Richard E. Fetter

Substitutes for leadership and the management of professionals

In a recent study, Podsakoff, Niehoff, MacKenzie, and Williams (1993) reported that although several of the subordinate, task, and organizational variables identified in Kerr and Jermiers (1978) Substitutes for Leadership model had main effects on subordinate criterion variables, few of these “substitutes” actually moderated the relationships between leader behaviors and the criterion variables in a manner consistent with that specified by Howell, Dorfman, and Kerr (1986). The goal of this study was to explore the possibility that the reason for the lack of support reported by Podsakoff and his colleagues, was their use of a sample comprised primarily of nonprofessionals, by testing the substitutes model using a more professional sample (n = 411 professional, managerial, and whitecollar employees drawn from 10 different organizations). In addition, other key objectives of this study were to: (a) provide a definitional and statistical clarification of Howell, Dorfman, and Kerrs (1986) “substituting,” “neutralizing,” and “enhancing” effects; (b) report the psychometric properties of a refined and reduced substitutes-for-leadership scale; (c) test the moderating effects of the substitute variables on a broader range of criterion variables than had been previously examined; and (d) investigate the proportion of variance explained in these criterion variables by the main effects of the leader behaviors and the substitutes for leadership. The results indicate that few of the substitutes variables moderated the relationships between the leader behaviors and the subordinate criterion variables, and that the majority of the moderated relationships identified did not meet the criteria specified by Howell, Dorfman, and Kerr. Possible reasons for these findings, and their implications for the substitutes model, are then discussed.

An empirical examination of the involvement to external search relationship in services marketing

The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of involvement on consumers’ external search activities across several service settings. Two of the services were credence services (life insurance and furnace overhaul) and two services were experiential services (exercise club and Caribbean vacation). Involvement was measured with a two‐dimensional nine‐item scale, the dimensions being importance and involvement. External search was assessed using a seven‐item two‐dimensional scale, source and effort in search. Self‐administered surveys were completed by 331 residents of a major Midwestern US city. The results indicate that, across all four services, involvement does indeed influence consumers’ propensity to search externally. Finally, the implications of the findings for marketing managers are discussed.

Dimensions of consumer search behavior in services

Develops a seven‐item scale to assess consumers’ external search activities and assessed the scale’s construct validity. Moreover, to examine the scale’s generalizability across various services, both things‐directed and people‐directed service settings are used. The findings suggest there are two identifiable aspects of consumers’ search activities, source and effort. Evidence of the construct validity of the seven‐item scale is based on exploratory factor analysis, calculation of Cronbach’s alpha, and a nomological assessment of the scale.

Revised Personal Involvement Inventory for Services

Whilst considerable attention has been devoted to the development and refinement of involvement scales for physical goods, only scant attention has been given to this research in the services literature. This paper provides an empirical examination of a 10-item involvement scale across four services (exercise club, life insurance, furnace overhaul, and income tax). Results of the study indicate that, in a services setting, involvement appears to be a 2-dimensional construct, importance and interest. Lovelocks (1983) classification was used as the basis for selecting four services investigated in this study.

Validating a Measure of External Search Across Service Settings

We developed an 8-item scale to assess consumers’ external search activities and examined the scale’s construct validity across both experiential and credence service settings. We found two aspects of consumers’ external search activities, private search and public search. The findings are invariant across both experiential and credence services.