Business Faculty Publications
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
12-1-2014
Publication Title
International Business Review
Keywords
B2B marketing; international business; customer-oriented selling; Entrepreneurship/Innovation
Disciplines
International Business | Marketing
Abstract
In the international business-to-business (B2B) setting, a firm's salespeople often have more direct, prolonged, and intimate contact with the customer and market environments than any other employees of the firm. In fact, for customers in many B2B markets, the salesperson is the face of the firm. The sales function can be characterized as an inherently entrepreneurial activity. Entrepreneurship is founded on knowing or seeing something others do not see, and the sales force has long been recognized as an important source of knowledge about a firm's customers and environment. However, there has been relatively little work linking entrepreneurship to international sales performance, especially in the B2B context. This paper focuses on the intelligence-gathering role of salespeople to firms practicing corporate entrepreneurship in the international B2B setting. More specifically, drawing on the theories of corporate entrepreneurship and the knowledge-based view of the firm, the authors develop a conceptual model that proposes international sales performance for firms practicing corporate entrepreneurship will be enhanced when salespeople practice customer-oriented selling and the firm's absorptive capacity is stronger. Recommended methodology for testing the proposed model is a single-informant survey of sales managers with firms in the domain of interest, using structural equation modeling with moderator tests. The paper concludes with implications and directions for future research.
Recommended Citation
Javalgi, R.G., Hall, K.D., & Cavusgil, S.T. (2014). Corporate entrepreneurship, customer-oriented selling, absorptive capacity, and international sales performance in the international B2B setting: Conceptual framework and research propositions. International Business Review, 23(6), 1193-1202. doi: 10.1016/j.ibusrev.2014.04.003
DOI
10.1016/j.ibusrev.2014.04.003
Version
Postprint
Publisher's Statement
NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in the International Business Review. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in International Business Review, 23, 6, 12-01-2014, 10.1016/j.ibusrev.2014.04.003
Volume
23
Issue
6
