerge as critical antecedents. Organizational value assessment tools can compensate for individual salespeople's lack of learning orientation; reference marketing efforts also strengthen the performance outcomes of VBS. Finally, VBS is most effective in organizational settings where perceived customers value demandingness is lower, enabling salespeople to use VBS as a proactive selling approach.
... While the contagious nature of psychological empowerment has not previously been examined specifically, researchers have explored contagion effects of other related concepts, such as motivation (c.f. Wieseke et al 2011), emotion (c.f. Bakker et al 2001 andBakker et al 2005), epidemics (c.f. ...
... Specifically, this can occur through the confidence they show in their task performance abilities (competence), their influence in the project organization (impact), their commitment and attachment to team and project goals (meaning) and overall the freedom to decide on how best to undertake their tasks (self-determination). Given the motivating nature of psychological empowerment, this view is supported by the motivation spillover phenomenon (Wieseke et al 2011) and from social learning theory perspective that suggests that motivation can be contagious (c.f. Bandura 1997). ...
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Psychological empowerment, described as constellation of experienced cognitions manifested as sense of meaning, competence, impact, and self-determination has been identified as an important motivating force in teams with performance consequences for individuals and teams. Prior research have therefore sort to identify factors from the individual-, team-, project- and organisation-levels that impact empowerment cognitions with the hope of providing concrete targets for promoting psychological empowerment. One constituency that has been overlooked is the likelihood that psychological empowerment in teams may be capable of being transmitted from one team member to another. This paper reports a study investigating whether psychological empowerment cognition in project teams is contagious. Using survey responses from 380 individuals, nested in 115 project management teams, we test the psychological empowerment contagion hypothesis using analysis of variance, interrater agreement and hierarchical linear modelling as proxies. Analysis of variance indicates that the between-team variance of team psychological empowerment is statistically significant and substantially larger than the within-team variance. Several measures of interrator agreement also show considerable agreement (consensus) within teams, further confirming the prevalence of psychological empowerment in teams. Team psychological empowerment also has a significant positive and independent impact on individual psychological empowerment, even after controlling for the impact of variables previously identified as influencing psychological empowerment. Team members who reported higher levels of team psychological empowerment were also more likely to experience higher levels of individual psychological empowerment themselves. Psychological empowerment is contagious and can be transmitted from one team member to another. These findings supplement the traditional sources of antecedents of empowerment and suggest that team members play an important multiplier role in engendering feelings of psychological empowerment both consciously and unconsciously.
... For example, Liao and Chuang (2007) found that store-level transformational leadership (charisma, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individualized consideration) was positively associated with store-level service climate and that service climate moderated leadership's effects on employee service performance. In a similar vein, Wieseke et al. (2011) show how the leader's own motivation influences employee motivation to serve customers, and Berry (1995) highlighted the role of inspirational motivation in service leadership to create a service culture, if not climate. More recently, Walumbwa, Hartnell, and Oke (2010), in a study of seven multinationals operating in Kenya, found that servant leadership, which consists of both inspirational and moral components, linked directly to a service climate. ...
... to mid-0.60s) as those for employee performance and satisfaction. Managers serve as models for employees, and this dynamic warrants more research on manager ratings of service climate (Walker, Smither, and Waldman 2008;Walumbwa, Hartnell, and Oke 2010;Wieseke et al. 2011); knowing this effect clearly has practical implications for the use of the service climate construct. ...
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Theory and research on service climate are synthesized, and an extensive agenda for future research is proposed. The service climate construct is first differentiated from conceptually related but distinct constructs, such as job satisfaction, service culture, and service orientation. Then a framework is presented based on prior research that displays service climate's antecedents and consequences and the linkages among them. The synthesis draws heavily upon organizational behavior/human resource management (OB/HRM), but service climate has also received significant interdisciplinary attention. In particular, past work has integrated OB/HRM's focus on the internal organization and marketing's focus on the external world of the customer. The future research agenda includes further specification of the framework's variables and linkages (e.g., the relative roles of individual and contextual attributes in creating service climate) as well as recommended research methods (e.g., profile analysis to assess interactions among multiple climates in a setting). Finally, the utility of the service climate framework for analyzing four key issues in service management is demonstrated: service infusion in manufacturing; the cocreation of value; sustainable competitive advantage; and the fostering of additional interdisciplinary research.
... The importance of motivation grounds on the belief that external marketing success is based on motivating front-line employees, as they are the main representatives of a service firm (Hartline et al., 2000). Scholars claim that the extent to which individuals strive to meet their needs is associated with the level of "motivational force" they encounter (Wieseke et al., 2011) and in particular, with the support they receive from their managers (Schmit and Allsched, 1995). ...
... From a methodological view, the use of a nested research design allows us to explore how managerial behaviours stress positive employee consequences in line with recent studies in the field highlighting manager's pivotal role for the diffusion of marketing philosophy across the firm (Lam et al., 2010;Wieseke et al., 2011). This approach enables managers to realize how top management initiatives are performed down the organizational pyramid and interpreted at different levels of the organizational hierarchy. ...
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Purpose – The purpose of this study is to explore how the adoption of an internal marketing (IM) programme in a retail banking setting enhances some positive employee behaviours that promote customer perceived service quality. Design/methodology/approach – A multilevel research design is adopted which draws evidence from branch managers, employees and customers in order to investigate whether branch manager’s adoption of an IM philosophy affects front-line employee responsiveness to the firm’s IM strategies and their levels of motivation, empowerment and organizational identification (OI), respectively. Findings – Results indicate that manager’s IM adoption can enhance employee adoption of IM and raises their levels of motivation, empowerment and OI. The moderating role of manager-employee dissimilarity is also discussed. Finally, findings confirm that employee motivation, empowerment and OI affect customer perceptions of service quality. Originality/value – This study provides an important shift by formally including IM into multilevel marketing research and establishes another link in the IM-organizational performance relationship, uncovering some behavioural routes through which the positive effects of IM can add to the achievement of firm’s external marketing objectives.
... However, sales technology implementations are bound to fail if salespeople do not adopt the newly introduced tools . Past research has intensively dealt with the topic of salespeople's technology adoption (e.g., Wieseke et al. 2011). However, we argue that these important seminal efforts did not address salespeople's technology adoption from a longitudinal perspective, did scarcely study specific implementation or change management strategies, and did scarcely differentiate the quantity of the technology adoption (e.g., mere hours of usage) and the quality of usage (e.g., whether technologies are correctly employed). ...
... While this distinction between investment/availability versus adoption may sound trivial, new sales technologies frequently encounter resistance and such resistance might particularly arise for PSA applications because people tend to mistrust algorithms (e.g., Dietvorst et al. 2015). Building on past research on sales technologies and pertinent theories on technology effectiveness, we propose that the extent to which sales employees adopt PSA constitutes the fundamental factor determining the effect of PSA on outcomes such as financial performance (Hunter 2019;Mathieu et al. 2007;Wieseke et al. 2011). ...
... In light of this tremendous practical relevance, numerous academic articles have carved out the benefits of new technology to increase sales performance. That is, extant research showed that salespeople's usage of technologies can increase their revenues, profitability, cross-selling success, upselling success, and improve customer relationships (Wieseke et al. 2011;Singh et al. 2019). However, current sales research is lacking an understanding how digital transformation affects and is affected by individual salespeople and sales managers. ...
Article
The digital transformation of organizations is a pervasive force which fundamentally changes companies and, in fact, society as a whole. For many companies, the sales force is at the center of this transformation seeing the essential role of salespeople at the customer-company interface and the exceptional quantifiability of salespeople’s work outputs and inputs. New, cutting-edge sales technologies such as predictive sales analytics, virtual or augmented reality, or AI bots hold the promise of significant productivity gains, yet, simultaneously may entail insidious side effects for sales employees and companies. While past research made significant progress in understanding the benefits of these new technologies, the intricate ‘human side’ of the digital transformation remains relatively ‘uncharted territory’. With this special issue, we aim to contribute to a better understanding of the human side in digital transformation of sales—to augment academic knowledge, provide immediate guidance to practitioners, and improve academic sales education. This editorial reviews the works in the special issue, the state of digital sales transformation in practice, and on this basis derives ideas for future research.
... For measuring self-efficacy, we used the scale proposed by Sujan, Weitz, and Kumar (1994). We measured the age and gender (based on Wieseke et al. 2011), sales experience, company and team tenure (from both the manager and the FLEs based on Kraus et al. 2015), team goals (based on Wilden and Gudergan 2015), the city where the questionnaires were distributed (cities based on Yu, Patterson, and de Ruyter 2013), and retail product mix (based on Johnson & Sohi 2014). All measures used seven-point Likert scales, ranging from1 = totally disagreeẗo7 = totally agree(See Web Appendix I for details). ...
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This study focuses on the bright side of perceptual differences regarding leadership that may exist between managers and employees. Specifically, building on leadership literature, the authors propose that in situations wherein a manager’s perceptions of their own leadership are lower than that of their employees’ perceptions of their managers’ leadership, employees’ sales performance levels are higher. Data were collected from retail store managers and frontline employees in Brazil in three different contexts (e.g., footwear, clothing, and furniture). Based on polynomial regression analyses, the findings suggest that sales performance is generally higher when a manager’s self-perceptions are lower than their frontline employees’ perceptions of managers’ transactional and transformational leadership.
... As Sundaram, Schwarz, Jones, and Chin (2007, p. 108) note, "encouraging the use of technology more frequently is likely to result in the salesperson incorporating the technology into his or her daily work routine…Therefore, management should deploy resources that demonstrate how the salesperson can use the technology more efficiently and effectively." Given that technology use by salespeople is positively related to a number of favorable outcomes such as knowledge, adaptability, productivity, revenue, profitability, customer relationships, and salesperson service behaviors (e.g., Agnihotri, Trainor, Itani, & Rodriguez, 2017;Ahearne, Jones, Rapp, & Mathieu, 2008;Hunter & Perreault, 2007;Wieseke et al., 2011), techno-training becomes a critical organizational resource for sales organizations to equip their salespeople with a technological knowledge infrastructure and promote technology usage to facilitate the execution of critical sales tasks (Buehrer, Senecal, & Pullins, 2005;Pullig, Maxham, & Hair, 2002;Rapp, Skinner Beitelspacher, Schillewaert, & Baker, 2012). Accordingly, over the years, researchers have explored the role of techno-training in the context of salespeople's adoption and use of diverse technology such as general sales force technology, sales force automation, and, more recently, social media technology (see Table 1 for a review of empirical studies in this area). ...
Article
Given that salesperson turnover is a significant problem for sales organizations, sales researchers have devoted a lot of attention toward explicating various drivers and mitigators of salesperson turnover intentions. Within this domain, consistent with the popular sentiment “employees don’t quit their jobs, they quit their bosses,” scholars have explored sales manager-related triggers such as leadership style, salesperson – sales manager relational exchange, and several managerial characteristics. We extend this stream of research by developing and testing a framework of salespersons’ perceptions of their manager’s leadership worthiness – a higher-order construct comprising of competence, charisma, and behavioral integrity – and its subsequent impact on salesperson turnover intentions. Our framework illustrates that salespersons’ inferences, judgments, and attributions regarding their manager exert a pull-to-stay effect by lowering turnover intentions. Specifically, we find that leadership worthiness mitigates turnover intentions directly and indirectly via personal identification with and trust in the manager. We also find support for the moderating effects of salesperson gratitude on the relationships between leadership worthiness and both salesperson turnover intentions as well as identification with the manager. We conclude by discussing theoretical and practical implications of our findings as well as directions for future research.
... Furthermore, management must evaluate rewards systems and align them with both components of service-sales ambidexterity. Service unit managers can play a crucial role in influencing customer service representatives' motivation (Wieseke et al. 2011). Branch management should relinquish its role as controller and instead be a motivator or role model to develop the team's ability to serve and sell. ...
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Purpose – This paper aims to examine how the motivation and ability of individual employees to sell influences their units’ capability to align their service delivery with sales in a way that satisfies customers. It also addresses the potential influence of employees’ confidence in their supervisor’s ability to sell, such that they predict a joint influence of personal and proxy agency. Design/methodology/approach – This study uses hierarchical linear modeling to address the research issues. Findings – Employees’ learning orientation has a positive influence on service-sales ambidexterity, but the impact of a performance-avoidance goal orientation is negative, and a performance-prove orientation has no influence. Proxy efficacy enhances the positive impact of learning orientations due to the manager’s ability to lead by example, facilitate knowledge sharing and provide advice. However, it attenuates the impact of self-efficacy on service-sales ambidexterity, because skilled supervisors tend to take over and eliminate opportunities for employees to build their own skills. It also confirms the positive influence of service-sales ambidexterity on branch performance. Originality/value – To examine the emerging service-sales ambidexterity issues raised in frontline service units, this study adopts a motivation and capability paradigm. It is among the first studies to address service-sales ambidexterity issues by considering both individual and branch contextual factors.
... Internal reliabilities were strong in each subscale (Valence αs = 0.95 and 0.96, Instrumentality αs = 0.84 and 0.90, Expectancy αs = 0.82 and 0.88). The test was developed as part of a study on test-taking motivation; the wording in the items is context-sensitive but can be adapted for other study settings (e.g., see Wieseke, Kraus, Alavi, and Kessler-Thönes, 2011). ...
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Compiling empirical work from management and social science disciplines, the Research Companion to Ethical Behavior in Organizations provides an entry point for academic researchers and compliance officers interested in measuring the moral dimensions of individuals. Accessible to newcomers but geared toward academics, this detailed book catalogs the varied and nuanced constructs used in behavioral ethics, along with measures that assess those constructs. With its cross-disciplinary focus and expert commentary, a varied collection of learned scholars bring essential studies into one volume, creating a resource that promises to enhance the burgeoning field of behavioral ethics.
... Furthermore, management must evaluate rewards systems and align them with both components of service-sales ambidexterity. Service unit managers can play a crucial role in influencing customer service representatives' motivation (Wieseke et al. 2011). Branch management should relinquish its role as controller and instead be a motivator or role model to develop the team's ability to serve and sell. ...
Article
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Frontline employees in traditional customer service units are under increasing pressure to pursue the twin goals of providing quality service while achieving productivity gains by meeting increased sales targets—that is, being service-sales ambidextrous. Drawing from literature on organizational ambidexterity, this study explores forces that facilitate the conversion from a service-only environment to one that emphasizes both sales and service behavior. With a sample of more than 2,306 frontline employees in 267 bank branches, this study examines the impact of contextual variables on service-sales ambidexterity from a multilevel perspective. It then explores the consequences by analyzing objective financial data at the retail branch level, which reveal a significant relationship between ambidexterity and financial performance. Empowerment and transformational leadership are positively associated with service-sales ambidexterity at individual and branch levels; team support is associated with ambidexterity only at the individual employee level. Managers thus should let service workers exercise their own judgment when deciding when or what to up- or cross-sell. The delegation of authority works best for branch office veterans whose service excellence and selling both are recognized and rewarded.
... Furthermore, management must evaluate rewards systems and align them with both components of service-sales ambidexterity. Service unit managers can play a crucial role in influencing customer service representatives' motivation (Wieseke et al. 2011 ). Branch management should relinquish its role as controller and instead be a motivator or role model to develop the team's ability to serve and sell. ...
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This paper aims to establish a conceptual understanding of customer engagement. Drawing from management, marketing, applied psychology literature and marketing practitioners' views, an initial working definition of customer engagement was formed. Customer engagement describes the level of a customer's various "presence" in their relationship with the organisation. The presences include physical presence, emotional presence and cognitive presence. Customer engagement is conceived as a higher-order construct which consists of four components, namely, vigor, dedication, absorption, and interaction. Given the intangible nature of services and that a degree of customer- provider social interaction is typically required in delivery of services, we contend the construct has high relevance in service industries. Eight related marketing constructs were identified and compared to customer engagement. Key reasons for devoting research attention to customer engagement are also discussed.
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Predominantly based on a static perspective, existing studies have documented that supervisor support is a key facilitator of front-line employees’ service behaviors. Incorporating a change perspective, our study examines the effects of daily shift and variability in supervisor support on employees’ service performance at both the within- and between-person levels. We draw on affective events theory to propose positive affect as the underlying mediating mechanism and examine the moderating role of employee self-control capability. We test the hypotheses using data from 56 front-line service employees across 10 consecutive workdays ( N = 547) and from their supervisors in the follow-up survey. The results indicate that, at the within-person level, an upshift (downshift) in daily supervisor support is positively (negatively) related to daily positive affect, leading to higher (lower) levels of daily service performance. At the between-person level, variability in supervisor support is negatively related to employees’ positive affect, which in turn, reduces their service performance. A lower (versus higher) level of employee self-control capability at the between-person level enhances the within-person relationship between daily supervisor support change and daily positive affect and the between-person relationship between variability in supervisor support and employees’ positive affect. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Article
Purpose This paper investigates the effect of balanced orientation (BO) toward customers and employees on financial distress and firm valuation. Rooted in stakeholder theory and the attention-based theory of firms, the study aims to understand how a balanced synthesis of employee orientation (EO) and customer orientation (CO) influences the long-term market performance and survivability of firms, particularly in the context of emerging markets. Design/methodology/approach A panel dataset of the top 500 firms listed on the National Stock Exchange of India was analyzed using fixed-effect panel models with robust estimators. The Heckman procedure was employed to address selection bias. Financial data were sourced from the CMIE Prowess database and balanced orientation data were extracted from the annual letters to shareholders. Findings The study finds that a balanced approach to EO and CO significantly lowers bankruptcy risk and increases firm valuation. Contrary to the traditional dichotomy of EO and CO, BO emerges as a key driver in reducing financial distress and enhancing long-term market performance. Firms embracing multiple strategic orientations outperform those solely focused on customer orientation. Practical implications For emerging market firms facing resource constraints, developing BO is challenging but crucial. This study suggests adopting a sequential or alternating approach to developing EO and CO, which can alleviate bankruptcy risk and improve market valuation even in competitive environments. Originality/value This paper contributes to the existing literature by empirically demonstrating the significance of BO in emerging markets. It offers a novel perspective on strategic management, highlighting the importance of balancing customer and employee needs, especially in resource-constrained environments.
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In the following article, we intend to acknowledge and consolidate various topics from Frank Jacob’s research. Frank Jacob focused much of his research on the formative shift from products to services and the resulting changes in value creation and marketing and sales processes. This article, therefore, uses a concise literature review to show how the concept of service is continuing to change as a result of increasing digitalization and is becoming what is known as e-service. This progressive evolution of service is closely related to the changing understanding and constantly evolving conceptualization of value. The article consequently provides a theory-based overview of the evolution of value and the meaning of value-in-use. In particular, this changing understanding has strong implications for sales processes as well as for the role of the sales force and individual sales representatives who sell these types of e-services. Finally, this article contributes to the existing literature by outlining the criteria for classifying e-services and value-in-use, and highlighting the role of value-oriented selling in e-services through multiple perspectives that include the e-selling process, the sales force, and salesperson level.
Article
Purpose Seeing past research, sales managers’ encouragement of their salespeople, tailored to the demands of value-creating sales, should constitute a key success factor for implementing value-centered business models. But prior research is largely silent on sales managers’ encouragement behavior for adopting value-centered business models regarding specific sales manager encouragement behaviors. Hence, this paper aims to examine the moderating effect of in-role and extra-role encouragement by sales managers in value-centered business models on financial firm performance. Design/methodology/approach The research model was tested empirically on a sample of key informants from 209 firms working in (sales) management positions using regression analysis. Findings The findings suggest that in-role encouragement behavior is more effective to achieve financial firm performance in value-centered business models. Sales managers should use in-role encouragement to provide their salespeople with a clear structure as a framework for their tasks and work environment and a strategic alignment along the sales organization. Research limitations/implications First, while the study included a variety of industries, it only covered countries from the Dach region (Germany, Austria, and Switzerland), which could limit the generalizability of the findings. To validate the results in additional countries, future research could replicate the research in a cross-country study to test whether the effects differ between countries. Second, the study surveys one key informant per firm on a firm-level leadership tendency. Although leadership culture may promote similar leadership styles or behaviors within one firm, individual leadership behaviors may still vary. Future research should validate the findings using individual sales managers data. Practical implications Firm managers must encourage sales managers in value-centered business models to engage in in-role encouragement and avoid extra-role encouragement and thus intensify their micromanagement. Micromanaging the salesforce comprises extensive guidance regarding their expectations and execution toward their salespeople’s work-related tasks and their way of thinking. Furthermore, firms must ask themselves whether their sales managers are capable of micromanaging at all and whether they have the capacity to do so. If not, they must create the appropriate capacities for this. Supplementary, firms should offer regular training for managers on the application of in-role encouragement. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study combining the two rather separately considered research streams of encouragement behavior and value-centered business models regarding the effects on firm performance outcomes.
Preprint
Purpose Customer sweethearting is a common illicit behavior of frontline employees in service firms. This paper aims to examine the impact of supportive–disloyal leadership behavior on customer sweethearting at different levels of leader–member exchange (LMX) quality. Design/methodology/approach Drawing on imitation theory and need-to-belong theory, the paper builds a conceptual model and empirically tests it using data from a survey-based study and a complementary experiment. Findings The authors find that employees’ customer sweethearting is affected by their supervisors’ supportive–disloyal behavior (employee sweethearting) through two divergent paths: employees imitate the sweethearting behavior of their supervisors; and employee sweethearting triggers employees’ feelings of belongingness to their organization, which reduces their customer sweethearting behavior. Practical implications The findings suggest that service firms can mitigate customer sweethearting by raising awareness that supervisors act as negative role models to subordinates and fostering high-quality LMX relationships, which give employees a sense of belonging to the supervisor and the organization. Originality/value By taking supervisors’ supportive–disloyal leadership behavior as an ambivalent driver of customer sweethearting into account, this paper provides further insight into the occurrence of customer sweethearting, particularly its underlying contrasting psychological mechanisms.
Article
Changes in technological and sales environments necessitate organizations to constantly invest in equipping salespeople with newer technological knowledge and tools. However, the success of investments in technological transformation hinges on salespeople’s beliefs regarding technology, in general, and their recognition that enhancement of technological skills results in better sales outcomes. This study develops and tests a framework that illustrates how continuous techno-training can serve as an important resource for influencing critical technology-related and sales-related outcomes. Specifically, drawing from job demands-resources theory and research on technology training in the sales context, we demonstrate that continuous techno-training can help in developing techno-efficacy directly as well as indirectly through fostering techno-expectancy and suppressing techno-stress. In turn, we show that techno-efficacy is positively related to sales-efficacy, which enhances both sales effort and sales performance. Based on our findings, we offer several meaningful implications to sales research and practice.
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Recent marketing research has identified mixed effects of luxury companies’ corporate social responsibility (CSR) engagement on customer-level outcomes. To gain a better understanding of these effects, we develop a conceptual framework in which we propose that, unless carefully implemented, CSR engagement leads to lower financial performance, decreased customer loyalty, and elevated extrinsic CSR attributions for luxury companies. These effects are exacerbated if consumers actively deliberate on the company’s CSR efforts. However, luxury companies can mitigate these pitfalls and reap the potential rewards of CSR engagement by (1) engaging in company-internal, especially employee-focused CSR instead of company-external, philanthropic CSR or (2) framing their brands as sustainable instead of exclusive. We find consistent support for our theorizing in five empirical studies. The results contribute to existing knowledge on stakeholder reactions to luxury brands’ CSR and can help managers successfully navigate the implementation of CSR in luxury contexts.
Article
Purpose The COVID-19 pandemic has, besides the health concerns, caused an unprecedented social and economic crisis that has particularly hit service industries hard. Due to extensive safety measures, many service employees have to work remotely to keep service businesses running. With limited literature on leadership and virtual work in the service context, this paper aims to report on leadership effectiveness regarding employees' work performance in virtual settings brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. Design/methodology/approach Drawing on the input–process–outcome (IPO) framework, this research investigates the effectiveness of leadership on service employees' work performance mediated by work-related tension, autonomy, and group cohesiveness. Furthermore, this study explores moderating effects of the service provider's digital maturity. To test the derived model, the authors collected survey data from 206 service employees who, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, unexpectedly had to transform to a virtual work environment. The authors analyzed the data using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). Findings The results indicated that it took task- and relation-oriented leadership behavior to maintain service employees' work performance in a virtual environment during crisis situations. Further, results indicated mediating effects of service employees' individual job autonomy and team cohesiveness; surprisingly, work-related tension did not impact employees' work performance. Results offered service businesses guidance on how to effectively lead in times of crisis when service employees predominantly work in virtual environments. Originality/value This is the first empirical study to show how leadership affects service employees' work performance in a virtual work environment during crisis times. Thus, the study contributes to the scarce literature on the impact of leadership in service firms that have to operate in such a setting.
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In B2B markets, firms seek to provide customer solutions instead of merely selling goods or services. As boundary-spanners, salespeople are pivotal for implementing this strategic shift. Yet, extant literature provides limited insights into salesperson’s resources and competencies required for customer solutions, particularly in the early phases of solution selling. This research focuses on salesperson’s value opportunity recognition competence (VOR), which is a central requirement for salespeople to be able to navigate the early phases of solution selling. Analyzing large-scale, multi-level data of 799 salespeople and their respective sales managers in 29 sales organizations, the authors investigate the role of different salesperson resources and work environment characteristics for strengthening their VOR. The authors find that salespeople need both customer and technical knowledge, but customer knowledge is more important. Salespeople also can substitute individual technical knowledge with strong internal relations, but strong customer relations are no substitute for individual knowledge about customers’ business models and processes. Formalization turned out to be a double-edged sword in the context of VOR development, while transformational leadership has positive effects only. The findings bear concrete implications for improving the selection, training, and work environment of solution salespeople.
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Purpose This paper examines motivational practices and engagements of schools – through strategies developed by principals with the members of the school management team – to improve academic performance. Design/methodology/approach The research used an interpretive approach within a qualitative design in which schools were purposefully selected. In each of the sampled schools, individual interviews were conducted with the principal as well as a focus group with the school management team and another focus group was identified teachers. Findings The main findings reveal that school labelling (where schools are labelled as underperforming schools) as a public notice was identified as the main push towards intrinsic motivation, especially when positive results in learner performance are eventually achieved. Extra classes, teaching collaboration, monitoring and team building were some of the main strategies used. Efforts appear to focus on performance in Grade 12 examinations. Therefore, the study recommends that attention be spread across all grades as a long-term improvement plan for the education system. Furthermore, since these strategies have worked successfully, the national and the provincial education departments should consider developing plans for academic improvement based on these strategies. Research limitations/implications This research contributed to the understanding of school improvement in a specific context of low socio economic and societal context and schools are able to improve in spite of the challenging context. This is specifically in a developing country's context. More research can be conducted about the specific influence of intrinsic motivation and how extrinsic factors can become internalised as intrinsic motivation factors. Practical implications The findings from this project can provide leadership at schools with the necessary information and examples of what can be done to get teachers to improve the performance in a challenging context. The use of extrinsic as well as intrinsic motivational actions can provide the leadership with the necessary guidelines to implement in their schools. The appointment of principals with specific characteristics needed attention in policy as well as the practice of the appointment process. Originality/value The research is contributed to the knowledge of school improvement from a perspective of a developing country and is using motivational theories within this context. The limited literature which links motivation to the process of school improvement is advanced from ice perspective of low socio economic context in a developing country.
Article
The authors develop a conceptual framework depicting relationships between salespeople's self-efficacy and customer response (defined as satisfaction, word-of-mouth, loyalty and cross-selling) as moderated by two dimensions of manager leadership behavior. The conceptual framework hypothesized that transactional leadership behavior amplifies the positive association between salespeople's self-efficacy and these four customer response variables. Otherwise, transformational leadership behavior reduces the positive influence of salesperson´s self-efficacy on customer satisfaction, word-of-mouth, loyalty and cross-selling. The authors collected data from the main retail companies and distributed a survey questionnaire to 341 customers. These customers were attended by 174 salespeople in the retail segment (electronics products), and these salespeople were managed by 55 managers who supervised the retail stores. The results showed that (i) salesperson self-efficacy has a positive and main effect on customer satisfaction, word-of-mouth, loyalty and cross-selling, (ii) transactional leadership behavior moderates positively the association between salesperson's self-efficacy and customer satisfaction, word-of-mouth and loyalty, and (iii) transformational leadership behavior negatively moderates the association between salespeople's self-efficacy and word-of-mouth. The results are robust to endogeneity concerns, supporting our hypotheses. The original value comes from path-goal theory (House, 1971, 1996), which explains the positive effect of transactional leadership behavior on vendor behavior. Path-goal theory suggests that the leader guides the followers to choose the best paths to reach their goals. Since this guidance happens, it amplifies the influence of self-efficacy. In addition, the second original value originates from the negative effect of transformational leadership (Khoo and Burch, 2008; Kark et al., 2003). Transformational leaders increase follower dependency on their actions and decisions and this dependency reduces the effects of self-efficacy.
Article
Purpose Hostels’ competitiveness relies heavily on unique and genuine service and, thus, counts on employees actively creating a social, welcoming environment and, at the same time, caring about – and being loyal to – their hostel. This paper aims to investigate whether retaining employees who care about their hostel and refrain from destructive behaviours implies that these workers need to have a better quality of working life, as well as whether work engagement mediates this relationship. Design/methodology/approach A survey was conducted with 98 employees from 40 hostels in Lisbon. An analysis of the survey data was performed to test the research hypotheses. The model was estimated by means of partial least squares structural equation modelling. Findings The results reveal that quality of working life has a strong negative impact on employees’ exit behaviours and a positive effect on their loyalty. In addition, work engagement was found to mediate fully the relationship between quality of working life and both employee voice and neglect, as well as partially mediating exit intentions. Originality/value This study extended prior research in two ways. First, most theoretical and empirical studies in the hospitality and tourism industry have focused on hotels, so this research targeted a new context (i.e. hostels). Second, this study offers a clear indication of the relationship between employees’ quality of working life, work engagement and behaviours, thus offering valuable insights for management and hostel staff.
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The field of organizational behavior, its international dimensions, and the subfield of organization development (OD) are described. OD values are more congruent with some cultures' values than others, and culture influences various aspects of the planned change process. Thus, global OD initiatives and practices have to be contextualized to fit local conditions. Globalization and the needs of global organizations determined the topics that receive most attention in international organizational behavior. Examples of recent international research include studies of manager impact on employees in two regional clusters and job satisfaction. Two ongoing debates are described: whether money buys happiness in the psychological well-being field, and whether cultural behavior and multinational enterprise practices are converging or diverging.
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Jedes Jahr entsteht allein dem deutschen Einzelhandel durch Diebstahl ein Schaden in Milliardenhöhe, was einer Umsatzeinbuße von etwa einem Prozent entspricht und angesichts der relativ geringen Margen im Einzelhandel besonders alarmierend ist. Über 20 Prozent dieser Inventurdifferenzen lassen sich den Mitarbeitern der Unternehmen zuordnen (EHI Retail Institute 2015).
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This study integrates the social identity, the social learning and the psychological contract perspective in order to explore branch manager’s role for diffusing internal market orientation philosophy across store employees in a retail banking context. As branch managers constitute the main linking pin between contact employees and top management, we stress some employee-related gains from their IMO adoption as well as some contact employees’ behaviours which enhance customers’ perceptions of service quality.
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This paper examines the process linking high-performance work systems (HPWS) and organisational ambidexterity both at the unit and firm level of analyses by integrating strategic HRM, human capital and social capital perspectives. Multisource and multilevel data from 2,887 employees and 536 managers of 58 banks was collected. Results revealed that firm-level HPWS were positively related to unit-level employee human capital. Unit-level employee human capital partially mediated the relationship between firm-level HPWS and unit organisational ambidexterity. Furthermore, firm-level social climate moderated the effect of firm-level HPWS on unit organisational ambidexterity through unit-level employee human capital. This paper contributes to HPWS and ambidexterity research by revealing the impacts of firm-level HPWS and mediating mechanisms, as well as identifying boundary conditions for pursuing unit-level organisational ambidexterity.
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A 10-item multidimensional measure of test-taking motivation based on expectancy theory, the Valence, Instrumentality, Expectancy Motivation Scale (VIEMS), was developed using a student sample (N = 90) and tested using 2 samples of job applicants in a field settings (N = 296; N = 246). In Field Study 1, the VIEMS was related to test performance. Hierarchical regression analysis showed that the VIEMS explained variance in test score beyond a general measure of rest motivation. In a second longitudinal field study, pretest and posttest perceptions of motivation were compared. Results indicated that expectancy was related to actual test performance, and perceived test performance accounted for variance in posttest reports of motivation after controlling for pretest levels of motivation. Test-taking motivation did not account for variance in test performance differences between African Americans and Whites in either field study.
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We tested several hypotheses derived from an extended version of Shamir, House, and Arthur's (1993) theory of charismatic leadership. We used three different samples of subordinates to assess leader behavior, individual-level correlates, and unit-level correlates, respectively. We also examined the effects of charismatic behaviors and unit-level correlates on superiors' assessments of leaders' performance. The findings provide only very partial support for the theory and indicate a need for greater sensitivity to the multiple constituencies of leaders in theories and studies of charismatic leadership in organizations.
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We present six recommendations for building theories of work motivation that are more valid, more complete, broader in scope, and more useful to practitioners than existing theories. (1) Integrate extant theories by using existing meta-analyses to build a megatheory of work motivation. (2) Create a boundaryless science of work motivation. (3) Study the various types of relationships that could hold between general (trait) and situationally specific motivation. (4) Study subconscious as well as conscious motivation. (5) Use introspection explicitly in theory building. (6) Acknowledge the role of volition in human action when formulating theories.
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We develop a framework of service-unit behavior that begins with a unit's leader's service-focused behavior and progresses through intermediate links (service climate and customer-focused organizational citizenship behavior) to customer satisfaction and then unit sales. Data from a sample of 56 supermarket departments provide at least moderate support for our mediational hypotheses. We discuss findings with a particular focus on the relationship between internal organization functioning and external effectiveness in service settings. In addition, several issues related to testing for mediation using quantitative analysis are identified and discussed.
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This paper presents a theoretical model that integrates two related, but distinct mechanisms by which transformational leaders influence follower motivation. That is, we propose that an affective mechanism by which charismatic leaders induce positive emotional experiences in their followers, and a cognitive mechanisms that includes communicating the leader's vision and its effects on goal setting explain the connection between charismatic and transformational leadership and follower motivation. Further, we specify the pathways through which affective and cognitive processes influence three components of follower motivation: The direction of action, the intensity of effort, and effort persistence.
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It is widely held that a customer-oriented firm is more likely to deliver exceptional service quality and create satisfied customers. However, little research has addressed the question of how the orientation can be disseminated among employees throughout the firm. This dissemination is especially important in service firms in which frontline, customer contact employees are responsible for translating a customer-oriented strategy into quality service. The authors propose a structural model that explains how service firms can disseminate their customer-oriented strategy by aligning the strategy with specific management- and employee-initiated control mechanisms (i.e., formalization, empowerment, behavior-based employee evaluation, and work group socialization) that lead to increased commitment and shared values on the part of customer contact employees. The findings indicate that there are three "corridors of influence" between customer-oriented strategy and shared employee values. The dominant corridor, which focuses on dual (management- and employee-initiated) control, emphasizes the importance of work group socialization and organizational commitment in the dissemination of customer-oriented strategy. A secondary corridor focuses on two management-initiated control mechanisms: formalization and behavior-based evaluation. The final corridor, which focuses on the empowerment of customer contact employees, has a more limited impact than originally hypothesized. The authors discuss implications for the implementation of customer-oriented strategy and the management of customer contact employees, along with several directions for further research.
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This study contributes to the efforts to integrate work commitment constructs into the long-dominant expectancy theory framework of salesforce motivation and performance. Responses were gathered from 231 industrial salespeople in order to: 1) provide evidence concerning discriminant and convergent validity of two measures of work commitment and 2) distinguish expectancy and commitment constructs; and investigate the relationships between motivation, commitment, and two important outcomes—effort and performance. The results of the study indicate that conceptual and empirical differences do exist between commitment variables and expectancy-based motivation variables. Job commitment and extrinsic motivation are found to be related to salesperson effort, which in turn is related to salesperson performance.
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Several expectancy theory measures of work motivation (i.e., expectancies, instrumentalities, and valences) were evaluated in a work simulation. Forty employees were hired for 2 weeks to work on a clerical task under one of two (high or low) levels of expectancy and under low then high instrumentality. A variety of measures of expectancy and instrumentality were administered on four different occasions in order to test their test—retest reliability and their validity. In addition, seven different measures of valence were administered on two occasions. Traditional measures of expectancy and instrumentality faired poorly while new measures were found to be quite stable and valid. Valence measured with an attractiveness scale was judged to be acceptable and superior to the other alternatives. The value of using these measures in future expectancy theory research is discussed.
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This paper summarizes and integrates research concerned with a long-neglected topic in psychology: the relationship between conscious goals and intentions and task performance. The basic promise of this research is that an individual's conscious ideas regulate his actions. Studies are cited demonstrating that: (1) hard goals produce a higher level of performance (output) than easy goals; (2) specific hard goals produce a higher level of output than a goal of “do your best”; and (3) behavioral intentions regulate choice behavior. The theory also views goals and intentions as mediators of the effects of incentives on task performance. Evidence is presented supporting the view that monetary incentives, time limits, and knowledge of results do not affect performance level independently of the individual's goals and intentions. A theoretical analysis supports the same view with respect to three other incentives: participation, competition, and praise and reproof. Finally, behavioral intentions were found to mediate the effects of money and “verbal reinforcement” on choice behavior. It is concluded that any adequate theory of task motivation must take account of the individual's conscious goals and intentions. The applied implications of the theory are discussed.
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An explanation of the effects of leader behavior on subordinate satisfaction, motivation, and performance is presented. The explanation is derived from a path-goal theory of motivation. Dimensions of leader behavior such as leader initiating structure, consideration, authoritarianism, hierarchical influence, and closeness of supervision are analyzed in terms of path-goal variables such as valence and instrumentality. The theory specifies some of the situational moderators on which the effects of specific leader behaviors are contingent. A set of general propositions are advanced which integrate and explain earlier fragmentary research findings. Several specific predictions are made to illustrate how the general propositions can be operationalized. The usefulness of the theory is demonstrated by showing how several seemingly unrelated prior research findings could have been deduced from its general propositions and by applying it to reconcile what appear to be contradictory findings from prior studies. Results of two empirical studies are reported that provide support for seven of eight hypotheses derived directly from the general propositions of the theory. A third study designed to test three of the original eight hypotheses is also reported. Two of these three hypotheses are successfully replicated. In the light of these results and the integrative power of the theory, it is argued that the theory shows promise and should be further tested with experimental as well as correlational methods.
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The statistical tests used in the analysis of structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error are examined. A drawback of the commonly applied chi square test, in addition to the known problems related to sample size and power, is that it may indicate an increasing correspondence between the hypothesized model and the observed data as both the measurement properties and the relationship between constructs decline. Further, and contrary to common assertion, the risk of making a Type II error can be substantial even when the sample size is large. Moreover, the present testing methods are unable to assess a model's explanatory power. To overcome these problems, the authors develop and apply a testing system based on measures of shared variance within the structural model, measurement model, and overall model.
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