Role Clarity and the Salesman

Abstract

O NE of the major causes of job tension is a lack of role clarity; that is, either the nonexistence of information needed to do his job effectively, or the lack of adequate information, leaves the worker with an ambiguous perception of his role.1 It has been shown that a lack of role clarity increases the probability that a person will be dissatisfied with his job, will experience psychological stress (job tension), will seek opportunities for improving clarity and satisfaction, will be less innovative, and will generally show a lack of job interest.2 While different groups within the same organization may experience different amounts of role clarity, there appear to be several factors associated with the sales position that make it more susceptible to a lack of role clarity than other positions in the firm. First, the salesman must often perform with inadequate or nonexistent information. This can occur in his relationships with customers as well as with his company. In many instances he lacks clear-cut knowledge of his customers' needs or has little indication of whether or not they are interested in his proposals, whether their potential business is worth his time and effort, or what the probability of making a sale is. Within the company, the salesman often is not provided with adequate information concerning his performance. This lack of performance feedback has long been a bone of contention between salesmen and their managers .3 Second, most salesmen occupy a boundary position-one that requires much crossing of boundaries between departments within organizations. Such positions are very likely to exhibit a lack of role clarity.4 The salesman's boundary position in relation to his customers is obvious. However, he is also frequently required to coordinate his activities with other departments within his own firm (e.g., production). Often information necessary to achieve this coordination is not provided, and conflict results between different functional areas of the firm.5 Finally, the salesman's occupation might be called semi-innovative. Most salesmen are required to develop new business, and much of their workday is relatively unstructured. Innovative roles are very susceptible to a lack of role clarity. This is because innovative personnel are often expected to seek a change in the status quo which other elements of the firm are attempting to maintain, and the information to perform this role effectively is usually nonexistent.6 Despite the fact that the selling role is highly conducive to a lack of role clarity in most firms, the sales occupation has seldom been the subject of research that focused on role clarity and emotional reactions to it. In the study.reported here, the authors sought to empirically test the question of role clarity as perceived by sales force members, both in terms of its effect on several job-related factors and its importance for salesmen as compared with another group in the organization. The results reveal that greater role clarity may lead to better job performance.