Patience, consideration and responsibility (P.C.R.): emerging psychological capacities for coping with crisis and persistent changes in personal selling

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic altered buyers’ concerns and resulted in more complex demand for high-involvement goods, such as financial products. These changes seem likely to persist after the pandemic. Additionally, other unforeseen events, although likely not as pervasive as the pandemic, could occur at any time. In this context, the ability of salespeople to keep their mental abilities sharp is vital in overcoming challenges and moving forward. This study highlights the emerging psychological capacities that help salespeople cope with new work circumstances following the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as dealing with other unforeseen events, and identifies ways to develop these psychological capabilities. Findings from in-depth interviews with 20 salespeople suggest that patience (P), consideration (C), and responsibility (R) are the emerging psychological capacities that motivate salespeople to achieve positive outcomes during and after the pandemic. These capacities can be developed through the exercise of passion and purpose, gratitude, long-term thinking, self-reflection, and self-compassion. We found the P.C.R. framework to fit the existing psychological capital (PsyCap) model, providing nuances to our understanding of PsyCap by proposing a framework with the emerging psychological capacities that salespeople require to succeed in the post-COVID personal selling environment. The study’s limitations and future research directions are also discussed.

Keywords:

• Personal selling
• motivation
• psychological capacities
• PsyCap
• COVID-19
• qualitative approach

Declaration of interest

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

This research was funded by Monash University Malaysia (Covid Kickstarter Fund Scheme).

Notes

1 Malaysia implemented its first nationwide lockdown with the Movement Control Order (MCO) in March 2020. The MCO was subsequently tightened or relaxed depending on the COVID-19 situation in the country. The Enhanced MCO (EMCO), Conditional MCO (CMCO), Recovery MCO (RMCO) and National Recovery Plan (Phase 1 to Phase 4) are the various types and degrees of lockdown imposed by the Malaysian government at different times throughout the pandemic.

2 The stringency index “records the strictness of ‘lockdown style’ policies that primarily restrict people’s behavior.” It is a composite measure based on nine response indicators that include school closures, workplace closures, and travel bans, rescaled to a value from 0 to 100 (100 = strictest). The collation of data is ongoing. (Source: https://www.bsg.ox.ac.uk/research/research-projects/covid-19-government-response-tracker)

3 A unit trust (also known as a mutual fund) is a collective investment scheme that pools money from individual investors who have a similar investment goal for investment in a portfolio of assets that are purchased and managed by a professional fund manager. Investment returns, capital gains, and income distributions in such schemes are not guaranteed (Moneysense 2018).

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by Monash University Malaysia (Covid Kickstarter Fund Scheme).