Title: Internal Self-Promotion and Marketing Boundary Spanners: When and Why it is Functional
Abstract:
Self-promotion to manage impressions of competence is not unique to marketing roles but the agency features of boundary-spanning role make the study of when and why self-promotion is functional for marketing boundary-spanners a relatively unique phenomenon that is overlooked. The study addresses this oversight by three objectives in the context of sales professionals as prototypical marketing boundary spanners: (1) identify what makes some sales professionals more prone to engage in self-promotion behaviors, (2) specify conditions under which sales professionals' self-promotion behaviors have a functional, as opposed to dysfunctional, influence on sales performance, and (3) (theorize and) explain that self-promotion acts are not just impression management tactics but, instead, are acts of self-motivation for stretch goals. Together, the preceding contributes to the self-promotion literature by providing insights into what prompts sales professionals to engage in self-promotion acts, when self-promotion is performance-positive, and why self-promotion might lift sales performance. We use a combination of empirical studies to test the hypothesized effects. First, we use a large-scale field survey study of randomly selected B2B sales professionals to establish the external validity of the self-promotion phenomenon and test for its antecedents and boundary conditions. Second, we conduct a controlled experimental study with experienced sales professionals assigned randomly to different treatment conditions that prioritize internal validity to examine the hypothesized mechanisms of self-promotion effects on sales performance. Our results show that, while self-promotion acts may be detrimental to performance, sales professionals can enjoy performance positive effects if they also engage in relational behaviors with customers. Specifically, when sales professionals engage in self-promotion behaviors, each unit increase in relational behaviors yields an additional 41% lift in sales performance. The experimental study confirms the results from the field study and provides further support for a mediated-moderation mechanism where sales effort mediates the moderating effect of self-promotion and relational behavior on sales performance. Overall, we show that, contrary to popular belief, sales professionals are not immune to the self-promoter paradox. Engaging in self-promotion behaviors hurts sales performance; however, this performance punishing effect is mitigated when the professionals also engage in a higher level of relational behaviors with customers. Implications of these results are discussed.
Biography:
Jagdip Singh is AT&T Professor of Marketing at the Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University. He is an internationally recognized scholar of organizational frontline effectiveness. Jagdip’s expertise involves designing, managing, and sustaining effective and enduring customer connections at the frontlines of organizations.
Jagdip is twice recipient of the Weatherhead School of Management’s Research Recognition Award for outstanding contributions to research in 1997 and again in 2018. In 2019, Jagdip was awarded the University’s Faculty Distinguished Research Award, the highest honor for enduring and significant research impact. Also in 2019, Jagdip received the Lifetime Achievement award from the American Marketing Association’s SIG-Sales. In 1992, Jagdip received the Case Western Reserve University’s John S. Diekhoff Award for excellence in graduate teaching, and the Excellence in Doctoral Teaching and Mentoring award in 2007 and again in 2017. Jagdip co-founded the interdisciplinary "Organizational Frontlines Research" initiative including an annual symposium (since 2015) sponsored by the Marketing Science Institute, Sheth Foundation, and several leading Sales and Service centers. Dr. Singh has received the "Excellence in Reviewing" awards from the Journal of Marketing, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Retailing, and the Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management.
Contact: If you would like to attend this seminar, please email mktoffice@wbs.ac.uk.