Improving the Motivation of Sales Representatives at the Schindler Corporation: Empirical Evidence from the Schindler Corporation

This master thesis was written for the Schindler Corporation. Urban mobility is Schindler’s business. Their main products are elevators, escalators and mowing walks. The company comprises the sales of new installations, maintenance, repair and mod-ernization. Concerned with the sales of new installments, service contracts, repairs and modernizations of plants are their sales representatives. Saturated markets and high competition. This is what modern sales representative’s daily business looks like. They need to be awake, fast, and at different places at the same time, since the company’s profitability stands and falls with the performance of their sales representatives for the most part. Essential for high performance is high motivation. The purpose of this master thesis is to investigate and improve employee motivation. Particularly, the motivation of sales representatives. It should be considered how to improve employee motivation and what motivates them. Furthermore, how factors like age and gender influence their motivation. For the present topic, empirical social research was conducted. To achieve the re-search aim and give answer to the research questions, quantitative research was con-ducted. Quantitative research methods are oriented to scientific research understand-ings. Individual procedures and techniques are directed to verify or falsify preformu-lated hypotheses. For an empirical approach, theoretical content is tested for specific realities using selected methods such as surveys. Explorative elements are applied in the critical literature review. Data from the sales representatives of the Schindler cor-poration was gathered with a descriptive approach through an online survey. The evaluative part in the analysis of the survey via SPSS revealed, that age and gen-der strongly influences motivational thinking of employees. While younger employees tend to focus on career related elements, older employees rate safety, flexibility and health issues higher. Furthermore, women tend to rate things like a kindergarten in company or also safety issues like a permanent contract higher than men who are more attracted by monetary incentives. Overall the highest motivator for the sales rep-resentatives are good interpersonal relations at work. This is one of the most important factors for the Schindler Corporation