An empirical investigation of the professional identification of sales managers and their ethical intentions

Purpose The purpose of this study is to show how senior management can create work environments conducive to ethical behavior in organizations through the use of sales managers’ professionalism and professional identification. The study also aims to demonstrate the influence of professional identification in occupations other than those requiring certification. Design/methodology/approach This study conceptualizes and tests a model using data collected from a survey panel of 350 sales managers. To test the hypotheses, this study makes use of covariance structured analysis. Findings The results demonstrate the importance of developing sales managers’ professionalism as an antecedent to professional identification. The findings also show professional identification positively affects professional ethical values, work-related norms and occupational commitment. This study finds that work-related norms moderate the relationship between professional ethical values and ethical intentions and directly and positively influence ethical intentions. Research limitations/implications This study used a panel sampling technique and these findings cannot be generalized to other populations. This study recommends that this study is replicated not only with sales managers but also with other categories of marketers. This study also highlights that more work using methods such as longitudinal panel data and experimentation is required to validate the current findings. Practical implications The findings are of particular interest to senior managers and managers of professional associations, as well as other sales practitioners. Because ethical intentions are affected by work-related norms and from an interaction between work-related norms and professional ethical values, senior managers need to ensure both the work activities in which their staff are involved and the professional ethical values of their employees contribute to appropriate ethical intentions. Originality/value This study introduces professional identification into the sales ethics literature and theorize relationships among the professionalism of sales managers and their professional identification, work-related norms, professional ethical values, occupational commitment and ethical intentions. This study empirically measures the professionalism of sales managers.