Personal and Organizational Variables: Their Relative Effect on Reward Valences of Industrial Salespeople

The authors investigate the relationship between personal and organizational characteristics and the attractiveness of various rewards to industrial salespeople. Data were gathered from 241 industrial salespeople and the sales managers of 17 participating industrial firms. Of the 84 relationships examined, 18 statistically significant relationships are found between such predictor variables as age, job tenure, income level, specific self-esteem, compensation plan base, promotion opportunity rate, and recognition rate and criterion variables which are the valences for various rewards. Organizational variables are found to be more promising than personal characteristics in terms of their relationship to the attactiveness of various rewards.