Intrinsic Motivation of Sales Students

The following section is discussed about the effects of intrinsic motivation on sales students to pursue the career in sales. Intrinsic motivation gives people satisfaction, interests, enjoyment for their target activity. Intrinsic motivation is very important for sales students when they choose their career in sales or sales management. Students should internally motivated when they choose their career path otherwise, they would not feel satisfaction or interests on their activities. They will feel pressured or stressed every time to achieve something. Competence, challenges, skill, or knowledge development, teaching innovation, appreciation and feedback could increase sales student’s intrinsic motivation for choosing their career in sales. These things have a major impact on sales students and internally motivated them.

2.2.1. Competence

Autonomous motivation is related to competence, relatedness, and autonomy (Gagne et al.

2010). The Autonomously motivated people realized the support and optimism and they are more satisfied with their work and their well-being is better (Gagne et al. 2010). Controlled motivation is not related to these predecessors (Gagne et al. 2010). Therefore Gagne et al.

(2010) suggests that early tasks that satisfy basic emotional needs are more likely to foster an autonomous motivator. The results are generally better with autonomous than controlled motivation, although controlled motivation is not necessarily bad (Gagne et al. 2010).

Maslow (1943) suggests that people are interested in knowledge and understanding. Also, SDT supports the idea that people need to feel capable and competent (Deci & Ryan 1985). The people want to learn and develop their activities. Development is an important motivator.

People get more motivated when they understand and realize about needs of development.

Competence motivation helps to people to learn the process by itself which helps them to achieve their goals in future. It is much better than any rewards because it can give students interests, enjoyment, and satisfaction on their activity.

2.2.2. Challenging

People feel internally motivated when they face any challenges because it gives them satisfaction and interest when they face challenges and find out the solution. Sales job is quite difficult and challenging also it motivates sales students to choose their career in sales. The challenge seeking improves people’s activities as well as the outcome. And goal setting is very important in this path. Sales students need to have goals because goal setting motivates them to be productive and reach the goals (Brown et al. 2005). The research from Brown et al. (2005) suggest that the goal setting must be considered carefully to best motivate the people.

According to Brown et al. (2005) there are different types of goal setting system, but the goals could be self-set. If sales students have accurate goals, then they could face any challenges to achieve these goals which positively effect on them and it increases intrinsic motivation. Only effort or pressure has positive impact on both need satisfaction and motivation, because the pressure could be experienced also as challenge. Sales students’ intrinsic motivation could be increased if they perform challenging tasks because challenges can have motivated them to achieve their goals.

2.2.3. Skill and Knowledge Development

The skill and knowledge development of sales students is a part of their intrinsic motivation.

Sales students could develop their knowledge and skills by doing sales job. Sales job is quite different type of job where salespeople need to interact with different type of customers and then they have to adapt the customer’s culture, then they need to know about market segmentation and market adaptability, also about information technology, sales service and so on. Then they got to know about customer’s feedback and satisfaction regarding them (Madhavaram & McDonald, 2010). This thing makes the job interesting that is the reason that sales students are attracted to sales job. Mallin and Pullins (2009) testify that the sense of fulfilment, enjoyment and achievement increase intrinsic motivation in selling environment.

Encouraging salespeople to customer orientation and customer relationship building can increase the senses and thus also intrinsic motivation (Mallin & Pullins 2009). So, sales students could gather different type of knowledges form sales job which can develop their skills. Also, they could understand the different types of person’s emotion and feelings when

they interact with different type of customers. It makes the work quite interesting which increases intrinsic motivation of sales students because they could feel enjoyment and satisfied to gain different type of knowledge from sales field and develop their skills.

2.2.4. Teaching Innovation

Sales students could be motivated by teaching innovation about sales career. In the educational institution, teachers motivate sales students to choose their career in sales. They show them the positive outcome and they can make the thing interesting which attracts the sales students to sales work. Teachers give lectures about sales career and its positive effects, and also about selling process. Sales students could get practical experiences about sales job from the educational institutions or sales education (Cummins et al. 2015). It could improve their knowledge about sales.

Teachers provides motivation to students by their lectures about positive impact of sales job, how to start the career in sales and why they should choose it (Cummins et al. 2015). They give tasks for sales management practices and role play which can help them in future and also, the sales students enjoy these tasks in this environment with their friends. It makes them more confident for their future career. When sales students play the role or practice about sales management, they could understand how to interact with customers, and what they need to do in sales job. So, it gives them some experiences before they start their career. It could help to develop their knowledge and skills for sales field. In some educational institutions, the teachers invite some professional experienced person or guest who have knowledge about sales and sales management (Cummins et al. 2015). Then students could learn from them about sales or sales managements. They encourage sales students to choose their career in sales. Sales students could be motivated by those people who already chose their career in sales and gain lots of achievements from sales career. When teachers give motivation to sales students about sales career then students find interests in it and they enjoy the practices and group works with their friends in the institution which increases their intrinsic motivation.

2.2.5. Appreciation and Feedback

The appreciation of work is a good way to motivate sales students. Maslow as early as 1943 proposed that human have a desire for reputation and prestige, recognition, attention, and appreciation. According to Wiley (1997) people are motivated when their work is appreciated.

People need to have feedback and recognition from their work. According to Wiley (1997) the praise is the most powerful, yet lest costly and most underused, motivational tool. The recognition is more important for people who enjoy their task and intrinsically motivated (Miao et al. 2007). Sales students need to be appreciated by teacher or supervisor when they do some sales task and also, they need feedback from their supervisor. It could increase their confidence level and motivates them intrinsically. The lack of appreciation and feedback is the major reason why sales students demotivated by sales task which effects on their confidence.