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An empirical
Determinants and consequences study of
of ethical behaviour: an empirical salespeople
study of salespeople
473
Sergio Román and José Luis Munuera
Marketing Department, University of Murcia, Murcia, Spain Received July 2003
Revised April 2004
Accepted August 2004
Abstract
Purpose – The main purpose of this research is to gain a clearer understanding of several key
determinants and consequences of the ethical behaviour of salespeople.
Design/methodology/approach – Questionnaires were administered during regularly scheduled
meetings to a total of 280 financial services salespeople. The salespeople questioned were mainly
specializing in selling high-involvement financial products (e.g. mortgages, life insurance) to final
consumers.
Findings – Results suggest that method of compensation and control system (CS) are important
determinants of ethical behaviour. Age (AGE) also proves to be a significant antecedent of ethical
behaviour. However, education (EDU) is not significantly related to ethical behaviour. Additionally, a
salesperson’s ethical behaviour leads to lower levels of role conflict-intersender and higher levels of job
satisfaction, but not higher performance.
Research limitations/implications – To improve generalization of the findings, future research
should broaden the sample by including a variety of industries. Likewise, the use of longitudinal data
could provide new insights into the antecedents and consequences of ethical behaviour of salespeople
and in particular the relationship with performance. Continuing research is needed to further analyse
the relationship between ethical behaviour and other relevant behaviours that may take place during
the interaction with the customer (e.g. organisational citizenship behaviours and customer orientation).
Practical implications – This research is, to our knowledge, the first study that simultaneously
identifies and analyses several key antecedents and consequences of the ethical behaviour of
salespeople.
Originality/value – This study adds to the literature by reducing the existing gap and showing
companies insights into how to foster ethical sales behaviour and the positive consequences that this
behaviour has on their salespeople.
Keywords Business ethics, Sales force, Financial services
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Sales professionals have been frequent targets of ethical criticism (Abratt and Penman,
2002). For example, the results of a Sales & Marketing Management survey of 200 sales
managers revealed that 49 per cent of managers say their salespeople have lied on a
sales call, 34 per cent say their salespeople have made unrealistic promises on a sales
call and 22 per cent say their salespeople have sold products their customers did not
need (Marchetti, 1997).
There are several reasons for focusing specific attention on salespeople’s ethical European Journal of Marketing
Vol. 39 No. 5/6, 2005
behaviour. Salespeople are exposed to greater ethical pressures than individuals in many pp. 473-495
other jobs. They work in relatively unsupervised settings; they are primarily responsible q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0309-0566
for generating the firm’s revenues, which at times can be very stressful and they are often DOI 10.1108/03090560510590674
EJM evaluated on the basis of short-term objectives (Dubinsky et al., 1986; Bellizzi and Hite,
39,5/6 1989; Wotruba, 1990). In addition, research suggests that a salesperson’s ethical behaviour
can play a critical role in the formation and maintenance of long-term buyer-seller
relationships (Gundlach and Murphy, 1993; Román and Ruiz, 2005). In contrast, unethical
behaviour can even generate liability problems for salespeople’s organizations through
both intentional and inadvertent statements (Boedecker et al., 1991).
474 Despite the importance of understanding salespeople’s ethical behaviour, only a few
studies have empirically addressed the determinants and consequences of such
behaviour (Loe et al., 2000; McClaren, 2000) and none of them, to our knowledge, has
simultaneously analysed its determinants and consequences. Therefore, the main
purpose of this research is to gain a clearer understanding of several key determinants
and consequences of the ethical behaviour of salespeople. By doing so, we will
contribute to the marketing literature reducing the existing gap and we will show
companies insights into how to foster ethical sales behaviour and the positive
consequences that this behaviour has on their salespeople. The following
sections develop the hypotheses, test them empirically and discuss implications of
the findings.
Research hypotheses
Ethical sales behaviour
The salesperson may behave unethically, when interacting with different stakeholders
such as customers, competitors and employers. In the hierarchy of stakeholder
importance, it appears that salespeople regard ethical transgressions against
customers as being less ethical than any controversial actions against competitors
or their employer (Chonko and Burnett, 1983; Chonko and Hunt, 1985). Accordingly,
the focus of this research is on salespeople’s ethical behaviour as related to interactions
with their customers.
Ethical selling behaviour is a highly elusive construct and is often situation specific
(Lagace et al., 1991). Nevertheless, it can be argued that ethics requires an individual to
behave according to the rules of a moral philosophy with an emphasis on the
determination of right and wrong (Gundlach and Murphy, 1993). More specifically,
ethical sales behaviour is related to widely “recognized” societal norms such as fair
play, honesty and full disclosure (Robertson and Anderson, 1993; Futrell, 2002).
Consequently, in the context of this study, ethical sales behaviour is defined as fair and
honest actions that enable the salesperson to foster long-term relationships with
customers based on customer satisfaction and trust. Examples of such activities
include: selling products that meet customers’ needs, providing true information about
the product (e.g. when comparing with the competitors’ products, or in terms of its
benefits or availability) and implementing low-pressure selling techniques (Chonko
and Burnett, 1983; Dubinsky et al., 1991; Lagace et al., 1991; Reidenbach et al., 1991;
Tansey et al., 1994; Verbeke et al., 1996; Singhapakdi et al., 1999).
The conceptual model we propose is shown in Figure 1, namely that some
organizational factors (reward system (RE) and salesforce control system (CS)) and
some personal factors (age (AGE) and education (EDU)) affect the salesperson’s ethical
behaviour. Further that this behaviour, in turn, influences the salesperson’s role
conflict-intersender, performance and satisfaction. This research does not intend to
examine all potential antecedents and consequences of ethical behaviour, rather it
An empirical
study of
salespeople
475
Figure 1.
Conceptual model
represents a further step in the process of understanding how several key personal and
organisational variables are related to ethical behaviour in the personal selling context.
The logic for the choice of such variables and their hypothesised relationship with
ethical sales behaviour is explained below.
Age and education. Among the personal antecedents, two clear empirical
generalizations from the non-sales ethics literature are that, although the findings
are not unanimous, older and more educated persons generally behave more ethically
than younger and less educated persons (Browning and Zabriskie, 1983; Jones and
Gautschi, 1988; Ruegger and King, 1992; Deshpande, 1997). These demographic
variables are, in a sense, proxies for a cluster of personality or attitudinal
characteristics that tend to be associated with these demographic characteristics (Ross
and Robertson, 2003). Nevertheless, as indicated by McClaren (2000), because of the
specific characteristics of the sales profession mentioned earlier, previous research has
yielded inconclusive evidence regarding the effect of AGE and EDU on a salesperson’s
ethical behaviour. For example, Hoffman et al. (1991) and Honeycutt et al. (2001) did not
find a significant relationship between a salesperson’s AGE and his/her ethical
behaviour. Results from Dubinsky et al. (1992) indicated that AGE had a significant
impact on salespersons’ ethical perception, whereas EDU had no significant effect.
Consequently, we shall further analyse the role of such demographic variables on
ethical behaviour in the personal selling context.
We expect older salespeople to be more ethical than younger salespeople for several
reasons. First, as AGE increases, subjects have displayed more conservative and strict
ethical tendencies and hold less compromising interpretations of what is to be judged
ethical (Sikula and Costa, 1994). Second, ethical decision-making and intended ethical
behaviour, in general, increases as individuals move from lower levels to higher levels
of moral reasoning (Wotruba, 1990) and moral reasoning is directly linked to AGE
(Rest, 1986). Third, older people have been exposed longer to ethical dilemmas in
non-business contexts (Izzo, 2000), therefore they are more willing to accept and
conform to ethical standards and behave accordingly (Serwinek, 1992). All the above
leads us to propose the following:
H3. The older the salesperson, the more ethical the salesperson’s behaviour.
Despite the inconclusive findings mentioned above, we expect EDU to have a positive
influence on a salesperson’s ethical behaviour. First, it can be argued that the
educational process is designed to foster critical thinking and the ability to view
situations from multiple perspectives (Levy and Sharma, 1994). In this sense, previous
research has found that EDU is positively related to moral judgement (Rest and
Thoma, 1985; Rest, 1986). Similarly, the effect of EDU on ethical behaviour can be
supported by Kohlberg’s (1969) typology. EDU is believed to result in greater
sensitivity to different points of view and to be linked to a person’s stage of cognitive
EJM moral development (Singhapakdi et al., 1999). A second possible link is the normative
39,5/6 view that the core of EDU itself is virtue or right conduct (Hogness, 1986; Howard,
1989). Building upon the Socratic dictum “knowledge is virtue”, this classical view of
EDU would suggest that the more educated would be the more virtues. Accordingly,
we propose that:
H4. The more educated the salesperson, the more ethical the salesperson’s
478 behaviour.
Method
Data collection and sample
Based on the research of Dubinsky et al. (1991, 1992), salespeople from only one
industry were surveyed to hold constant the type of product sold. Prior research has
found that the job-related responses of salespeople vary across sales settings (Churchill
et al., 1985). Accordingly, the cooperation of three financial service institutions in Spain
of approximately the same size was obtained. Financial services are highly abstract
services characterized by credence attributes and consequently difficult for consumers
to fully understand. Hence, the consumer must rely on the agent for correct information
and proper guidance (Howe et al., 1994). Therefore, financial services salespeople could,
if they chose to act unethically, take advantage of the consumer’s naivety and improve
their own position (Wray et al., 1994).
Following Kelley (1992) and Boorom et al. (1998), questionnaires were administered
during regularly scheduled meetings to a total of 280 financial services salespeople. All
of them completed the questionnaires. Respondents were assured that their responses
would be kept confidential and the questionnaires were immediately given to the
researchers. In exchange for salespeople completing the questionnaires, we provided a
sales training seminar following the data collection.
The salespeople questioned were mainly specializing in selling high-involvement
financial products (e.g. mortgages, life insurance) to final consumers. Each salesperson
managed a portfolio of clients and was responsible for ongoing customer contact after
the sale was closed. As shown in Table I, 83 per cent of them were male, 60 per cent
were between 25 and 39 years old, 48 per cent had a college degree and 56 per cent had
from 3 to 15 years of selling experience. In this sample, the total annual compensation
percentage of fixed salary varies from a low of 10 per cent to a high of 95 per cent with
a mean of 78 per cent.
Measures
In-depth interviews were first carried out with convenience samples of financial
services salespeople in order to get a better understanding of the research variables.
Additionally, preliminary versions of the questionnaire were administered[1], as
pretest and results were used to improve measures and design an appropriate structure
(see scale items in Appendix, Table AI).
All scales consisted of ten-point multiple-item Likert questions except the RE, AGE
and EDU. The last two were single-item questions as shown in Table I. Following
Cravens et al. (1993), the RE was measured with the previous and current year
percentages of fixed salary in the salesperson’s pay package. Salesforce CS
was measured by a nine-item scale adapted from Oliver and Anderson (1994) and
EJM Percent Total
39,5/6
Gender
Male 83.6
Female 16.4 100
Age
482 , 25 2.5
25-32 22.9
33-39 37.9
40-45 20
45 þ 16.8 100
Experience
,1 3.2
1-3 23.2
3-8 33.9
9-15 22.5
15 þ 17.1 100
Education
School graduation 5.7
Table I. Diploma (High school) 46.1
Profile of respondents Undergraduate Degree I (three year-degree program) 31.1
ðn ¼ 280Þ Undergraduate Degree II (five year-degree program) 17.1 100
Verbeke et al. (1996). Following these authors, the CS was measured at the level of the
individual as the perception of the salesperson about the CS he/she faces[2].
Since ethical sales behaviour is situation specific (Lagace et al., 1991), we first
reviewed financial services literature looking for relevant unethical practices in the
industry that take place during the salesperson-customer interaction (Mitchell et al.,
1992; Dunfee and Gunther, 1999; Cooper and Frank, 2002; Román, 2003). We selected
the scale developed by Román (2003), because it measures ethical sales behaviour from
the customers’ perspective in the Spanish financial services industry. Next, we
pre-tested this scale during in-depth interviews carried out with salespeople. Based on
the results of these interviews a three-item scale adapted from Román (2003) was used
to measure the salesperson’s ethical behaviour (ESB). These items were consistent with
previous unethical sales behaviours identified in the financial services literature and
reflected the most predominant ethical problems faced in the Spanish financial services
industry: “If I am not sure a product is right for a customer, I will still apply pressure to
get him to buy”, “I stretch the truth about the competition in order to make my product
more attractive to the customer” and “I lie about the availability of the product in order
to make the sale”[3]. All items were reverse-scored. Therefore, a high score indicates a
greater degree of ethical sales behaviour. This procedure of using negatively-expressed
items to measure ethical behaviour is common practice in the ethics literature (Lagace
et al., 1991; Honeycutt et al., 2001).
Role conflict-intersender (RCI) was measured by the original two items that
composed this dimension in Rizzo et al.’s (1970) scale. Performance (P) was measured
by four items from the “outcome” performance dimension in Behrman and Perrault’s
(1982) study. Following Dubinsky et al. (1986), job satisfaction (JS) was assessed by a
three-item version of the Hackman and Oldhman’s (1976) scale.
A confirmatory factor analysis model for the six multi-item scales was carried out An empirical
using the maximum likelihood procedure in LISREL 8.30 (Jöreskog and Sörbon, 1996). study of
Overall goodness-of-fit estimates of the measurement model suggests a good fit
between theory and data (Table II). salespeople
Reliability of the measures was confirmed with coefficient alpha higher than the
recommended level of 0.7 (Nunnally, 1978). Also, all items loaded on their hypothesized
factors and the estimates were positive and significant (the lowest t is 9.01) which 483
provided evidence of convergent validity (Bagozzi and Yi, 1988). Discriminant validity
among the dimensions of each of the six concepts considered was assessed by
restricting factor intercorrelations (F) pairwise to unity and subsequently computing a
chi-square difference test (CDT), following Anderson and Gerbing’s (1988) suggestions.
All model comparison statistics were significant, indicating that the null hypotheses of
equal fit should be rejected, which provides evidence of discriminant validity. The
estimated correlation matrix among the constructs is shown in Table III.
Results
The results of the structural model, shown in Table IV, provide support for all of the
hypotheses formulated in the conceptual model except H4 and H6. That is to say, EDU
does not influence ethical behaviour and ethical behaviour does not have a significant
effect on performance. The model’s fit was acceptable when one takes into account the
large sample size ðn ¼ 280Þ and the normed chi-square value ðx 2 =df ¼ 1:70Þ[4]. In
addition, the CFI and the TLI are greater than 0.90 and the RMSEA and RMSR are not
greater than 0.08 (Hair et al., 1998).
Overall, the three significant antecedents accounted for 15 per cent of the variance in
salesperson’s ethical behaviour. Research has already found several antecedents to
ethical behaviour not included in our model such as cognitive moral development,
CS RE P ESB JS RCI
ethical intention, perceived competitive intensity, peer pressure and code of ethics
(Wotruba, 1990; McClaren, 2000). Ethical behaviour explains 2 per cent of the variance
in a salesperson’s role conflict-intersender, which can be expected given the fact that
role conflict-intersender is caused by a number of different people including peers,
other executives in the company and the salesperson’s family (Walker et al., 1975).
Finally, ethical behaviour and role conflict-intersender explained 9 per cent of the
variance in job satisfaction, which again might be expected due to the number of
determinants of job satisfaction not considered in this conceptual model (Brown and
Peterson, 1993).
A rival model
It is generally agreed that researchers should compare rival models and not just test
the performance of a proposed model (Anderson and Gerbing, 1988; Bagozzi and Yi,
1988). Our model posits that the RE, CS, AGE and EDU influence their outcomes only
through the key mediating variable of ethical behaviour. Because our parsimonious
model permits no direct path from any of the four variables to any outcome, it implies a
central nomological status for ethical behaviour. Based on previous research, we
estimated a rival model (less constrained model) that adds five new paths not
considered in the conceptual model. Following research from Cravens et al. (1993) and
Grant and Cravens (1996), the RE and the CS were hypothesized to influence
performance. In addition, consistent with Goolsby (1992) and Michaels and Dixon
(1994), EDU was also viewed as direct antecedents of role conflict-intersender. Based
on empirical evidence from Churchill et al. (1985) and Babakus et al. (1999), a direct
path from role conflict to performance was allowed to be estimated. Similarly,
following Michaels et al. (1987) and Babakus et al. (1999), performance was
hypothesized to influence job satisfaction.
The rival model had a x 2 value of 231.51 with 135 degrees of freedom. The
remaining fit statistics indicated an adequate fit of the data
( x 2 /df¼ 1.71 CFI ¼ 0.95; GFI ¼ 0.91; RMSEA ¼ 0.05; RMSR ¼ 0.08;
TLI(NNFI) ¼ 0.93). However, the decrease of the chi-square between our proposed
model and the rival model was not significant ð7x 2 ð5Þ ¼ 6:78; p . 0:1Þ. On the basis
of these findings, we believe that the exercise of fitting a rival model has provided
additional support for our conceptual model.
Path Hypothesis Standardized estimate Hypothesis supported R2 Fit statistics
Results of hypothesized
salespeople
An empirical
model
485
Table IV.
study of
EJM Discussion
39,5/6 This research is, to our knowledge, the first study that simultaneously identifies and
analyses several key antecedents and consequences of the ethical behaviour of
salespeople. We believe this research makes significant contributions to the literature.
Firstly, Chonko et al. (1996) highlighted the importance of studying the consequences of
sales management activities in salespeople’s ethical decision-making. We have
486 responded to their challenge by analysing how the RE (H1) and CS (H2) affect
salespeople’s ethical behaviour. Our results provide evidence that both systems are clear
determinants of a salesperson’s ethical behaviour. The first finding contributes to the
literature by providing further empirical evidence for the significant results obtained by
Honeycutt et al. (2001) and also overcoming its main limitation: ethical behaviour was
approached by a single-item measure, which may not have captured the nature of the
variable. The second finding represents an initial step in providing empirical support for
the positive effect of a behaviour-based CS on a salesperson’s ethical behaviour.
Secondly, our results indicate that as The AGE of salespeople increases, they appear
to become more conservative in their ethical behaviour (H3). It is important to take into
account that though correlated with sales experience, age presents opportunities for
role-taking resolution of ethical dilemmas in non-business contexts, which implies that
an older salesperson has been exposed to either overt or implied ethical standards, thus
being more apt to accept those standards and behave accordingly. On the contrary, it
seems that a higher level of EDU does not have a direct impact on ethical behaviour
(H4). A possible explanation is that EDU was measured as years of EDU, whereas the
type of EDU and more specifically, ethical EDU may be a more important determinant
of ethical behaviour (Izzo, 2000).
Thirdly, previous research analyzing the relationship between ethical behaviour
and role conflict has led to mixed findings (Chonko and Burnett, 1983; Dubinsky and
Ingram, 1984). The use of a disaggregated conceptualization of role conflict has yielded
clearer results, as our findings provide evidence of ethical behaviour reducing a
salesperson’s role conflict-intersender (H5). Likewise, the results support the notion of
ethical behaviour and role conflict-intersender as significant determinants of job
satisfaction (H7 and H8). The first finding (H7) provides further empirical evidence to
Beatty et al.’s (1996) results obtained through a qualitative research method and
represents, to our knowledge, the first quantitative test of a salesperson’s ethical
behaviour enhancing job satisfaction. The second finding (H8) implies that ethical
behaviour has also an indirect effect on job satisfaction through role conflict and
provides additional support for previous theoretical arguments and empirical evidence
favouring the negative effect of role conflict on job satisfaction (Behrman and Perrault,
1984; Brown and Peterson, 1994).
Finally, ethical sales behaviour does not seem to translate into short-term sales
performance (H6), which warrants further discussion and analysis. This result can be
attributed to a number of reasons. First, it is somewhat consistent with previous
empirical research that has not found a significant relationship between ethical
behaviour and performance (Honeycutt et al., 1995). Second, an organization’s RE may
encourage, albeit unintentionally, the unethical conduct of salespeople. Salesperson’s
behaviour (including unethical behaviour) that results in increased sales also increases
agent commissions, which in turn reinforces the behaviour utilized to obtain those
sales (Ferrell and Fraedrich, 1991). Hence this type of RE may tend to focus
salespeople’s efforts on activities with immediate payoffs (Lagace et al., 1991). Past An empirical
studies have indicated that the unethical behaviour of top producing salespeople is study of
more likely to be overlooked by sales managers thus perpetuating such behaviour
among top performance salespeople (Bellizzi and Hite, 1989). Third, ethical salespeople salespeople
are more likely to develop and maintain long-term buyer-salesperson relationships
through the development of trust (Hawes et al., 1989), but not necessarily to increase
short-term sales; which is consistent with Dubinsky et al.’s (1992) comments: “. . .at 487
least in the short run, questionable conduct may engender selling success”. In addition,
ethical behaviour may lead to higher sales only when salespeople are dealing with their
relational customers as opposed to transactional customers. Relational customers
could reward the ethical behaviour of the salesperson by continuing to place orders.
Managerial implications
We believe our findings have strong managerial implications because they suggest
that variables under management control (compensation and CS) are more important in
terms of explaining salespeople’s ethical behaviour as compared to demographic
variables not directly controllable by the company (AGE and EDU). Companies need to
foster a salesperson’s ethical behaviour not only because of the positive consequences
to the salesperson in terms of higher job satisfaction and lower role
conflict-intersender, but also because unethical sales behaviour can cause disputes
with customers, possibly even resulting in litigation.
We encourage corporations to create an environment where the potential for
unethical behaviour is quite low. Accordingly, we suggest that sales managers should
take time to communicate with their salespeople, assisting and guiding them to
accurately view their day-to-day sales activity from an ethical perspective; then not
reward them on a 100 per cent commission based on the sales made and evaluate their
various activities, not just the outcomes achieved (sales volume). We do not imply that
companies should avoid incentive programs, rather they could use a combination of
base salary plus incentive pay in the form of commissions, bonuses or both based not
only on the sales performance, but also on how well long-term objectives such as
customer satisfaction have been achieved. In addition, since older salespeople seem to
behave more ethically than younger ones, training program content should be adjusted
to meet the needs of different age groups. For example, younger salespeople should be
given material that emphasizes the importance of company ethical norms and values.
Finally, these recommended managerial actions can be reinforced by some form of
ethical code or rules to guide salespeople’s ethical behaviour and this code of ethics can
be incorporated into the training program.
Notes
1. Since the questionnaire was administered in Spanish, the questionnaire was drafted
originally in English and translated into Spanish. The questionnaire was then translated
back into English and checked for consistency with the original to ensure that any idiomatic
or colloquialistic wording was minimized (Douglas and Craig, 1983).
2. Bagozzi and Baumgartner (1994) recommended that three sub-scale composites be developed
as multiple indicators of scales with more than five items. Consequently, maximum
likelihood factor analysis with an oblique rotation was used to guide the development of
three summated sub-scale composites of CS (Lastovicka and Thamodaran, 1991). Then, the
three indicators of the control system (CS1, CS2 and CS3) were used in the confirmatory
factor analysis.
3. The term availability for banking products/services is referring, for example, to the period of An empirical
time the customer has to wait between ordering a credit card and actually being able to use
it, or the gap between having a bank loan approved and the money being available. study of
4. In samples larger than 200 Hair et al. (1998) suggest using the normed chi-square (x 2/df), salespeople
which indicates a good fit when its value ranges from 1 to 2.
489
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495
Appendix
Ethical sales behaviour (scale: the statements below describe various ways you may act with your
customers. For each statement please indicate to what extent you behave that way. . .: 1 ¼ “never”
10 ¼ “always”)
ESB1. If I am not sure a product is right for a customer, I will still apply pressure to get him to buy a
ESB2. I stretch the truth about the competition in order to make my product more attractive to the
customer
ESB3. I lie about the availability of the product in order to make the sale
Reward system (scale: percentage of fixed salary in compensation plan. . .)
RE1. Present pay period
RE2. Last pay period
Control systemb
Subjective Input Evaluation (CS1) (scale: how heavily do you think your manager relies on these kinds
of measures in evaluating your performance. . .: 1¼ “doesn’t use at all” to 10 ¼ “uses extensively”)
Attitude
Ability
Effort
Absence of A Bottom-Line Orientation (CS2) (scale: evaluate each statement to reflect to what degree
you agree or disagree with them. . .: 1 ¼ “I strongly disagree” to 10 ¼ “I strongly agree”)
When management rates my performance, they take a lot of things into consideration
Management decides who is good by looking strictly at each salesperson’s behaviour
Management leaves us alone as long as our results are ok
Extent of Supervision (CS3) (scale: evaluate each statement to reflect to what degree you agree or
disagree with them. . .: 1 ¼ “I strongly disagree” to 10 ¼ “I strongly agree”)
My boss makes sure everyone knows what to do and how to do it
Management here stays very well informed of salespeople’s activities
We are subject to very little direction from our company’s management
Role Conflict-Intersender (scale: indicate to what degree do the following things happen in your job. . .:
1 ¼ “never” to 10 ¼ “always”)
RCI1. I receive incompatible requests from two or more people
RCI2. I do things that are apt to be accepted by one person and not accepted by others
Performance (scale: evaluate your performance. . .: 1 ¼ “needs improvement” to 10 ¼ “outstanding”)
P1. Produce a high market share for the company in my territory
P2. Quickly generating sales of new company products
P3. Identifying and selling to major accounts in my territory
P4. Exceeding all sales targets and objectives in my territory during the year
Job satisfaction (scale: evaluate each statement to reflect to what degree you agree or disagree with
them. . .: 1 ¼ “I strongly disagree” to 10 ¼ “I strongly agree”)
JS1. I frequently think about quitting this job
JS2. I am satisfied with the kind of activities I perform everyday
JS3. Generally speaking, I am very satisfied with this job
Notes: aItems in italic are reverse-scored. bA high score indicates a greater degree of behaviour-based Table AI.
control system Scale items