The importance of conscientiousness in the telemarketing industry

Abstract

Researchers have long pondered the personality type-performance relationship. However, in the sales industry and especially in telemarketing, findings have been contradictory with regards to which personality trait best contributes to performance. The telemarketing industry is a rapidly growing industry, but is typically marred with high staff turnover and low levels of performance. An improved understanding of the factors that contribute towards performance in this industry is a key mandate of management. Personality-type has been shown to be a key driver of performance in the sales industry. However, it is unclear whether the personality types touted in typical sales positions (for example extroversion) are suited for the telemarketing environment. South Africa is one of the top emerging call centre locations in the world and as such the purpose of this study was to determine which personality type best contributes towards performance in the South African telemarketing industry. A census was conducted on telesales personnel in a large telemarketing organisation and the five-factor model was used to test employees' personality types. Contrary to current research, which suggests that extraversion is the five-factor trait best suited to salespeople, this study found that conscientiousness was the only personality trait that influenced sales performance in the call centre context.

Is Turnover Relationship to Performance Linear Or U-Inverted? A Systematic Literature Review

“…There is no relationship between turnover and performance Not Significant / Irrelevant -11 (Graham et al, 2020) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 12 (Trunina et al, 2020) There is no relationship between turnover and performance Not Significant / Irrelevant -13 (Kotaskova et al, 2020) There is no relationship between turnover and performance Not Significant / Irrelevant -14 (Horváthová et al, 2020) There is no relationship between turnover and performance Not Significant / Irrelevant -15 (Hussain et al, 2020) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 16 (Osuizugbo, 2020) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 17 (Garg et al, 2019) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 18 (Kaldeen, 2019) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 19 (Jamal, 2019) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 20 (Rivolta, 2018a) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 21 (Yu et al, 2019) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 22 (Gao et al, 2017) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 23 (Shaw & Shi, 2017) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 24 (Burin et al, 2016) There is a significant linear relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 25 (Parker & Gerbasi, 2016) There is no relationship between turnover and performance Not Significant / Irrelevant -2 9 28 Qualitaive SLR/Literature Review Quantitative 115 26 (Wang et al, 2015) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 27 (Gaertner et al, 2015) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 28 (Burin et al, 2015) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 29 (Korsakienė et al, 2015) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 30 (Durukan et al, 2012) There is a relationship between turnover and performance Significant Linear 31 (Bertelli & Lewis, 2013) There is no relationship between turnover and performance Not Significant / Irrelevant -3...…”