Bias or No Bias? The Monadic and Dyadic Role of Gender in Salespersons'Performance and Hiring

摘要

Businesses operate in a diverse marketplace today;they interact with customers and employees with diverse backgrounds.Gender diversity in organizations have positive effects on performance.In the Business-to-Business(B2B)domain,sales teams are among boundary spanners which can have a profound impact on the organization's effective interactions,relationship management,and performance.As a way to compete in diverse B2B environments,companies in the past tended to allocate B2B sales representatives matching the background of the clientele(particularly regarding gender).Although salesforce diversity results in some positive outcomes,scholars have argued the importance of understanding its challenges as well.This research answers the following research questions: Does gender affect sales performance evaluation and hiring? Does the monadic gender characteristic(i.e.the candidate's gender)and the dyadic gender compositions(i.e.the manager-candidate's gender situations(e.g.a female manager and a male candidate))influence the sales performance evaluation and hiring? Are there any bias within the monadic as well as dyadic manager-candidate gender situation when it comes to sales performance evaluation and hiring? Today,at a historic tipping point for gender roles and in the wake of #metoo,gender issues are demanding further investigation.In the big picture,this study contributes to such an exploration by clarifying certain gender-related dynamics.