Relationship Between Job Orientation and Performance of Sales People: A Financial Services Industry Perspective

Abstract

The modern financial services sector, which is highly competitive and offers mostly homogenous solutions, banks on the salesperson’s ability to develop profitable and long-lasting relationships with their customers. The relationship orientation of salespeople, especially customer orientation, is found to have a significant impact on their ability to achieve this challenge. Studies indicate that many factors associated with the work environment influence sales performance. Customer orientation of the salesperson apparently plays a vital role in this context. Motivation to expend efforts is created through rewards and the salesperson’s evaluation of the job and its outcomes are the key to engage in customer-oriented selling. The present study attempts to develop a model incorporating three critical job-related constructs (experienced meaningfulness, organizational identification, and pay satisfaction) and understand its influence on salespeople’s performance, mapping their customer orientation. The study is carried out among financial services salespeople in India to authenticate the prescribed model. It has to be noted that when an organization acquires the ability to make the job meaningful and motivates its salespeople to identify with the organization by aligning organizational goals with individual goals, it is possible that the employees tend to overlook the influence of monetary rewards.

Keywords

Customer orientation experienced meaningfulness organizational identification pay satisfaction sales performance.

Introduction

Customers’ estimation of satisfaction with an organization is based on the perception of the quality of service received from the customer-contact employees, because they are perceived as the first and may be only representation of the organization by customers (Hartline, Maxham, & McKee, 2000). The adoption of customer-oriented selling behaviour by salespeople in this context is probably because of their focus on achieving customer satisfaction and organization’s profit (Boles, Babin, Brashear, & Brooks, 2001; Swenson & Herche, 1994). Several studies show the positive effect that salespeople’s customer orientation has on sales performance (Saxe & Weitz, 1982; Brown, Mowen, Donovan, & Licata, 2002; McIntyre, Claxton, Anselmi, & Wheatley, 2000; Harris, Mowen, & Brown, 2005). This is expected, because as boundary spanners, salespeople play a crucial role in providing added value in the exchange process and forge long-term relationship with customers (Beverland, 2001; Leigh & Marshall, 2001). This aspect is particularly significant in financial service industry, the specific context used for this study, where due to the multiplicity and the complex nature of products and services, customers depend on the advice given by salespeople while making investment decisions. As a result, there is an increasing interest in the determining factors which can lead to enhanced customer orientation among employees as they engage in their job.

Indications from the job characteristics model and research efforts conducted in this line explain that experienced meaningfulness of the job is an important influence on workplace behaviour and performance (Berg, Dutton, & Wrzesniewski, 2013; Hackman & Oldham, 1980; Rosso, Dekas, & Wrzesniewski, 2010; Wrzesniewski, Dutton, & Debebe, 2003). When employees feel that their organizations value their contributions and cater to their welfare, it has a positive influence on the employees’ organizational identification (Edwards & Cable, 2009; Zagenczyk, Scott, Gibney, Murrell, & Thatcher, 2010). Since equity theory (Adams, 1965) and discrepancy theory (Lawler & Hackman, 1971; Mohrman & Lawler, 1981) point out that the perception with respect to pay would determine the satisfaction for individual employees, organizations would find it easier to modify the compensation component to produce favourable work outcomes (Williams, Brower, Ford, Williams, & Carraher, 2008).

From an organizational point of view, it is necessary to evaluate the implications of the interrelated effects of the affective evaluation of the job and the incentives they receive for their motivation to practice customer orientation. When salespeople ignore the possibility of short-term profits by sacrificing customers’ interests, they receive long-term benefits from the customers in terms of positive word-of-mouth and loyalty, generating new customers and superior value for stakeholders (Kumar, Venkatesan, Bohling, & Beckman, 2008; Macintosh, 2007). Conferring to the theory and indications from the literature, the degree of customer orientation by the sales team depends on favourable job satisfaction, which is explained as a ‘function of the perceived relationship between what one wants in a job and what is offered’ (Stanton, Balzer, Smith, Parra, & Ironson, 2001). The present study anticipates that in a relationship building context, the salespeople’s customer orientation plays a vital role in enhancing the perceived meaning of the job and in improving their identification with the organization, especially when they are satisfied with the pay they receive for the efforts invested (Thakor & Joshi, 2005).

Experienced Meaningfulness

It is argued that, since employees spend more than 60 per cent of their life at their workplace (van Zyl, Deacon, & Rothman, 2010), they try to find meaning for their lives through the work they carry out (Cameron, Dutton, & Quinn, 2003). Meaningfulness is explained as the level of significance a particular thing conveys for an individual (Pratt & Ashforth, 2003). Employees are likely to perceive greater meaning in their life if they are able to develop rewarding interpersonal relationships with their co-workers (Mohan & Uys 2006). It has been established through studies that employees are able to impart greater meaning for the work they do when they are treated with dignity and respect and when they find themselves to be useful and valuable to the organization (Oliver & Roos, 2007). Personal association with the work that is carried out by the employee is radiated through the perceived meaningfulness of the work (van Zyl, Deacon, & Rothman, 2010).

Employees would be able to maintain happiness when they are able to experience engaging and meaningful work (Money, Hillenbrand, C., & da Camara, 2008), which can be justified in both individual and organizational contexts (Geldenhuys, 2014; Lyubomirsky, Sheldon, & Schkade, 2005). According to Hackman and Oldham (1980), the attributes of skill variety, task identity and task significance enhance the meaningfulness of a job as an employee experiences it. In the financial services sales scenario, employees are required to build and maintain profitable and enduring relationships with customers. Since jobs exist in organizational context, evaluation of the firm and the job by the employees generate the motivation to engage in customer-oriented selling and better performance outcomes (Gilson & Harter, 2004; May, Thakor, & Joshi, 2005; Pratt & Ashforth, 2003). Salespeople must be familiar with customer-oriented selling, that being an important activity (Hall, 1976; Thakor & Joshi, 2005). May et al. (2004) proved that when employees perceive their task to be important, they are likely to invest their time and energy for the execution of the task. Under this premise, the following two hypotheses have been formulated:

H1: Experienced meaningfulness (EM) of the job has positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).

H1(a): A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) mediates the relationship between the salesperson’s experienced meaningfulness (EM) of the job and individual sales performance (SP).

Organizational Identification

Organizational identification can be understood as a state of psychological congruence between the values of the salespeople and the organization (Mael et al., 1992). Organizational identification is an unambiguous form of social detection in which persons define themselves in terms of their association in a specific organization (Mael et al., 1992). It is found that strong organizational identification takes place as the employees’ organizational identification is more prominent than alternative identities, and there are similarities in the characteristics of the organization and the self-concept of the employee (Dutton, Dukerich, & Harquail, 1994). Individual bonds of attachment build identity and highlight the importance of social relations in organizational identification (Brickson, 2005; Sluss & Ashforth, 2007). Meta-analysis conducted with respect to organizational identification has established that there is a positive association between organizational identification and employee performance (Riketta, 2005; van Knippenberg & van Schie, 2000; Walumbwa, Avolio, & Zhu, 2008; Weiseke, Ahearne, Lam, & von Dick, 2008).

In a highly challenging sector such as the financial market, which is dominated by intense competition and homogeneous products, the salespeople would have to be highly customer-oriented to foster long-lasting profitable relationships with their customers and achieve the organizational objectives. When employees perceive that the organization values the contributions of its employees and caters to their wellbeing and socioeconomic needs, it has a positive influence on the employees’ organizational identification (Edwards, & Peccei, 2010; Sluss, Klimchak, & Holmes, 2008; Zagenczyk et al., 2010). An employee’s favourable evaluation of the organizational values and goals helps him to align personal goals with those of the organization, which fosters identification with the firm. Organizational identification of an employee is found to have significant influence on the employee’s behaviour, orientation and performance (Barney & Stewart, 2000; Thakor & Joshi, 2005). Therefore, that the following hypotheses have been formulated:

H2: Organizational identification (OI) of the salesperson has a positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).

H2 (a): A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) mediates the relationship between organizational identification (OI) of the salesperson and individual sales performance (SP).

Pay Satisfaction

The positive affective evaluation of the magnitude of the reward that is received in exchange for the investment of effort is known as pay satisfaction (Churchill, Ford, & Walker, 1974; Thakor & Joshi, 2005; Walker, Churchill, & Ford, 1977). The larger the magnitude of the reward that is received, the superior is a salesperson’s ability to obtain valued outcomes. Pay satisfaction inspires salespeople’s determination by inducing them to chase valued outcomes (Lawler & Hackman, 1971; Lawler & Suttle, 1973). Employees who are likely to invest more mental energy into their jobs are likely to expect higher levels of pay to balance for their higher levels of accountability (Locke, Sirota, & Wolfson, 1976; O’Reilly & Caldwell, 1979). Employees tend to use an array of comparisons (Lawler & Hackman, 1971; Summers & DeNisi, 1990) to verify the degree of pay satisfaction. The main references are internal comparisons consisting of internal equity, and similar employees outside the organization doing similar work, which captures external equity or competitiveness (Milkovich & Newman, 2005).

Equity theory (Adams, 1965) as well as discrepancy theory (Lawler & Hackman, 1971; Mohrman & Lawler, 1981) propose that the perceived quantity of pay that should be received and the actual amount of pay received primarily decide and evoke the feeling of pay satisfaction. When employees perceive consistency in what they should get and what they actually get, they get satisfied with their compensation. It is stated that the relationship between the pay that employees receive and the outcomes of the job is mediated by the attitudinal reactions to pay (Dreher, Ash, & Bretz, 1988). Based on this observation, it can be argued that in a sales scenario, the performance of the salespeople could be mediated by the orientation they have. If the employers are in a position to understand the antecedents of employee satisfaction with respect to the pay they provide, it would be possible for them to influence the level of employee satisfaction, because it is easier for organizations to strategically control and effect modifications in the payment mechanism than any other factor determining work outcomes (Williams, McDaniel, & Nguyen, 2006). Hence, that the following hypotheses can be stated:

H3: Pay satisfaction (PS) of a salesperson has positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).

H3 (a): A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) mediates the relationship between pay satisfaction (PS) of the salesperson and individual sales performance (SP).

The Intervening Role of Customer Orientation

When sales engagements in the relationship-oriented context started focusing on long-term profitable relationships, it became an important area of research. As such, customers often derive their satisfaction with a service provider based on the service received from the customer contact employees (Parasuraman, Zeithaml, & Berry, 1985). The researchers attempted to investigate the influences on sales performance taking into consideration the intervening role of orientation of salespeople leading to the determination of factors that enhance customer orientation among employees in organizations while they engage in their job. Experienced meaningfulness and organizational identification generate the feeling of accomplishment, which is likely to motivate the workers to engage in customer-oriented behaviour (Thakor & Joshi, 2005). The extent of reward received in exchange for the investment of effort is known as pay satisfaction (Churchill et al., 1974; Thakor & Joshi, 2005; Walker et al., 1977). The greater the magnitude of the reward that is received, the greater is the salesperson’s ability to obtain cherished outcomes. Customer-oriented selling would warrant greater efforts from salespeople, and long-term relationships are achieved by motivating salespeople to engage in customer-oriented selling. Motivation to expend efforts is created through rewards, and salespeople’s evaluation of the job and its outcomes is the key to engage in customer-oriented selling. Meaningfulness of the job increases the importance of the activity. Identification with the organization would motivate employees to carry out the task when they feel satisfied with the reward they receive in return. Based on these arguments, the meditational role of customer orientation is hypothesized in the corresponding sections.

Salesperson’s Customer Orientation and Sales Performance

When salespeople act as an interface between an organization and its customers, they are challenged by the task of providing customer satisfaction and obtaining profits for the organization. Ingram (1990) argues that if salespeople are to meet future challenges, they must adopt the perspective of the true professional and employ a customer-oriented approach. Keillor, Parker and Pettijohn (2000) examined the importance of relationship-oriented characteristics and provided evidence for the positive association of customer orientation with individual salespeople performance. Customer-oriented selling behaviour influences customer satisfaction levels in the short term resulting in better sales performance in the long run (Swenson & Herche, 1994). Literature also indicate that high performing salespeople are found to be more customer-oriented (Boles et al., 2001; Cross, Brashear, Rigdon, & Bellenger, 2007). This premise leads to the following hypothesis:

H4: A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) has a positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).

Methodology

For this study, salespeople (both male and female) working in the state of Kerala for insurance companies and banks (both public and private) with at least two years of sales experience, of which one year has been with the current organization, were considered. For the study, pretested questionnaires were used to capture responses. Experienced meaningfulness was captured by adopting the job cognition scale (Williams, Joshi, & Randall, 2001) comprising of six levels. Since identification is commonly regarded as being at the core of the commitment construct, the researchers adopted a seven-level scale of organizational identification, which was earlier employed by Thakor and Joshi (2005). Pay satisfaction was measured with the scale designed by Thakor and Joshi (2005), which utilizes levels from the pre-validated scales of Churchill et al. (1974) and Comer, Machleit and Lagace (1989). The researchers tried to identify the affective evaluation of salespeople towards the compensation they receive in exchange for the efforts invested in the performance of the sales job. For the present study, the customer orientation of salespeople is measured with the 12-level customer orientation scale (Saxe & Weitz, 1982) and sales performance construct is measured with a five-level scale developed by Boles et al. (2001). The questionnaires were distributed to 1,500 salespeople working in insurance companies and 750 salespeople from the banking industry across five districts of Kerala. The salespeople were contacted in their respective branches when they were attending their monthly review meetings, and due permissions were obtained from the branches. The purpose of the data collection and the method of filling the questionnaires were explained and doubts and clarifications were addressed. Repeat visits were necessary to obtain the filled up questionnaires. Sample control measures, such as collection of data from not more than two branches in a day and meeting the respondents at different times, were employed to increase the accuracy of the data.

Once the data collection from each branch was complete, the reporting authorities of the salespeople (team leaders, development officers and assistant managers) were contacted to verify the accuracy of the details provided by the employees. Based on the evaluations of the supervisors, 87 responses were eliminated from the final data set. This procedure helped to reduce the self-reporting bias of the respondents. Total 1,437 filled up responses were obtained, of which 331 (244 incomplete and 87 suggested by the supervisors) were omitted. Thus, 1,106 usable responses were obtained and used for the study. Data collection was completed within seven months (October 2014 to March 2015). Harman’s single-factor test was conducted to test the presence of common method effect. The Common Method Variance Bias test was carried out for the data set used for the analysis, has and it obtained a value of 22.295 per cent for its single factor extraction sum of squared loadings. This value, being less than 50 per cent, establishes that there is no Common Method Variance Bias in the data set used for the purpose of analysis. The results of the confirmatory factor analysis of job influences indicate that the model is acceptable, as the model fit values fall in the acceptable range. Though the RMSEA value is slightly higher (.061), the GFI and AGFI values of 0.9 and CFI value of 0.913 ensure an adequate fit for the model. All the variables are found to be fitting well in the job influences model, indicating an acceptable fit between the proposed model and the data set. The reliability and validity tests of the data were also performed and the results were all within the acceptable range (Figure 1).

Figure 1.

Source: Author.

Results and Analysis

To analyse causal relationships between constructs used in the study, the structural equation modelling (SEM) approach was adopted. Analysis of the research model was done by using the software, AMOS (21). To understand the influence of job variables, namely experienced meaningfulness (EM), organizational identification (OI) and pay satisfaction (PS), on individual salespeople performance (SP), two structural equation models were developed. The first model comprises the job variables and sales performance and in the second model, customer orientation of salespeople was included. The initial model developed for the study displayed a poor fit with the data set. To modify and improve the model fit, suggestions were incorporated by way of correlating error terms. The modifications incorporated to the initial model helped in finally arriving at a good fitting model. The fit indices for the final model are provided in Table 1.

From the analysis, it is observed that there exists a significant and positive relationship between a salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) and sales performance (SP) with standardized coefficient .255 (t = 5.688, p < .001). The relationship of the variable experienced meaningfulness (EM) with a salesperson’s sales performance (SP) is significant when tested in the absence and presence of the mediator variable (SCO). The indirect effect was also found to be significant (p = .000). These findings point out that the relationship between experience meaningfulness and the salesperson’s sales performance (SP) is partially mediated by the salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO). The relationship of the variable organizational identification (OI) and the salesperson’s sales performance (SP) is significant when tested in the absence of the mediator variable (SCO). When tested in the presence of the mediator variable (SCO), the relationship was found to be not significant (standardized coefficient .066, p = .285). The indirect effect was found to be significant (p = .003). These findings support the conclusion that the relationship of organizational identification and the salesperson’s sales performance (SP) is fully mediated by the salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO). The relationship of the variable pay satisfaction (PS) with the salesperson’s sales performance (SP) is not significant when tested in the absence and presence of the mediator variable (SCO). The indirect effect was also found to be not significant (p = .405). These findings conclude that the relationship of pay satisfaction (PS) and the salesperson’s sales performance (SP) is not mediated by the salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO). The summary of the hypotheses testing and the results are reported in Table 2.

Table 1.

Fit Indices of the Final Model

Indicators	Values	Fitness
Normed Chi-square	4.480	Moderate
GFI	.895	Good
AGFI	.872	Good
CFI	.926	Very good
SRMR	.048	Very good
RMSEA	.056	Good
P ratio	.898	Very good
Hoelter Index	290 at .05 302 at .01	Very good

Source: Author.

Table 2.

Summary of Hypotheses Test Results—Job Variables

Sr. No.	Hypotheses	Result
1	H1: Experienced meaningfulness (EM) of the job has a positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).	Supported
2	H1 (a): A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) mediates the relationship between salesperson’s experienced meaningfulness (EM) of the job and individual sales performance (SP).	Supported (partial mediation)
3	H2: Organizational identification (OI) by the salesperson has a positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).	Supported
4	H2 (a): A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) mediates the relationship between organizational identification (OI) of the salesperson and individual sales performance (SP).	Supported (full mediation)
5	H3: Pay satisfaction (PS) by the salesperson has a positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).	Not supported
6	H3 (a): A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) mediates the relationship between pay satisfaction (PS) of the salesperson and individual sales performance (SP).	Not supported
7	H4: A salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) has a positive influence on individual sales performance (SP).	Supported

Source: Author.

The Changing Perception of Compensation

When the assessments of the factors that determine the performance of an individual salesperson are carried out, satisfaction with the compensation received finds a prominent place in the list. Individuals and organizations tend to believe in the argument that there exists a relationship between satisfaction with the pay received and performance (Dreher & Ash, 1990; Fugate, Kinicki, & Ashforth, 2004; Iaffaldano & Muchinsky, 1985). Contradicting the leads from the literature, this study could not establish a significant relationship between pay satisfaction and sales performance. Though there are counter indications from literature regarding the relationship between pay satisfaction and performance outcomes (Babakus et al., 1996, Piercy, Low, & Cravens, 2004) the researchers wanted to analyse this relationship in detail. Following the advice of the experts from the industry and academia, the relationship was tested in the absence of experienced meaningfulness and organizational identification constructs. In order to evaluate the influence of pay satisfaction on sales performance, two structural equation models were developed—one with the presence of salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO) and the other without the same. The results show that in both the cases, the relationship between pay satisfaction and sales performance was found to be positive and significant. The comparison of the two models is given in Table 3.

Table 3.

Summary of Comparison—Pay Satisfaction models

Relationship	Direct without SCO	Direct with SCO
PS → SP	.263***	.139***

Source: Author.

Notes: SCO: Salesperson’s customer orientation; PS: Pay satisfaction; SP: Sales performance.

*** p value is less than .001 (p < .001), i.e., the relationship is highly significant.

From the Table 3, it can be seen that the strength of the relationship between pay satisfaction to sales performance diminishes from .263 to .139 in the presence of the mediator variable (SCO). In both the cases, the relationship is positive and significant. These results indicate that the relationship between pay satisfaction and sales performance is partially mediated by the salesperson’s customer orientation (SCO).

Discussions

The study has looked at the impact of job influences on sales performance, giving special emphasis to the orientation of salespeople. It is observed that when employees attach considerable importance to a job and its outcomes, it tends to be meaningful. Meaningfulness in the job is derived from various dimensions such as work environment and favourable interactions with fellow employees. Co-worker support and customer satisfaction can contribute to identifying the meaningfulness of the job executed. When organizations develop and enforce policies that foster camaraderie among employees, the employees are able to identify meaningfulness of their work. Meaningful job and favourable policies help employees in aligning individual goals with the organizational ones and in identifying themselves with the organization. When employees perceive the organizational policies to be customer-oriented, they are motivated to enhance their customer-oriented behaviours, thereby ensuring customer satisfaction and better performance at individual and organizational level.

Since activities are carried out in an organizational setting, the researchers argue that the morals of this setting can guide employee sensitivity towards activity implication. When employees are familiar with the organizational goals and values as well as the workplace setting, they are in a position to frame individual goals that would be valued by the organization. When organizations share adequate information with their employees, it helps the employees frame individual bonds of attachment and shape their identity in the organizational context. It also helps them discover the relevance of social relations for an improved organizational identification. The present study indicates that the more the employees are able to identify with their organization, the more are they willing to allocate time and efforts to creatively address the challenges of their job. This situation would motivate them to align their self-interests with the interests of the organization to produce improved performance outcomes.

The results of the present study suggest that an improved organizational identification helps the employees discover more meaningfulness in their work. Identification of deeper meaningfulness in their job motivates employees to value their colleagues better. This can foster healthier co-worker support. When an organization operates on a customer-oriented philosophy, the success of the organization can only be ensured when the employees are also customer-oriented. That the salespeople’s customer orientation is found to fully mediate the relationship between organizational identification and sales performance is indicated from the current study. Though the influence of pay satisfaction could not be established initially, a deeper analysis could uncover the significant role of the variable. The results are reported in the previous sections of this paper.

Managerial Implications

Employees perceive their job to be more meaningful when their work is recognized by the organization. Optimality goal alignment for employees and organizations would enhance organizational perception of their employee performance. Moreover, when individual and organizational goals are aligned, it helps the employees to identify with their organization in a better way. This situation would motivate employees to consider monetary and non-monetary rewards as secondary. One of the important contributions of this study is the identification of the influence of pay on individual performance. Pay now has more of a hygiene role to play. Absence of comparable pay structure prevailing in the industry demotivates the sales people, whereas the presence of the same may not really motivate them. Based on the results of this study, it is argued that when comparable pay is provided, meaningfulness of the job and identification with the organization shrink the role of compensation with regard to individual sales performance.

Information from the analysis of job influences will help managers to design policies in such a way that it can help employees to identify with the organization in a better manner. Improved organizational identification would help employees find improved meaning in their work. Both these situations can help organizations divert their major focus from employee compensation. When organizations are able to build a workforce that identifies with the organization in a superior manner and finds deeper meaningfulness in the work, they would gain a substantial competitive advantage in the market. Organizations, especially the ones in the financial services sector, have to realize that they cannot motivate employees with financial compensation and rewards beyond a certain point. This realization would help mangers to frame organizational policies accordingly and initiate steps so as to help employees identify more with the organization and experience deeper meaningfulness in their work.

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