Better together: Trait competitiveness and competitive psychological climate as antecedents of salesperson organizational commitment and sales performance

This study assesses the direct and interactive effects of trait competitiveness and competitive psychological climate on organizational commitment and sales performance using data collected from industrial salespeople and company records. Findings indicate that the positive impact of trait competitiveness on sales performance is contingent upon a highly competitive psychological climate, helping to explain inconsistent findings in the literature and underscoring the need for firms to manage the fit between salespeople and organizational culture. Additionally, the study reveals continuance commitment’s negative moderation of the affective commitment–sales performance relationship. Taken together, the model reveals an interesting process such that managers should recruit salespeople with high trait competitiveness and foster a competitive climate internally to generate the best sales performance outcomes.