Philippine E-Journals

Can Goal Orientations of Sales people Predict Performance?

Rustica D. Badillo

Discipline: Economics, Business

 

Abstract:

The recent work of Sujan, Weitz, and Kumar brings into sharp focus two distinct goal orientations of salespeople: learning and performance. In the article entitled "Learning Orientation, Working Smart, and Effective Selling" (1994), the authors made two primary contributions to sales force literature. They are: (1) the development and examination of the novel propositions that shed light on how supervisors influence the goal orientations of sales people, and (2) the examination of whether supervisor's influence on salespeople's orientations is moderated by sales person experience. The article's hypotheses were tested using data from salespeople in two Fortune 500 companies. The results support several of the apriori hypotheses and suggest that supervisory behaviors (as perceived by salespeople) have a significant influence on salespeople's learning and performance orientations. Furthermore, the authors obtained some support for the moderating effect of salesperson experience.