Reward structure as a moderator of the relationship between extraversion and sales performance

The proposition that the relationship between extraversion and sales performance is moderated by reward structure was investigated. Specific hypotheses were tested with data obtained from 152 sales representatives. One group of sales representatives was rewarded primarily for obtaining new sales and another primarily for retaining customers. Data pooled across the 2 groups showed that extraversion did not correlate significantly with either new sales or customer retention. However, moderator analysis revealed that extraversion was positively associated with the dimension of performance that was explicitly rewarded but not with the nonrewarded dimension. A significant correlation between conscientiousness and new sales, but not between conscientiousness and customer retention, was found with the pooled data. As expected, relationships between conscientiousness and sales performance were not moderated by reward structure.