Determinants and consequences of ethical behaviour: an empirical study of salespeople

• Published in: European journal of marketing 2005-05, Vol.39 (5/6), p.473-495
• Main Authors: Román, Sergio, Luis Munuera, José
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Behavior; Business ethics; Compensation plans; Competition; Conflicts of interest; Customers; Ethics; Financial services; Hypotheses; Job satisfaction; Sales; Sales force; Salespeople; Studies; Wages & salaries
• ISSN: 0309-0566; 1758-7123
• DOI: 10.1108/03090560510590674

Purpose - The main purpose of this research is to gain a clearer understanding of several key determinants and consequences of the ethical behaviour of salespeople.Design methodology approach - Questionnaires were administered during regularly scheduled meetings to a total of 280 financial services salespeople. The salespeople questioned were mainly specializing in selling high-involvement financial products (e.g. mortgages, life insurance) to final consumers.Findings - Results suggest that method of compensation and control system (CS) are important determinants of ethical behaviour. Age (AGE) also proves to be a significant antecedent of ethical behaviour. However, education (EDU) is not significantly related to ethical behaviour. Additionally, a salesperson's ethical behaviour leads to lower levels of role conflict-intersender and higher levels of job satisfaction, but not higher performance.Research limitations implications - To improve generalization of the findings, future research should broaden the sample by including a variety of industries. Likewise, the use of longitudinal data could provide new insights into the antecedents and consequences of ethical behaviour of salespeople and in particular the relationship with performance. Continuing research is needed to further analyse the relationship between ethical behaviour and other relevant behaviours that may take place during the interaction with the customer (e.g. organisational citizenship behaviours and customer orientation).Practical implications - This research is, to our knowledge, the first study that simultaneously identifies and analyses several key antecedents and consequences of the ethical behaviour of salespeople.Originality value - This study adds to the literature by reducing the existing gap and showing companies insights into how to foster ethical sales behaviour and the positive consequences that this behaviour has on their salespeople.