Abstract

Research suggests that political skill affects how salespeople build and leverage social capital. However, there are important questions left unanswered in this relationship. First, although it is linked to specific structural characteristics of networks, it is unclear how political skill affects the overall quality of one’s social network. Similarly, it is unclear if objective and subjective social network quality measurement approaches produce comparable results. Third, although theory positions political skill and social network quality as desirable personal and structural resources, it is unknown how these resources affect dyadic relationships between salespeople and clients. Finally, there is a need to assess how the dimensions of political skill differentially affect social network quality. To address these questions, we propose a new model of social network quality, examining how political skill influences social network quality and salesperson performance in a two-study investigation. We begin by predictively testing the unique contributions of objective and subjective social network quality in the relationship between political skill and sales magnitude one year later. We then extend these findings using dyadic salesperson and customer data to explore how political skill and social network quality predictively impact sales magnitude, sales frequency, and relationship performance.

摘要

研究表明，政治技能会影响销售人员建立和利用社会资本的方式。然而，在这种关系中还有一些重要的问题没有得到解答。首先，虽然它与网络的特定结构特征有关，但尚不清楚政治技能如何影响一个人社交网络的整体质量。同样，尚不清楚客观和主观的社交网络质量测量方法是否会产生可比较的结果。第三，虽然理论将政治技能和社交网络质量定位为理想的个人和结构资源，但这些资源如何影响销售人员和客户之间的二元关系尚不清楚。最后，需要评估政治技能的维度如何不同地影响社交网络质量。为了解决这些问题，我们提出了一种新的社交网络质量模型，通过一项两项研究调查政治技能如何影响社交网络质量和销售人员绩效。我们首先在一年后预测性地测试客观和主观社交网络质量在政治技能和销售量之间的关系中的独特贡献。然后，我们使用二元销售人员和客户数据扩展这些发现，以探索政治技能和社交网络质量如何预测性地影响销售量、销售频率和关系绩效。我们首先在一年后预测性地测试客观和主观社交网络质量在政治技能和销售量之间的关系中的独特贡献。然后，我们使用二元销售人员和客户数据扩展这些发现，以探索政治技能和社交网络质量如何预测性地影响销售量、销售频率和关系绩效。我们首先在一年后预测性地测试客观和主观社交网络质量在政治技能和销售量之间的关系中的独特贡献。然后，我们使用二元销售人员和客户数据扩展这些发现，以探索政治技能和社交网络质量如何预测性地影响销售量、销售频率和关系绩效。