Selling and Sales Management in Action Examining the Bases Utilized for Evaluating Salespeoples' Performance

Evaluating salespeoples' performance is an important task for sales managers. However, little is known about what bases are used by sales managers to evaluate the performance of their salespeople. A study was conducted to determine the bases actually used by sales managers and the results were compared with a study conducted in 1983. Findings indicate more emphasis on profit and cost control, a continued reliance on qualitative measures, and a wide variety of bases being utilized to evaluate the performance of salespeople. Furthermore, the stability of results, across a wide variety of respondent job titles as well as business types and sizes, indicates a good deal of generalizability to other firms.     

How to Improve Your College Recruiting Program

In today's ever-changing business environment, teamwork has emerged as a requirement for success. As industry faces this paradigm shift, a formal team structure is emerging that goes beyond that proposed by previous selling/buying center researchers. Accordingly, a conceptualization of the functions and roles of these formalized selling and buying teams is proposed as a starting point for future investigations. The movement toward formal self-directed teams is explored, updated definitions of the selling and buying teams are proposed, and the functions and roles of each team are reviewed. Key constructs and organizational implications also are discussed.     

Leaders in Selling and Sales Management: John H. Patterson

Although there is much controversy regarding the teaching of ethics in our universities today, ethical dilemmas are a part of the reality of the sales force. This study examines the differences in the perceptions of sales management students and practitioners in an ethical situation. The results suggest that gender does have an impact on the severity of the consequences and that there are significant differences between the perceptions of practitioners and sales management students.     

‘Mundus imago Dei est’: The Spirituality of the Emblematist of the French Renaissance

Abstract

This study explores the constitutive principle of Mundus imago Dei est in the work of emblematists representative of both Catholic and Protestant traditions in France in the late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-centuries. Examples selected have been militant (Georgette de Montenay), philosophical (Jean-Baptiste Chassignet), and devotional (Jean de La Ceppède). The aim is to discover common rhetorical strategies of an aesthetic in the service of faith. Qualities and features derived from the Augustinian tradition are demonstrated. Further, apparent disharmony of images is shown to yield to harmony of thought.     

International Genetic Counseling Students’ Perspective on Their Training Experience in the United States

International students face social, psychological and academic challenges upon moving to a foreign country to pursue higher education. Clinical disciplines such as genetic counseling present additional challenges adapting to an unfamiliar health care system and different interactions and expectations with patients and colleagues. This study used semi-structured interviews to identify challenges that international genetic counseling students face during training in the United States. Eight international genetic counseling alumni who graduated from U.S.-accredited programs were interviewed. Participants stated that the U.S. academic system was unfamiliar—class participation and paper-writing required the greatest adjustment. There was a need for help in understanding social norms in academic settings. Clinically, they were unfamiliar with the dynamics and communication style of U.S. families. Non-native English speakers experienced greater difficulty in all areas. Most participants reported that they were uncomfortable asking for help in transitioning to life, study and work. Participants identified mentorship programs for international students as potentially useful in clarifying expectations in academic and clinical settings. These results may assist international students preparing to study genetic counseling in the U.S. and may help genetic counseling training programs identify the academic and clinical challenges faced by international students.     

Perception of symmetry and repetition within and across visual shapes: Part-descriptions and object-based attention

In five experiments, we investigated the detection of symmetry (i.e., translation plus reflection) or repetition (i.e., translation alone) between two vertical jagged contours. The complexity of the two contours was manipulated, as was their figure-ground assignment; the two contours either belonged to a common object "inside" them, to two separate objects "outside" them, or to two separate objects each to the right of one contour. Replicating Baylis and Driver (1994), symmetry judgements were unaffected by contour complexity when made within a single shape, implying a parallel process operating efficiently across contour discontinuities. However, all the other conditions yielded substantially slower judgements as complexity increased, suggesting either effortful point-by-point comparisons, or a highly inefficient parallel process. In agreement with Baylis and Driver (1995a), symmetry perception was harder when figure-ground assignment turned convexities along one contour into concavities along the other contour; and likewise for repetition detection. However, even when convex parts matched between the two contours, judgements were still affected by complexity unless they belonged to a common object. This supports Baylis and Driver's (1993) proposal that effortless comparisons for the layout of multiple convex parts can only be made within single perceptual objects.     

Assessing knowledge-intensive work environment: General versus situation-specific instruments

The aim of the present study is to examine to what extent general and situation-specific work environment instruments capture the salient work characteristics in a knowledge-intensive context. We conducted qualitative open-ended interviews with 30 employees (24 men and six women) from a Norwegian university department. The information from the interviews was content-analysed and coded on the scales of five work environment instruments; two general instruments (the General Nordic Questionnaire for Psychological and Social Factors at Work [QPSNordic] and the Job Diagnostic Survey [JDS]) and three situation-specific instruments (Assessing the climate for creativity [KEYS], Situational Outlook Questionnaire [SOQ], and the Organizational Climate Measure [OCM]). The results showed that situation-specific work environment instruments covered significantly more statements about the work environment than the general instruments. More statements could be categorized on the organization and individual levels, compared to group and leadership levels. The situation-specific instruments covered more statements than general instruments at the organization level. These statements were mainly related to the organizational context, social and relational characteristics, and encouragement of creativity and organizational impediments to creativity. The findings support the value of situation-specific instruments for assessing the work environment in knowledge-intensive organizations.     

The moral psychology of rationing among physicians: the role of harm and fairness intuitions in physician objections to cost-effectiveness and cost-containment

Introduction

Physicians vary in their moral judgments about health care costs. Social intuitionism posits that moral judgments arise from gut instincts, called “moral foundations.” The objective of this study was to determine if “harm” and “fairness” intuitions can explain physicians’ judgments about cost-containment in U.S. health care and using cost-effectiveness data in practice, as well as the relative importance of those intuitions compared to “purity”, “authority” and “ingroup” in cost-related judgments.

Methods

We mailed an 8-page survey to a random sample of 2000 practicing U.S. physicians. The survey included the MFQ30 and items assessing agreement/disagreement with cost-containment and degree of objection to using cost-effectiveness data to guide care. We used t-tests for pairwise subscale mean comparisons and logistic regression to assess associations with agreement with cost-containment and objection to using cost-effectiveness analysis to guide care.

Results

1032 of 1895 physicians (54%) responded. Most (67%) supported cost-containment, while 54% expressed a strong or moderate objection to the use of cost-effectiveness data in clinical decisions. Physicians who strongly objected to the use of cost-effectiveness data had similar scores in all five of the foundations (all p-values?>?0.05). Agreement with cost-containment was associated with higher mean “harm” (3.6) and “fairness” (3.5) intuitions compared to “in-group” (2.8), “authority” (3.0), and “purity” (2.4) (p?<?0.05). In multivariate models adjusted for age, sex, region, and specialty, both “harm” and “fairness” were significantly associated with judgments about cost-containment (OR?=?1.2 [1.0-1.5]; OR?=?1.7 [1.4-2.1], respectively) but were not associated with degree of objection to cost-effectiveness (OR?=?1.2 [1.0-1.4]; OR?=?0.9 [0.7-1.0]).

Conclusions

Moral intuitions shed light on variation in physician judgments about cost issues in health care.

     

Healing Rituals for Couples Recovering from Adultery

Recovery from the trauma of adultery is a process that is full of points where the couple can get stuck. We describe an experiential model that utilizes healing rituals. We start with a general exploration of the use of rituals in marriage and family therapy. The key elements of effective rituals are described. We describe stuck points in these relationships including: 1) knowing the details, 2) releasing the anger, 3) showing commitment, 4) rebuilding trust, and 5) rebuilding the relationship. Ritualized interventions are described for each of these stuck points.