The strongest correlate of new product success is understanding of market requirements early in the new product development (NPD) process. This is true in high technology environments where rapid change and chaotic market conditions prevail. Although a firm's salesforce is viewed as one of many sources of new product ideas and market information, the involvement of salespeople in NPD activities varies widely across firms. This study examines salesforce involvement in a firm's NPD predevelopment activities, i.e. idea generation and screening, preliminary market assessment, and concept evaluation. Because of the limits of existing research in this area, a two-phase research design was used. The first phase developed a scale for measuring salesforce involvement in NPD predevelopment activities. This scale was incorporated into a study model. The second phase tested the study model, a linkage of salesperson involvement level to organization and individual salesperson attributes. The scale-development sample consisted of 136 sales professionals. The resulting scale was a nineteen item, multi-dimensional measure incorporating three factors of involvement: involvement initiated by the salesperson, involvement initiated by NPD-Organization, and a salesperson's cognitive interest in NPD involvement. In the second phase of the study, a sample of 248 salespeople from nineteen companies completed self-administered written surveys. At the organization attribute level, the length of the NPD cycle was significantly associated with involvement subscale measures. In particular, the longer a firm's NPD cycle for product improvements, the less involvement the salesforce has in NPD-headquarters initiated involvement activities. A similar significant relationship exists between a firm's new product cycle time and the level of involvement in salesforce-initiated NPD predevelopment activities. At the study model's salesperson level, a series of factors were associated to NPD team-initiated and salesforce-initiated involvement subscales. These factors are a salesperson's: customer orientation, location distance from NPD, level of feedback from NPD, membership on NPD teams, knowledge of where to send NPD-related information, and belief that information communicated to NPD will be appropriately used. Study findings suggest that organizations can affect the degree of involvement that their salesforce or individual salespeople has in early phases of NPD.

The problem considered was that many direct sales personnel do not recruit others into the sales force even though monetary rewards and recognition for achievement can be earned for successful recruitment. The purpose of this study was to identify attitudes that were characteristic of consultants who were successful recruiters within a direct sales organization.

No description available.

Sales management researchers apply various leadership measures and theories taken from conventional work-group settings. These applications may be questionable given the unique boundary-spanning context in which the field sales force must operate. This study raises the questions and offers an approach which may be more appropriate. Specifically, this study questions the assumption that the manager acts and the salesperson reacts, and the focus of sales management studies which study managerial behavior in isolation from those of the salesperson he or she is supervising. The Leader-member Exchange theory (and the basis for this theory, social exchange) is offered as an approach which may be more consistent with the work-setting and obstacles faced by the field sales manager. This study offers a conceptual model of salesperson-manager relationships as a guide to explaining effective leadership in the field sales setting. A study was conducted on a subset of this conceptual model. Using the survey responses of industrial field salespeople and their managers, this study tested (1) the exchange relationships between the perceived behaviors of both the manager and salesperson, (2) the degree to which these exchanges influence the salesperson’s overall assessment of the salesperson-manager relationship, (3) the degree to which this assessment affects job-related outcomes and (4) the impact of environmental uncertainty on this boundary spanning link between salesperson and manager. The results of this study provides some support for the notion of an exchange relationship between the salesperson and manager. An exchange relationship may exist between the salesperson’s competency and the manager’s latitude. The salesperson’s assessment of the working relationship is based on the latitude received and the loyalty felt toward the manager {rather than his or her contributions of competency). This approach to studying the effects of leader behavior was effective in explaining salesperson satisfaction levels. It was less effective in predicting the goal achievement levels of the field sales force. Finally, the results of this study indicate the amount of uncertainty in the environment may have a direct effect on goal achievement levels of the salespeople, but lacks a moderating influence over the link between salesperson-manager relationships and outcomes. / Ph. D.

This study investigated forecasting accuracy over time. Several quantitative and qualitative forecasting models were tested and a number of combinational methods was investigated. Six time series methods, one causal model, and one subjective technique were compared in this study. Six combinational forecasts were generated and compared to individual forecasts. A combining technique was developed. Thirty data sets, obtained from a market leader in the cosmetics industry, were used to forecast sales. All series represent monthly sales from January 1985 to December 1989. Gross sales forecasts from January 1988 to June 1989 were generated by the company using econometric models. All data sets exhibited seasonality and trend.

The world of the sales representative is rhetorical in substance and in action. In the examination of the current communicative environment of the capital equipment salesperson, the literature demonstrates that the role can be characterized primarily by being accountable for revenues and quotas. Additionally, the role is one that operates at the periphery of organizations and is somewhat autonomous from the day-to-day operations of the firm by which the salesperson is employed. A third characteristic that comes to the fore is the constant emphasis on building and maintaining relationships with the stakeholders in the interests of the company. These stakeholders involve relationships among customers and prospective customers and among supervisors, peers, partners, suppliers, manufacturers, administrators for billing, and other support roles, as well as the marketing and other facets of the very organization by which the salesperson is employed. Fourth, the salesperson has to operate in the rhetorical venue of constantly persuading these stakeholders. The fifth and final characteristic of the environment that comes to the fore is the fact that the salesperson's role is perceived as one that is inherently deceitful and breaches ethical boundaries. <br> There is a definitely a tension between ethics and sales. This tension between sales and ethics is illuminated extensively in the majority of literature on the subject of sales ethics. With the belief that salesperson must be a liar in order to succeed, as has been shown previously and the implications of the lies being so severe and also at the same time the implications of not succeeding being just as severe if not more so, how does a person succeed in sales while maintaining the sense of integrity that is mandated personally and professionally, honestly, morally, legally, and ethically? The answer to this question begins by examining Alasdair MacIntyre's notion of the practice. By entering into a practice of sales, one relies on the Aristotelian idea that all activity should be guided by virtue and aimed at the good of society. Additionally, by entering into a practice guided by virtue, one can complete a unified life. It consists of complexity, goods internal to the practice, and its own standards of excellence. The successful practitioner of sales embodies passion, a lifelong commitment to excellence, and the virtues of honesty, ambition, friendliness, wittiness and tact, justice, and courage. To accomplish the practitioner's personal narrative must be consistent with this view of sales and the character formed by the habitual display of the virtues must fit into the practice of sales. In addition, the commitment and passion for sales must be congruent with one's narrative to be in the practice. Practitioners of sales must learn the nuances of the companies that they represent. They must develop the knowledge of sales techniques, negotiation techniques, and overall knowledge of the business. Identifying and engaging the assistance of formal and informal mentors with integrity accelerates this learning. <br> This project illuminates the rhetoric of Benjamin Franklin as a model to follow to enter into such practices. Franklin, very similar to Aristotle and MacIntyre relied on the idea of phronesis to guide him in his business affairs. Practical wisdom is the specific type of wisdom that Franklin was concerned about when he talked about wisdom in his previous works. His work has influenced the American democratic society for the many proverbs that he wrote in his works. Practical wisdom is involved with doing what is good, whether in private or public situations, for the betterment of everybody. This emphasizes the importance of utilitarianism to Franklin’s views. This kind of propensity for practical wisdom is reflected in his numerous proverbs, Poor Richard’s Almanac. He intended the proverbs in the book to be used across all nations to be wiser about their life. Franklin provides a fine example of rhetorically robust, ethical practitioner for sales professionals seeking to practice their craft with integrity. / McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts; / Communication and Rhetorical Studies / PhD / Dissertation;

Use of competency models has exploded in recent years. Unfortunately, the empirical research to validate such systems is scarce. This study explores the relationship between Competency-based Performance Management Systems and sales performance to determine whether the use of these systems increases performance. Performance data from sales representatives in a medical products company were examined to determine changes in performance following the introduction of the Competency-based Performance Management System (N=64). Correlations with performance were obtained for each competency dimension to determine if any factors were highly correlated with performance and if state-factors were more positively correlated with performance than trait-factors (N=66). The study found no significant relationship between implementation of a Competency-based Performance Management System and sales performance. Also state-factors were not more positively correlated with sales performance than trait-factors.

No description available.

Kam-ming Yuen. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong. / Bibliography: leaves [13-15] (2nd group)

The findings of this research confirm that the notion of descriptive efficiency has been developed as a populist concept in managerial discourse and is typically interpreted in simplistic, normative terms and thus has limited technical meaning in management praxis. Furthermore, the concept has been captured by uncritical, yet plausible, management commentators who have seemingly assumed that management efficiency will emerge from the adoption of their various prescriptions. The research will contribute to the general management literature through a cross-disciplinary critique and a re-interpretation of the notion of efficiency in management praxis. At a macro-level, the research advances the proposition that the notion of efficiency has become an ideological statement of support for any management intention, rather than a practical means to inform a range of management actions. A grounded theory of descriptive efficiency is proposed in order to explain the apparently unconscious application of laissez-faire and more contemporary principles of economics to management praxis and the wider management discipline without the support of a substantive elaboration of contemporary efficiency. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)