Motivating strategic front-line employees for innovative sales in the digital transformation era: The mediating role of salesperson learning

Salesforce steering is considered an effective management approach for improving sales performance, and various studies have explored the mechanisms of the impact of salesforce steering under different circumstances. However, the performance of salespersons in process innovation is rarely examined. Especially in the context of digital transformation, new business models require front-line employees to master more knowledge to provide more refined and customized services. Based on the organizational learning and sales literature, this study explores the relationship among salesforce steering, salesperson learning and innovative sales performance in service enterprises. It develops and tests a conceptual framework based on a survey of 476 strategic front-line employees (SFLEs) in China's tourism industry. The findings indicate that salesforce steering instruments have no direct effect on innovative sales performance, while exploratory learning and exploitative learning play mediating roles in the relationship between salesforce steering and innovative sales performance. These findings integrate different streams of literature and improve the understanding of the management and learning behaviour of SFLEs in the context of process innovation.