The Impact of Personality Traits on Sales Performance: Empirical Evidence from the Advertising Industry in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Generating income and revenue are the primary roles of sales personnel. Whilst many organizations have paid particular attention in training and development of the sales personnel, they seem to have neglected the profound impact of the personality traits of sales personnel in determining their success. This is clearly evident as given the same sales tools, level of education, and propensity to work, some sales personnel succeed where others fail. This paper therefore examines the impact of personality traits in determining the sales performance of sales personnel in the advertising industry in Sri Lanka. Big five personality traits were used as the major theoretical underpinning in developing the conceptual framework. Using a simple random sampling, data stemmed from a sample of 200 sales personnel was used to assess the proposed conceptual framework. Multiple regression analysis was used as the main inferential statistical analysis technique. As hypothesized, the findings demonstrate that openness to experience is significantly related to sales performance. However, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and extraversion are not significantly related to sales performance in the given research setting. Moreover, the findings emphasize that sales personnel with high openness to experience perform better in sales in the advertising industry in Sri Lanka.