Ramana Madupalli

The relationship of facets of salesperson job satisfaction with affective organizational commitment

Purpose – This paper aims to examines the relationships between various facets of salesperson job satisfaction as assessed by the INDSALES measure and salesperson organizational commitment. The paper also seeks to explore salesperson gender as a moderator of the relationship between facets of job satisfaction and organizational commitment.Design/methodology/approach – This study uses survey research of one firms business‐to‐business salespeople to examine the relationships between facets of salesperson job satisfaction and salesperson organizational commitment.Findings – Study results indicate that various facets of job satisfaction are more strongly related to organizational commitment. Findings also indicate that these relationships are not the same for male and female salespeople.Practical implications – Findings demonstrate to sales managers that not all types of satisfaction are related to organizational commitment, which has been strongly linked to a salespersons propensity to leave an organizatio...

Problematic customers and customer service employee retaliation

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of problematic customer behaviors on customer service employee (CSE) attitudes and subsequent retaliation toward customers. Design/methodology/approach – Data from five semi-structured in-depth interviews and a structured survey with 434 responses are used to develop and test the theoretical model. CSEs working in different call center companies serving American and European customers were approached using an established survey panel. Findings – Results using partial least squares methodology showed that problematic customer behaviors have significant effects on emotional dissonance and drain CSEs emotionally. Negative emotional reactions are positively impacted by higher emotional dissonance and exhaustion levels and, subsequently, lead to higher employees’ retaliation. Research limitations/implications – For implications, this study provides an understanding of the relationship between problematic customer behaviors and CSEs’ retaliation. Fut...

Campaign-Related Social Networking and the Political Participation of College Students

College students politically participate through traditional mechanisms at lower rates than their elders. Yet, members of this group may participate by other means, like friending candidates and joining political groups through social networking websites. We argue that these online activities serve as a meaningful form of civic engagement by broadening who participates and encouraging other forms of participation. Using a survey of randomly chosen undergraduates at a large Midwestern university, we discover that important distinctions exist between those who friend or join these online social networks and those who participate in more traditional off-line political activities. While interest in politics is a precursor to off-line engagement, it does not predict friending or joining an online social network that is political in nature. However, friending candidates or joining such networks appears to mobilize college students to engage in other forms of political participation.

Understanding Effects of Salesperson Locus of Control

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of external locus of control on different job characteristic variables – i.e. role conflict, role ambiguity and emotional exhaustion, in addition to the outcome variable, job satisfaction – in a business-to-business sales setting. Design/methodology/approach – Data from B2B salespeople were used to test the proposed model using structural equation modeling. Findings – The results indicate that a more external locus of control will be: positively related to role stress factors; indirectly and positively related to emotional exhaustion; and negatively related to job satisfaction. Originality/value – This study provides a managerially actionable foundation for influencing locus of control to increase a salespersons satisfaction with his/her position.

Explaining Users' Security Behaviors with the Security Belief Model

Information security is often viewed as a technological matter. However, security professionals will readily admit that without safe practices by users, no amount or type of technology will be effective at preventing unauthorized intrusions. By paralleling the practices of information security and health prevention, a rationale for employing constructs from existing models of health behavior is established. A comprehensive and parsimonious model (the Security Belief Model) is developed to explain information security behavior intentions. The model is tested empirically based on a sample of 237 Indian professionals. The results of the empirical study indicate general support for the model, particularly including severity, susceptibility, benefits, and a cue to action as antecedents to the intention to perform preventive information security behaviors. The paper also discusses implications of the model and results for practitioners and possibilities for future research are included. Explaining Users’ Security Behaviors with the Security Belief Model

Foreign or domestic: who provides better customer service?

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of customer service employees’ (CSEs) competence and service recovery outcomes on service evaluations of foreign and domestic CSEs. Design/methodology/approach – Three experiments were conducted to test and validate the proposed hypotheses. The participants were told a cover story that they were either listening to (Study 2) or reading (Studies 1 and 3) a real conversation between a customer service representative of a bank and a customer and the authors wanted their views about the service encounter. While country of origin (COO) and competency were common independent variables across three studies, Study 2 included service recovery with a full refund and Study 3 had both full and partial refund and apology offered or not. Findings – Results from three experiments show that while competent CSEs are evaluated the same, regardless of their COO, the domestic CSE is evaluated more negatively than the foreign CSE when both are incompetent. The aut...