Social Values and Salesperson Performance: An Empirical Examination

Abstract

Although social values have been used increasingly in consumer research, their utility in sales management research has received little attention. Using a national sample of industrial salespeople, the authors evaluate several hypotheses, developed from social adaptation theory and a theoretical framework of values domain, regarding the incremental ability of the List of Values (LOV) to predict salesperson performance beyond adaptive selling (ADAPTS) and customer orientation (SOCO). The LOV shows promise as a tool by which salesperson performance can be predicted. Managerial implications are discussed, and suggestions for future research are presented.