• No results found

The effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment and the role of management’s non-verbal communications

N/A
N/A
Protected

Academic year: 2021

Share "The effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment and the role of management’s non-verbal communications"

Copied!
73
0
0

Bezig met laden.... (Bekijk nu de volledige tekst)

Hele tekst

(1)

1

The effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand

commitment and the role of management’s non-verbal

communications.

MSc Thesis

MSc Business Administration – Marketing Track Universiteit van Amsterdam

Name: Tom Tol Student no. 10543562

Supervisor: Dr. Karin A. Venetis Date: 25-01-2018

(2)

2

Statement of Originality

This document is written by Tom Tol who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document.

I declare that the text and the work presented in this document are original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it.

The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents.

(3)

3 Acknowledgements

This MSc thesis is written to finish my MSc Business Administration, with a specialization in Marketing, at the University of Amsterdam. The thesis is about the effectiveness of internal branding and the role of management’s non-verbal communications. Writing this thesis and conducting this study would not have been possible without any help. Therefore, I would like to thank some people who helped me during this period.

First of all, I would express my gratitude to my thesis supervisor Dr. Karin Venetis from the University of Amsterdam for her valuable advice, feedback and coaching during the process of writing this thesis.

I would also like to thank the four organizations that allowed me to spread my questionnaire to their employees. Moreover, I would like to thank the employees and other participants who engaged in this research. Without the help of this employees, this research would not be possible.

Lastly, I would express my gratitude to all the relatives who have been trying to help gathering participants in times when it was needed the most.

I hope that you will enjoy reading this thesis as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Best regards, Tom Tol

(4)

4 Abstract

Recent works have emphasized the importance of internal branding for organizations in order to enhance both brand and organizational performance. Internal branding can be defined as the activities that an organization undertakes to ensure that the brand promise is being

delivered to customers. Prior studies found that internal branding positively affects employee brand commitment. However, the effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment may be influenced by management’s non-verbal communications. Some scholars suggest that internal branding may fail when it is not complemented with the non-verbal communications of managers. This study aims to examine the role of management’s non-verbal communications in the effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment. A survey has been developed and sent to 103 Dutch speaking employees of high-service organizations. The results of this study indicate that there is a small positive effect of internal branding on employee brand commitment. Moreover, the results show that management’s non-verbal communications have a positive effect on employee brand

commitment, and have a great deal in determining employee brand commitment. Most importantly, the results show that the relationship between internal branding and employee brand commitment is moderated by management’s non-verbal communications. In other words, the effect of internal branding on employee brand commitment is stronger for higher levels of management’s non-verbal communications. This study provides new insights in internal branding and highlights the role of managers in the internal branding process.

(5)

5 Table of content

1. Introduction 8

1.1 Background 8

1.2 Research gap and research question 10

1.3 Contribution 11

1.3.1 Academic relevance 11

1.3.2 Managerial relevance 11

1.4 Outline of the thesis 12

2. Literature review 12

2.1 Corporate branding 12

2.2 Internal branding 13

2.3 Employee brand commitment 16

2.3.1 Effect of internal branding on employee brand commitment 17

2.4 Management’s non-verbal communications 18

2.4.1 Management’s communication style and employee brand

commitment 19

2.4.2 Management’s communication style and the effectiveness of

internal branding on employee brand commitment 20

3. Conceptual model and hypothesis development 21

4. Methodology 22

4.1 Method 23

4.2 Sample 23

4.3 Measures 24

4.4 Statistical procedure 25

(6)

6 5. Results 26 5.1 Response analysis 26 5.2 Pre-analysis 28 5.2.1 Frequency test 29 5.2.2 Reliability analysis 29 5.2.3 Factor analysis 30 5.2.4 Descriptive analysis 31 5.2.5 Normality check 34 5.3 Hypothesis testing 34

5.3.1 Hypothesis testing: Internal Branding 35 5.3.2 Hypothesis testing: Management’s Non-Verbal Communications 36 5.3.3 Hypothesis testing: Moderation effect of Management’s

Non-Verbal Communications 39

5.3.4 Overview of hypotheses 41

6. Discussion 42

6.1 Discussion of results 43

6.1.1. Discussion of pre-analysis results 43

6.1.2 Internal branding and employee brand commitment (H1) 45 6.1.3 Management’s non-verbal communications and employee brand

commitment (H2) 47

6.1.4 Moderating role of management’s non-verbal

communications (H3) 49

6.1.5 Results overview and research question 50

6.2 Academic and managerial implications 52

(7)

7

6.2.2 Managerial implications 53

6.3 Strengths and limitations 54

6.4 Suggestions for further research 56

7. Conclusion 58

8. References 62

9. Appendices 65

Appendix A: Measurement scale items 65

Appendix B: Survey in Qualtrics 66

Appendix C: Multicollinearity 72

(8)

8 1. Introduction

1.1 Background

In a world that is characterized by similar product offerings and imitation of product innovation, previously well positioned brands have faced customer price sensitivity, decreasing brand loyalty and weaker advertising effectiveness (Burmann, Zeplin & Riley, 2009). The brand is even more important in the service industry. Many of the world’s successful service brands have employees who are able to provide customers with a unique brand experience (Yang, Wan and Wu, 2015). Recent works have emphasized the importance of internal branding for organizations in order to enhance both brand and organizational performance (Löhndorf & Diamantopoulos, 2014; Burmann et al., 2009, Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011; Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013).

Punjaisri and Wilson (2011) define internal branding as the activities undertaken by an organization to ensure that the brand promise reflecting the embraced brand values that set customers’ expectations is enacted and delivered by employees to external stakeholders, who perceive the brand and make sense of its identity and image. According to Punjaisri and Wilson (2007; 2011), there are four major mechanisms in internal branding, namely training programs, internal communication tools, orientation programs, and group meetings. Buil, Martínez and Matute (2016) state that employees are the key audience of an internal brand management process, which seeks to promote the brand inside the organization. This

motivates and stimulates employees by providing guidelines of acceptable brand behavior for employees to emulate in their daily behaviors (Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013). Furthermore, Baker, Rapp, Meyer and Mullins (2014) state that internal branding can enhance employees’ cognitive and affective engagement with the brand, and employee behaviors towards the brand. Moreover, internal branding is seen as a potential route to acquire a sustainable

(9)

9 competitive advantage by means of building a strong brand whose positioning is extremely difficult for competitors to imitate (Burmann et al., 2009).

Recent works on internal branding have shown positive relationships between internal branding and employees’ commitment to the brand (Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013; Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011; Burmann et al., 2009; Baker et al., 2014). Brand commitment can be defined as the extent of psychological attachment of employees to the brand, which influences their willingness to exert extra effort towards reaching the brand’s goals (Burmann et al., 2009). According to Allen and Meyer (1990), there are three conceptualizations of commitment. The first one, affective commitment, is defined as employees’ emotional attachment to the

organization (Allen & Meyer, 1990; Piehler, King, Burmann & Xiong, 2016). The second conceptualization is continuance commitment, which occurs when there is a profit associated with continued participation and a cost associated with leaving the organization. The third conceptualization is normative commitment, which suggests that individuals exhibit behaviors solely because they believe it is the right and moral thing to do (Allen & Meyer, 1990).

Piehler et al. (2016), Kimpakorn and Tocquer (2010) and King and Grace (2009) amongst others, state that affective commitment is often used to conceptualize employee brand commitment. According to these authors, normative and continuance commitment are unlikely to lead to pro-brand behaviors, because they exhibit external orientations, where affective commitment is internally oriented. They claim that employees who are emotionally attached to the brand, strengthen the brand through their behavior. In addition, this emotional attachment influences employees’ behavior and their willingness to exert additional effort to achieve the organization’s goals (Kimpakorn & Tocquer, 2010).

As mentioned before, internal branding can have a positive impact on employee brand commitment (Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013; Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011; Burmann et al., 2009; Baker et al., 2014). This relationship, however, may be affected by the way management

(10)

10 communicates the brand promise (Vallaster & de Chernatony, 2006; Baker et al., 2014). Baker et al. (2014) claim that brand communication directed at employees can facilitate a variety of outcomes, amongst which brand commitment is one of them. However, the way management communicates with employees is not considered here, while this may be of great importance for the effectiveness of internal branding. Vallaster and de Chernatony (2006) suggest that managers should both verbally and non-verbally communicate with their employees in order to build the brand. According to them, non-verbal communication elements may encourage employees supporting the brand promise. Moreover, they suggest that communicating both verbally and non-verbally to employees facilitates the internal brand building processes. In addition, Terglav, Ruzzier and Kaše (2016) suggest that the way management communicates the brand promise can influence internal branding processes, and state that talk alone does not count for much if not supported with the right behavior. Or in other words, the internal branding activities may fail miserably when it is not complemented with the right non-verbal communication of managers (Vallaster & de Chernatony, 2006). This may indicate that internal branding on itself does not lead to an increase in employees’ commitment to the brand. However, these findings are not empirically tested.

1.2 Research gap and research question

Although many studies state that management’s communication style may positively affect employees’ commitment to the brand, this effect has never been empirically tested. Moreover, it is unclear whether the effectiveness of internal branding mechanisms is affected by

management’s non-verbal communications. In other words, it is unclear whether internal branding mechanisms are still effective when they are not complemented with the right non-verbal communications of managers. Therefore, this study will address this gap. This study will examine whether internal branding mechanisms solely can affect employee brand

(11)

11 commitment or that management’s pro-brand behavior is needed for internal branding to be effective. In other words, this study will examine whether management’s non-verbal

communications influences the effectiveness of internal branding mechanisms on employee brand commitment. Therefore, the research question of this study is:

What is the role of management’s non-verbal communications in the effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment?

1.3 Contribution

1.3.1 Academic relevance

This study will contribute to the existing literature by examining the impact of management’s non-verbal communications on the relationship between internal branding and employee brand commitment. Even though many scholars suggest it may have an effect on the internal branding processes, this is never been empirically tested. Moreover, the effect of

management’s non-verbal communications on employee brand commitment has never been empirically tested. The findings of this study can contribute to the internal branding literature by adding new insights on management’s communication of the brand promise and the effectiveness of internal branding mechanisms on employee brand commitment.

1.3.2 Managerial relevance

This study also has managerial implications. First, it will be helpful for management to know whether internal branding mechanisms on itself will be enough to affect employee brand commitment. Moreover, it may be useful to know whether internal branding mechanisms on itself can increase employees’ commitment to the brand, or that internal branding does not even have an effect on employee brand commitment. A second implication may be that management can consider whether or not to change their behavior in according to improve

(12)

12 employees’ brand commitment. When employees’ brand commitment is higher, employees put more effort into their work to reach the organization’s goals. This in turn can increase the strength of the brand (Kimpakorn & Tocquer, 2010; Piehler et al., 2016). So management may consider to show more pro-brand behavior to make employees more committed to the brand. A third implication may be that when the results show that internal branding only has a small effect or no effect on employees’ commitment to the brand, and this effect is

strengthened when complemented with managers’ non-verbal communications, management may consider to exhibit more non-verbal communications towards employees in order to increase employees’ brand commitment and to make the internal branding activities more effective.

1.4 Outline of the thesis

The reminder of this thesis is as follows. First, the main concepts will be discussed in detail, followed by hypotheses and a conceptual model. Second, the methodology of this study will be discussed. Third, the results of the study will be analyzed and presented, followed by an explanation. Fourth, the findings, strengths, limitations and suggestions for further research will be discussed in the discussion section. Finally, a conclusion will be formulated.

2. Literature Review 2.1 Corporate branding

A brand can be defined as a name, term, sign, symbol, design, or combination of them which is intended to identify the goods and services of a seller or a group of sellers and to

differentiate them from those of competitors (Keller, 1993). Corporate branding refers to the systematic planned management of behavior, communication and symbolism in order to realize a favorable and positive reputation with target audiences for an organization (Punjaisri

(13)

13 & Wilson, 2011; Einwiller & Will, 2002). Here, behavior relates to the behavior of employees which can determine how external stakeholders perceive the corporate brand and make sense of its identity and image. Corporate branding differs from product branding as it stresses the importance of brand values (Da Silva & Alwi, 2008). With corporate branding, all members of an organization behave in accordance with the desired brand identity. Corporate identity is defined as an organization’s strategic choices and its expression thereof (Abratt & Kleyn, 2012). Harris & de Chernatony (2001) state that there is a gap between corporate identity on the one hand, and corporate reputation on the other hand. Corporate reputation can be defined as a collective representation of a brand’s past actions developed over time and results that defines the brand’s ability to deliver valued outcomes to stakeholders (Harris & de

Chernatony, 2001; Kowalczyk & Pawlish, 2002; Abratt & Kleyn, 2012). To narrow this gap, they claim that employees have a major role here and managers can further raise their brand potential by trying to achieve greater congruence among members of the brand team and between the team and other employees (Harris & de Chernatony, 2001).

2.2 Internal branding

Employees play an important role in how external stakeholders perceive the corporate brand. According to Punjaisri and Wilson (2011), a close alignment of the employees with the brand values may provide a sustainable competitive advantage. The more employees identify with the organization, the more employees are likely to uphold that identity in their actions. This is an aim of internal branding, which is defined as the activities undertaken by an organization to make sure that the brand promise that reflects the adopted brand values is delivered by employees to external stakeholders (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011; Einwiller & Will, 2002). Such brand-management processes help employees to articulate organizational goals and objectives effectively and deliver the brand promise to customers. It motivates and stimulates the

(14)

14 employees by providing guidelines of acceptable brand behavior to emulate in their daily behaviors (Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013). Liu, Ko and Chapleo (2017) state that effective internal branding involves employees making conscious decisions to focus on transforming the brand promise into reality when interacting with customers and helps to shape customers’ perception about the organization’s brand. Moreover, internal branding creates a special emotion by allowing employees to connect to a corporate brand and go beyond the experience of other brands (Yang et al., 2015). In addition, internal branding can be seen as a potential route to acquire a sustainable competitive advantage, by means of building a strong brand whose positioning is extremely difficult for competitors to threaten or imitate (Burmann et al., 2009).

Internal branding can help organizations to ensure that the brand values that set customers’ expectations are enacted and delivered by employees (Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013; Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011). According to Löhndorf and Diamantopoulos (2014), brand-congruent behavior, which is defined as the degree to which an employee’s personal communication and appearance in a customer interaction is in line with the organization’s brand identity, can create and maintain consistent images. Terglav et al. (2016) state that effective and consistent communication that reflect the brand identity can accomplish the following. First, it enables employees to gain brand knowledge and understand the brand and supports the psychological contract between the organization and the individual employees. Moreover, it drives employee internalization of brand values. Here, brand knowledge enables employees to understand the brand and desired behaviors, and fulfillment of the psychological contract and the internalization of brand values motivate the employees to project the desired brand to customers.

Furthermore, internal branding can enhance employees’ cognitive and affective engagement with the brand, and employee behaviors towards the brand (Baker et al., 2014).

(15)

15 Additionally, successful internal branding can enhance employees’ commitment to,

identification with, and loyalty to the brand. When employees internalize brand values, they will consistently deliver the brand promise across all contact points between the company and its stakeholders (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2007). Yang et al. (2015) also found that internal

branding has a positive effect on brand commitment, and besides, more positive brand-appropriate behavior. Consequently, this can have a positive effect on the strength of the brand, which is defined as the relative power of attraction of a brand in comparison to other brands (Piehler et al., 2016; Woodside & Walser, 2006).

According to Punjaisri and Wilson (2007; 2011) and Buil et al. (2016), there are different internal branding mechanisms. The first internal branding mechanism is training. Brand-centered training implies that human resource management practices are aligned with the organization’s brand values (Buil et al., 2016). Training can help develop and reinforce employees’ brand-supporting behavior (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2007; 2011). Moreover, through brand-centered training, employees acquire the skills to bring the brand experience to

customers (Yang et al., 2015). The second internal branding mechanism is internal brand communications, which refer to the actions that seek to enhance employees’ knowledge about the personality, values, and promise of the brand (Buil et al., 2016). According to Buil et al. (2016), internal brand communications include all the messages related to the brand and the organization. Hence, an organization need to define what to communicate and also the different communication channels that will be used to spread brand messages internally. Internal brand communications can relate to daily briefings, newsletters, notice boards and logbooks (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011). A well-managed internal brand communication may help to align employees’ behavior with the corporate values and develop a workforce that is committed, loyal, and identified with organizational values and goals (Buil et al., 2016). The third internal branding mechanism is orientation. Orientation is designed for new employees

(16)

16 and can be seen as their first training program to educate them to the organization’s mission and the brand vision (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2007; 2011). The last internal branding mechanism is group meetings. Through group meetings, employees get informed about the brand mission and brand promise (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011).

2.3 Employee brand commitment

As said before, successful internal branding can have a positive impact on employees’ commitment to the brand (Matanda & Ndubisi, 2013; Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011; Burmann et al., 2009; Baker et al., 2014). Employee brand commitment can be defined as the extent of psychological attachment of employees to the brand, which influences their willingness to exert extra effort towards reaching the brand’s goals (Burmann et al., 2009). It refers to the degree employees are interested in staying with the organization (Kimpakorn & Tocquer, 2010). According to Allen and Meyer (1990), there are three conceptualizations of commitment. The first one, affective commitment, is defined as employees’ emotional attachment to the organization (Allen & Meyer, 1990; Piehler et al., 2016). These employees identify with, are involved in, and enjoy membership in the organization. Affective

commitment encompasses three interrelated components, namely identification, involvement and loyalty (Kimpakorn & Tocquer, 2010). The second conceptualization is continuance commitment, which occurs when there is a profit associated with continued participation and a cost associated with leaving the organization. The third conceptualization is normative commitment, which suggests that individuals exhibit behaviors solely because they believe it is the right and moral thing to do (Allen & Meyer, 1990). It can be defined as the totality of internalized normative pressures to act in a way that meets organizational goals and interests. Piehler et al. (2016), Kimpakorn and Tocquer (2010) and King and Grace (2009) amongst others, state that affective commitment is often used to conceptualize employee brand

(17)

17 commitment. According to them, normative and continuance commitment are unlikely to lead to pro-brand behaviors, because they exhibit external orientations, where affective

commitment is internally oriented. They claim that employees who are emotionally attached to the brand, strengthen the brand through their behavior. In addition, this emotional

attachment influences employees’ behavior and their willingness to exert additional effort to achieve the organizations’ goals (Kimpakorn & Tocquer, 2010).

When employees are committed to the brand, it can increase their brand citizenship behavior (Piehler et al., 2016). Brand citizenship behavior is defined as all employee

behaviors that are consistent with the brand identity and brand promise such that together they strengthen the brand. Piehler et al. (2016) state that employees who are emotionally attached to the brand, should strengthen the brand through their behavior. Kimpakorn and Tocquer (2010) also state that strong brands are characterized by a strong employee commitment to the brand. Another consequence of employee brand commitment is that the delivery of the brand promise to customers is being improved (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011).

2.3.1 Effect of internal branding on employee brand commitment

Prior internal branding scholars (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011; Yang et al., 2015; Burmann et al., 2009; Baker et al., 2014) claim that internal branding mechanisms have a positive impact on employee brand commitment. However, there are also suggestions that this effect may not be very strong or even absent. The mechanisms described in Punjaisri and Wilson (2011) and Buil et al. (2016) especially describe the verbal ways in which employees get informed about the brand promise and how to deliver it.

One way of communicating the brand promise is verbally. In this context, verbal communication refers to the promises and talks of managers (Terglav et al., 2016). Terglav et al. (2016) claim that consistent and repeated communication to employees are necessary in

(18)

18 order to successfully communicate the brand identity and brand promise. Vallaster and de Chernatony (2006) confirm this and add to it that open, non-contradictory and reliable communication facilitates the development of trust and credibility of the brand’s promise, which is represented by the management. However, for verbal communications to be effective, they need to be complemented by non-verbal communications. Since the internal branding mechanisms proposed by Punjaisri and Wilson (2011) and Buil et al. (2016) do not show management’s non-verbal communications, it may be proposed that the mechanisms do not result in the desired employee brand commitment. In other words, even though prior research claims that internal branding mechanisms may improve employee brand

commitment, this effect may be weak or even absent when it is not complemented with the right behavior of managers. Moreover, Vallaster and de Chernatony (2006) claim that the internal branding processes may result in failure when it is not supported with management’s non-verbal communications. Hence, it may be assumed that the positive effect of internal branding on employee brand commitment is small. Therefore, the following hypothesis is proposed:

Hypothesis 1: There is a small positive effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment.

2.4 Management’s non-verbal communications

The way in which managers communicate with their employees may not only have an effect on employee brand commitment, but also on the effectiveness of internal branding

mechanisms (Vallaster & de Chernatony, 2006; Baker et al., 2014). Vallaster and de Chernatony (2006) state that management plays an active role during the brand building process when it comes to translating the brand promise into action. They claim that management not only influences the internal brand building process via verbal

(19)

19 communication, but also through non-verbal communication. Managers frequently point out that talk does not count for much if it is not supported with the right behavior (Terglav et al., 2016). Terglav et al. (2016) suggest that if management’s talks are complemented with the right behavior, this may have a strong positive impact on employee brand commitment.

In this context, non-verbal communication refers to behaviors and interactions of managers (Terglav et al., 2016). According to Vallaster and de Chernatony (2005) and

Terglav et al. (2016), demonstrating commitment, living the brand values, and exercising trust are crucial in order to deliver the brand promise to employees. Demonstrating commitment throughout the internal branding process reflects the faith managers have in their brand vision. Managers must thoroughly understand, support, and actively demonstrate commitment to the internal branding process (Vallaster & de Chernatony, 2005). Vallaster and de Chernatony (2005) state that it is the management that must first deliver the brand’s promise in an honest rather than in a forced or artificial way. By not just talking about these values but instead living them, employees appreciate how honest these values are and are therefore more likely to be committed to deliver them. Living the brand encourages the development of trust and respect amongst employees. In addition, Terglav et al. (2016) and Vallaster and de

Chernatony (2005) highlight the importance of trusting and enabling the employees. Vallaster and de Chernatony (2005) state that commitment and identification with the brand’s values and practices may be enhanced through the active involvement and participation of employees who deliver the brand promise. This implies giving up some control, or in other words,

trusting the employees. Brand managers trust that everybody in the organization is determined to live the brand values and knows how to turn challenges into opportunities.

(20)

20 As mentioned above, the communication style of managers can have a critical impact on brand-building processes. Terglav et al. (2016) suggest that if management’s talks are complemented with the right behavior, this may have a positive impact on employee brand commitment. So by demonstrating commitment, living the brand values, and trusting and enabling employees, it is assumed that it enhances employee brand commitment (Vallaster & de Chernatony, 2005; 2006). Therefore, the following hypothesis is proposed:

Hypothesis 2: There is a positive effect of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications on Employee Brand Commitment.

2.4.2 Management’s non-verbal communications and the effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment.

Morhart, Herzog and Tomczak (2009) state that managers can have an impact on employees’ brand-building behaviors. In addition, Terglav et al. (2016) and Vallaster and de Chernatony (2006) suggests that managers play an active role in translating the brand promise into action through verbal and non-verbal communication. More specific, Terglav et al. (2016) state that effective and consistent communication that reflects the brand identity can accomplish higher levels of employee brand commitment, by enable employees to gain brand knowledge and understand the brand, uphold the psychological contract between the organization and the employees, and by driving employee internalization of brand values. They claim that open, non-contradictory and reliable communication facilitates the development of trust and the credibility of the brand promise. Moreover, Vallaster and de Chernatony (2005) suggest that managers must thoroughly understand, support, and actively demonstrate commitment to the internal branding process.

Although no study has empirically examined the effect of management’s communication style on the effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand

(21)

21 commitment, different authors suggest that it may be of great importance that the verbal communications, through internal branding mechanisms, need to be complemented with non-verbal communications, by management, in order for brand-building processes to be effective (Baker et al., 2014; Terglav et al., 2016; Vallaster & de Chernatony, 2005; 2006).

Specifically, the effect of management’s non-verbal communications on the relationship between internal branding and employee brand commitment has never been empirically examined. But, based on studies of Vallaster and de Chernatony (2005; 2006) and Terglav et al. (2016) which suggest that both verbal and non-verbal communications are needed to improve brand-building processes, the following hypothesis is proposed:

Hypothesis 3: The relationship between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment is moderated by Management’s Non-Verbal Communications, so that the effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment is stronger for higher levels of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications.

3. Conceptual model and hypothesis development

This study will examine the role of management’s non-verbal communications in the effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment. To answer the research question, three hypotheses are developed in the prior sections based on existing literature.

The conceptual framework for this study is shown in figure 1. The first hypothesis is developed to confirm previous literature that employee brand commitment is positively affected by internal branding mechanisms and to look whether this effect is small because it only represents management’s verbal communications towards employees. The second hypothesis is developed to empirically test the fact that management’s non-verbal communications positively affects employee brand commitment. The third hypothesis is developed to test whether the non-verbal communications of managers are crucial for the

(22)

22 effectiveness of internal branding on employee brand commitment. In other words, is internal branding still effective when it is not complemented with the right behaviors of managers?

In this conceptual framework, Internal Branding is the independent variable and Employee Brand Commitment the dependent variable. Management’s Non-Verbal

Communications is the moderator variable, which is proposed to influence the relationship between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment.

Figure 1: Conceptual model

Hypothesis 1: There is a small positive effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment.

Hypothesis 2: There is a positive effect of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications on Employee Brand Commitment.

Hypothesis 3: The relationship between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment is moderated by Management’s Non-Verbal Communications, so that the effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment is stronger for higher levels of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications.

4. Methodology

In this chapter, the methods being used to conduct this study will be discussed. First, the research method will be discussed. Secondly, the sample and its characteristics will be

Management’s Non-Verbal Communications Internal Branding Employee Brand Commitment H1 H2 H3

(23)

23 explained. Third, the variables that are used in the study and their measurements will be addressed. Consequently, the statistical procedure of this study will be discussed. Finally, the limitations and strengths of this methodology will be addressed.

4.1 Method

This research uses a deductive approach, where theory will be tested by collecting

quantitative data. The role of management’s non-verbal communications in the relationship between internal branding and employee brand commitment will be explained, and therefore this study is explanatory of nature. To answer to research question, a correlational research design will be used. A survey will be developed to collect the cross-sectional data. This data collection method is chosen because it gives the opportunity to collect a large amount of data in a relatively short timeframe (Saunders, Lewis & Thornhill, 2009). A questionnaire for employees of high-service organizations will be developed in Qualtrics, and will consequently be sent digitally to the HR or Marketing department of high-service organizations, which can send it to the employees, and to individual employees. The outline of this survey can be found in Appendix B.

4.2 Sample

The research population of this study consists of Dutch employees working at high-service organizations. The respondents are selected by contacting HR or Marketing departments of at least 10 organizations. However, because it is difficult to get access to companies, individual employees are also contacted in case organizations will not give access. In other words, both a purposive non-probability and a convenience sampling technique are used in order to collect participants.

(24)

24 This research strives for as many respondents as possible. At least 100 respondents are needed to ensure the dataset is large enough to analyze. Prior research in internal branding and employee brand commitment showed different response rates, ranging from 29% (Morhart et al., 2009) to 36,6% (Buil et al., 2016) to 82,52% (Yang, Wan & Wu, 2015) to 88,15% (Kimpakorn & Tocquer, 2010). Therefore, it is not exactly clear what response rate to predict, but a response rate of above 50% would seem to be acceptable.

4.3 Measures

In the questionnaire, all respondents will be asked for their gender (nominal variable), age, tenure, work experience (ratio variables), position, line in organization (nominal variables), and educational background (ordinal variable). These variables will be the control variables in the study, since previous research examined that these factors may have an impact on

employee brand commitment (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011). For the other constructs, existing and validated measurement scales will be used on a Likert scale at interval level. The questionnaire will be administered in Dutch, so all the items are translated by using a direct translation technique. The list with measurement scale items and their translations can be found in Appendix A.

Internal Branding will be measured by 3 items from Buil, Martínez and Matute’s (2016) Internal Brand Communications scale and 3 items from their Brand-Centred Training scale, with a composite reliability index (CRI) of 0.885 and 0.937 respectively. This will be complemented with 7 items of Punjaisri and Wilson’s (2011) scale, with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.828 and will be measured on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). An example of an item of this scale is ‘’The organization communicates the brand values to me via informal channels (e.g. meetings, briefings, presentations, etc.)’’.

(25)

25 To measure Employee Brand Commitment, 8 items from Allen and Meyer’s (1990) affective commitment scale are used, with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.87, and will be measured on a 7-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree). An example of an item of this scale is ‘’I would be very happy to spend the rest of my career with this organization’’.

Management’s Non-Verbal Communications will be measured by using Morhart, Herzog and Tomczak’s (2009) transformational leadership scale, shortened to 10 items, with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.95, on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). An example of an item of this scale is ‘’My management lives our corporate brand in ways that build my respect’’.

4.4 Statistical procedure

After the data collection with Qualtrics, the data will be exported and analyzed by using SPSS. This section describes what statistical analyses will be conducted in order to test the hypotheses of this study.

Before analyzing the data, a frequency test will be conducted to see whether there are errors in the dataset. Next, by means of the frequency tables, missing data will be dealt with. For the responses to the Internal Branding questions, a score of 6, which stands for ‘not applicable’, will be considered as missing data. Moreover, a score of -99 will be assigned to all the other missing data. Next, reliability analyses will be conducted to examine the consistency of the measurements. Here, Cronbach’s alpha will be computed for Internal Branding, Management’s Non-Verbal Communications and Employee Brand Commitment. After the reliability analyses, a principal axis factor analysis will be conducted on Internal Branding, Employee Brand Commitment and Management’s Non-Verbal Communications. This analysis will be conducted in order to evaluate the goodness of the scales and to check whether items of the different scales show cross-loadings. Next, scale means will be

(26)

26 computed and a descriptive analysis will be conducted to examine their means, standard deviations and correlations. As a final preliminary step, a normality check will be conducted to test for skewness and kurtosis.

After preparing the dataset, the hypotheses of the study will be tested. To test hypothesis 1 and 2, a hierarchical multiple regression analysis will be conducted. The moderating effect of hypothesis 3 will be tested by ‘Process’ in SPSS. In these analyses, gender, age, tenure, work experience, position, line in organization, and educational background will be the control variables.

4.5 Limitations and strengths

This quantitative study will use surveys to gather the data in a cross-sectional setting. This data collection technique gives the opportunity to collect a large amount of data in a relatively short timeframe. Hence, as a result, it might be difficult to infer causal relationships between the constructs. Another limitation of this study is that a convenience non-probability sampling technique restraints generalizability of the results. Furthermore, because only employees will be participating in the survey, the use of self-reported measures can result in common method bias. In other words, this can result in an overestimation of the strengths of relationships (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, & Podsakoff, 2012). By asking participants to answer the questions in an honest way and highlighting the anonymity of the survey, it is tried to minimize the common method bias.

5. Results 5.1 Response analysis

For this research, the HR and/or Marketing departments of different organizations were contacted. In total, 25 companies were sent an e-mail and/or being called in order to get

(27)

27 access to employees’ e-mail addresses and to send an e-mail with an anonymous link to the survey. Of this 25 companies, 4 companies were willing to participate in the research. The other 21 companies gave a variety of reasons why not to participate in the study, such as lack of time, no interest in participating, own internal branding researches, or simply no reaction at all. The 4 companies who were willing to participate, consisted of a project management consultancy company, a mortgage company, an accounting consultancy company, and an insurance company. Other respondents were collected by asking connections on LinkedIn that work in high-service organizations to fill in the questionnaire.

This resulted in a sample of 103 Dutch speaking respondents, of which 56.3% were male and 43.7% female. The average age of the respondents varied between 25 and 44 and had on average a higher educational degree or a university degree. On average, respondents had 5 to 10 year work experience and were working on average 0 to 5 years at the

organization in which they currently work. Moreover, 68% of the respondents had an

operational position in the organization, and 68,9% of the sample works daily with customers. The distribution of age, education, work experience, tenure, position and line in organization can be found in table 1.

This table shows that especially higher educated respondents participated in the study. Although it was not the purpose of this research to select highly educated participants, the results show that 98.1% of the participants has a HBO or WO degree. This may be explained by the fact that high-service organizations, such as accountancy agencies and consultancy agencies, have on average highly educated people working in their company. Future research could investigate also lower educated participants. According to the table, 68% of the

participants worked in an operational role. This could be explained by the fact that a substantial part of the participants are aged between 18 and 34. Further research could investigate a more diverse sample to make the sample more generalizable.

(28)

28 5.2 Pre-analysis

Before analyzing the dataset, some preliminary test are being undertaken. These steps are being described in the following subsections.

Table 1: Sample distributions

Frequency Percent Gender - Male 58 56,3% - Female 45 43,7% Age - 18-24 17 16,5% - 25-34 42 40,8% - 35-44 20 19,4% - 45-54 17 16,5% - 55-64 7 6,8% Education

- Intermediate vocational education (MBO) 2 1,9% - Higher Vocational Education (HBO) 54 52,4%

- University (WO) 47 45,6%

Work Experience

- 0-5 years 46 44,7%

- 5-10 years 14 13,6%

- 10-20 years 21 20,4%

- More than 20 years 22 21,4%

Tenure

- 0-5 years 69 67,0%

- 5-10 years 11 10,7%

- 10-20 years 18 17,5%

- More than 20 years 5 4,9%

Position - Operational 70 68,0% - Management 17 16,5% - Executive 4 3,9% - Other 12 11,7% Line In Organization Front office 71 68,9% Back office 24 23,3% Other 8 7,8%

(29)

29 5.2.1 Frequency test

First, a frequency test was conducted to see whether there were errors in the dataset. This test showed that there were no errors in the dataset. This test also shows that there was some missing data present in the dataset. Since a score of 6 for internal branding would affect the results, a score of 6 is being considered as missing data. The cases with a score of 6 for internal branding items and -99 for all the items, were deleted from the dataset in order to keep the analyses reliable and valid. A total of 17 cases were considered as missing data. Hence, analyses were conducted based on 86 valid cases.

5.2.2 Reliability analysis

After cleaning the dataset and dealing with missing values, reliability analyses were conducted to examine the consistency of the measures (Saunders et al., 2009). Reliability analyses were conducted for Internal Branding, Management’s Non-Verbal Communications and Employee Brand Commitment.

The Internal Branding scale has a high internal consistency, with Cronbach’s Alpha = 0.852. The corrected item-total correlations indicate that 11 of the 13 items of the Internal Branding scale have a good correlation with the total score of the scale (score of above 0.30). The other two items show a corrected item-total correlation of 0.080 and 0.237. However, when removing this two items from the Internal Branding scale, Cronbach’s alpha would not increase substantially (difference less than 0.10).

Management’s Non-Verbal Communications also shows a high internal consistency, with Cronbach’s Alpha = 0.894. Here, the corrected item-total correlations of all items have a good correlation with the total score of the scale (all scores above 0.30). Moreover, none of the items would affect Cronbach’s Alpha substantially if they were deleted.

(30)

30 Finally, the Employee Brand Commitment scale shows a high internal consistency too, with Cronbach’s Alpha = 0.884. The corrected item-total correlations of all items have a good correlation with the total score of the scale (all scores above 0.30) and Cronbach’s Alpha would not substantially be affected when an item would be deleted from the scale.

5.2.3 Factor analysis

A principal axis factoring analysis (PAF) is conducted to evaluate the goodness of the scales and to examine if there are similarities between some variables. The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure verified the sampling adequacy for the analysis, with KMO = 0.817. Bartlett’s test of sphericity ꭓ² (465) = 1660.041, p <0.001, indicated that correlations between items were sufficiently large for the principal axis factoring analysis.

An initial analysis was conducted to obtain eigenvalues for each component in the data. The three components had initial eigenvalues over Kaiser’s criterion of 1 and explained 51.81% of the variance. In agreement with Kaiser’s criterion, examination of the scree plot showed a levelling off after the third factor. Therefore, three factors were retained and rotated with an Oblimin with Kaiser normalization rotation. Table 2 shows the factor loadings after rotation. The items that cluster on the same factors suggest that factor 1 represents

Management’s Non-Verbal Communications, factor 2 Employee Brand Commitment, and factor 3 Internal Branding. As the results suggest, MNVC_4 and MNVC_5 show high cross-loadings on the factor of EBC as well. Moreover, the results show that some items of IB have high loadings on MNVC as well, which could be due to the content of the items.

(31)

31 5.2.4 Descriptive analysis

Before conducting a descriptive analysis, scale means are computed and coded as IBTOT, MNVCTOT and EBCTOT. After computing scale means, a descriptive analysis is conducted, followed by a correlation analysis. The means, standard deviations, correlations and

Cronbach’s Alpha are presented in table 3. Table 2: Factor Analysis

Rotated Factor Loadings

Item MNVC EBC IB IB_1 .36 .05 .21 IB_2 .01 .20 .10 IB_3 -.11 .00 .40 IB_4 .68 -.19 .17 IB_5 .39 .01 .42 IB_6 .52 -.30 .32 IB_7 .39 -.14 .42 IB_8 .10 .12 .44 IB_9 .12 .08 .69 IB_10 .59 .02 .19 IB_11 .28 .00 .42 IB_12 .15 .06 .58 IB_13 .65 -.10 .31 MNVC_1 .56 .10 -.05 MNVC_2 .31 .22 .35 MNVC_3 .68 .05 -.02 MNVC_4 .42 .47 .01 MNVC_5 .67 0.50 .02 MNVC_6 .85 .18 -.21 MNVC_7 .71 .21 -.26 MNVC_8 .77 -.03 .14 MNVC_9 .46 .21 -.14 MNVC_10 .58 .09 .20 EBC_1 .23 .55 .14 EBC_2 .34 .50 -.06 EBC_3 -.13 .50 .17 EBC_4 .14 .56 -.13 EBC_5 .11 .78 -.03 EBC_6 .03 .88 .05 EBC_7 -.11 .83 -.08 EBC_8 .08 .83 -.11 Eigenvalues 10.06 4.23 1.78 % of variance 32,44 13.64 5.74

(32)

32 One of the main findings from the correlational matrix presented in table 3 is that Internal Branding is significantly correlated to both Management’s Non-Verbal

Communication (r = 0.67, p < 0.01) and Employee Brand Commitment (r = 0.23, p < 0.05). This results indicate that Internal Branding and Management’s Non-Verbal Communications are strongly related to each other, meaning that when Internal Branding is higher,

Management’s Non-Verbal Communications will be higher too. The results also indicate that when Internal Branding is higher, Employee Brand Commitment will be higher too. This correlation, however, is weaker than the correlation between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment. Moreover, the correlational matrix shows that Management’s Non-Verbal Communications is significantly correlated to Employee Brand Commitment (r = 0.55, p < 0.01). This indicates that when Management’s Non-Verbal Communications increase or decrease, Employee Brand Commitment will probably follow the same path.

Another important finding in this correlational matrix is that Work Experience correlates significantly with the other variables. Moreover, the correlation coefficients with the other variables is moderate to high. It is expected that Work Experience has a great deal determining the effectiveness of other variables. In other words, it is expected that

multicollinearity exists between Work Experience and the other variables in the model. Multicollinearity can be described as high correlations among the constructs (Grewal, Cote & Baumgartner, 2004). In the regression analyses (see section 5.3.1 and 5.3.2), a

multicollinearity check will be performed. When variables show a variance inflation factor (VIF) of higher than 5, this indicates a large multicollinearity problem (Yu, Jiang & Land, 2015). In case Work Experience shows a VIF score of higher than 5, Work Experience will be removed from the regression analysis in order to increase the reliability of the model.

(33)

33 T abl e 3: Mea ns, Sta ndar d Dev iati ons , Co rrel ati ons and Cro nbac h' s A lpha Var iab les M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 1. Gen der 1. 44 0. 50 -2. A ge 3. 59 1. 17 -0. 13 -3. Edu cati on 6. 41 0. 54 0. 15 -0. 41* * -4. Wor k Ex peri ence 2. 20 1. 21 -0. 24* 0. 88* * -0. 47* * -5. T enur e 1. 63 0. 96 -0. 12 0. 71* * -0. 41* * 0. 70* * -6. P osi tion 1. 51 0. 94 0. 04 0. 32* * -0. 04 0. 32* * 0. 27* -7. Li ne in Org ani zati on 1. 35 0. 61 -0. 09 0. 15 -0. 12 0. 12 0. 06 0. 38* * -8. Inte rnal Bran di ng 3. 56 0. 63 0. 00 0. 00 -0. 03 0. 12 0. 01 -0. 16 0. 05 (0. 85) 9. Man ag eme nt' s Non -V erbal Co mm uni cati on 3. 89 0. 70 0. 01 -0. 01 -0. 01 -0. 04 0. 03 -0. 10 0. 13 0. 67* * (0. 89) 10. Em pl oyee Bran d Co mm itme nt 5. 33 0. 84 -0. 04 0. 23* -0. 21 0. 16 0. 34* * 0. 07 -0. 10 0. 23* 0. 55* * (0. 88) *. Co rrel ati on is si gni fi cant at the 0. 05 level (2-ta iled) **. Co rrel ati on is si gni fi cant at the 0. 01 level (2-ta iled)

(34)

34 5.2.5 Normality check

The last preliminary step before testing the hypotheses is the normality check. Here, it is examined whether the data is normally distributed. To test for normality, a skewness and kurtosis test are conducted on IBTOT, MNVCTOT and EBCTOT. Moreover, a histogram of frequencies distributions, a Kolmogorov and Smirnov test, a Shapiro-Wilk test and a Q-Q plot have been conducted to check for normality.

The skewness and kurtosis test shows that Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment are normally distributed. This is confirmed by the Q-Q plots and histograms. Although the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test shows that Employee Brand Commitment is

normally distributed, it also shows that Internal Branding is not normally distributed. This is confirmed by the Shapiro-Wilk test, which also shows significance for Employee Brand Commitment. All the tests except from the kurtosis and skewness test show that

Management’s Non-Verbal Communication is not normally distributed. The kurtosis and skewness test show that the values are in acceptable ranges. This non-normality could be due to the self-reported bias from employees, who may have been afraid to talk badly about their management, and thus talk positively about their management.

5.3 Hypothesis testing

In this section, the three previously developed hypotheses are being tested. This section describes what analyses are being conducted in order to test these hypotheses, followed by the results of these analyses. First, hypothesis 1 and 2 will be tested by using a regression

analysis, followed by the results and interpretation of the results. Next, the hypothesized interaction effect will be tested separately by using Process, followed by the results and interpretation of that results.

(35)

35 5.3.1 Hypothesis testing: Internal Branding

Hypothesis 1: There is a small positive effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment.

To test this hypothesis, a hierarchical multiple regression analysis is performed to analyze the hypothesized relationship between internal branding and employee brand commitment. More specific, a hierarchical multiple regression analysis is performed to investigate the ability of Internal Branding to predict Employee Brand Commitment, after controlling for Gender, Age, Education, Work Experience, Tenure, Position, and Line in Organization.

As the correlation matrix in section 5.2.3 shows, there are high correlations between Work Experience and the other variables. Therefore, before the regression analysis is performed, a multicollinearity check is conducted to test whether Work Experience shows multicollinearity or not. The results of this check shows that Work Experience shows a VIF score of 6.07, indicating problematic multicollinearity. In order to increase the reliability of the model, Work Experience is removed from the regression analysis. An overview of this multicollinearity check can be found in Appendix C.

In the first step of the hierarchical multiple regression, six predictors, or the control variables defined above, were entered, while Work Experience was excluded from this model. This model was not statistically significant (F (6, 79) = 2.08; p > 0.05) and explained 14% of variance in Employee Brand Commitment. In the second step of the hierarchical multiple regression analysis, Internal Branding was entered to test the effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment. This model was statistically significant (F (7, 78) = 2.73; p <0.05), and the total variance explained by the model as a whole was 20%. The introduction of Internal Branding explained an additional 6% variance in Employee Brand Commitment, after controlling for Gender, Age, Education, Tenure, Position and Line in Organization (R²

(36)

36 change = 0.06; F (1, 78) = 5.85; p <0.05). In the final model, only one out of seven predictor variables was statistically significant, with Internal Branding recording a standardized Beta value of β = 0.25 (p < 0.05). In other words, if Internal Branding increases with 1, Employee Brand Commitment will increase with 0.25 standard deviations. Table 4 provides an overview of the regression analysis.

The results of the hierarchical multiple regression analysis show that internal branding has a significant positive effect on employee brand commitment. In other words, when

organizations use more internal branding, employees’ commitment to the brand will slightly increase. Therefore, hypothesis 1 is supported, since there is a (small) positive effect of internal branding on employee brand commitment.

5.3.2 Hypothesis testing: Management’s Non-Verbal Communications

Table 4: Hierarchical Regression Model of Employee Brand Commitment

R R² Change B SE β t Step 1 0.37 0.14 1. Gender -0.00 0.18 -0.00 -0.02 2. Age -0.01 0.11 -0.02 -0.11 3. Education -0.17 0.18 -0.11 -0.90 4. Tenure 0.26 0.13 0.30 1.96 5. Position 0.04 0.11 0.05 0.41 6. Line in Organization -0.20 0.16 -0.14 -1.24 Step 2 0.44 0.20 0.06* 1. Gender -0.02 0.17 -0.01 -0.10 2. Age -0.02 0.10 -0.02 -0.16 3. Education -0.17 0.18 -0.11 -0.94 4. Tenure 0.25 0.13 0.29 1.93 5, Position 0.10 0.11 0.11 0.90 6. Line in Organization -0.24 0.16 -0.18 -1.57 7. Internal Branding 0.33 0.14 0.25* 2.42

(37)

37 Hypothesis 2: There is a positive effect of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications on Employee Brand Commitment.

Before conducting a hierarchical multiple regression analysis, a multicollinearity check was conducted in order to test the multicollinearity of Work Experience. Like in section 5.3.1, Work Experience showed a problematic VIF score (VIF = 5.53). In order to increase the reliability of the model, Work Experience is removed from the regression analysis. The results of this multicollinearity check can also be found in Appendix C.

To examine hypothesis 2, a second hierarchical multiple regression analysis is conducted in order to test the hypothesized positive effect of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications on Employee Brand Commitment. More specific, a hierarchical multiple regression analysis is performed to investigate the ability of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications to predict Employee Brand Commitment, after controlling for Gender, Age, Education, Tenure, Position, and Line in Organization.

Like in the first hierarchical multiple regression analysis, the six control variables defined above were entered. In the second step, however, was Internal Branding replaced with Management’s Non-Verbal Communications. The first model showed, of course, the same results as in section 5.3.1, and thus explained 14% of the variance in Employee Brand

Commitment and was not significant (p > 0.05). The second and final model was statistically significant (F (7, 78) = 9.71; p < 0.001), and the total variance in Employee Brand

Commitment explained by the model as a whole was 47%. The introduction of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications explained an additional 33% variance in Employee Brand Commitment, after controlling for Gender, Age, Education, Tenure, Position and Line in Organization (R² change = 0.33; F (1, 78) = 48.02; p < 0.001). In the final model, two out of seven predictor variables were statistically significant, with Management’s Non-Verbal Communications recording a higher Beta value (β = 0.59; p < 0.001) than Line in

(38)

38 Organization (β = -0.27; p < 0.01). In other words, if Management’s Non-Verbal

Communications increases with 1, Employee Brand Commitment will increase with 0.59 standard deviations. Moreover, the results show for example that employees who work in the back office, typically have lower levels of Employee Brand Commitment. Namely, if Line in Organization increases with 1, Employee Brand Commitment will decrease with 0.27

standard deviations. Table 5 provides an overview of this regression analysis.

The results of the hierarchical multiple regression analysis show that management’s non-verbal communications have a significant positive effect on employee brand

commitment. In other words, when management’s non-verbal communications increase, employees become more committed to the brand. Therefore, the regression analysis finds support for hypothesis 2, since there is a positive effect of management’s non-verbal communications on employee brand commitment.

Table 5: Hierarchical Regression Model of Employee Brand Commitment (2)

R R² Change B SE β t Step 1 0.37 0,14 1. Gender -0.00 0.18 -0.00 -0.02 2. Age -0.01 0.11 -0.02 -0.11 3. Education -0.17 0.18 -0.11 -0.90 4. Tenure 0.26 0.13 0.30 1.96 5. Position 0.04 0.11 0.05 0.41 6. Line in Organization -0.20 0.16 -0.14 -1.24 Step 2 0.68 0.47*** 0.33*** 1. Gender -0.05 0.14 -0.03 -0.34 2. Age 0.01 0.09 0.01 0.07 3. Education -0.19 0.15 -0.12 -1.29 4. Tenure 0.20 0.11 0.23 1.91 5. Position 0.15 0.09 0.17 1.73 6. Line in Organization -0.37 0.13 -0.27** -2.89

7. Management's Non-Verbal Communications 0.70 0.10 0.59*** 6.93

(39)

39 5.3.3 Hypothesis testing: Moderation effect of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications Hypothesis 3: The relationship between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment is moderated by Management’s Non-Verbal Communications, so that the effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment is stronger for higher levels of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications.

Finally, the moderating effect of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications on the

relationship between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment is being analyzed, while controlling for Gender, Age, Education, Work Experience, Tenure, Position and Line in Organization. Table 6 provides an overview of this analysis. Because ‘Process’ automatically deals with multicollinearity by mean centering Internal Branding and Management’s Non-Verbal Communications, Work Experience can be remained in this analysis.

This model explains 53.99% of the variance in Employee Brand Commitment (F (10, 75) = 8.58; p < 0.001). The regression coefficient for the interaction effect IB*MNVC is 0.27 and is significant (p < 0.05). This indicates that Management’s Non-Verbal Communications moderate the relationship between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment. In

Table 6: Analysis of the moderating effect of Management's Non-Verbal Communication

Variable Coefficient SE t p Constant 6.34 1.11 5.72 0.00 IB (X) -0.16 0.21 -0.76 0.45 MNVC (M) 0.91 0.24 3.84 0.00 IB*MNVC (XM) 0.27 0.13 2.05 0.04 Gender -0.08 0.16 -0.51 0.61 Age 0.21 0.15 1.46 0.15 Education -0.20 0.15 -1.39 0.17 Work Experience -0.24 0.14 -1.68 0.10 Tenure 0.24 0.12 1.90 0.06 Position 0.12 0.12 1.02 0.31 Line in Organization -0.34 0.12 -2.79 0.01 R² = 0.5399, p < 0.001 F (10, 75) = 8.5796

(40)

40 other words, the effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment is strengthened by Management’s Non-Verbal Communications.

This analysis also shows that Internal Branding has a negative, but not significant, effect on Employee Brand Commitment. This is in contrast with the previous regression analysis. However, because the effects are not significant, it cannot be said that internal has a negative effect on employee brand commitment. Management’s Non-Verbal

Communications, however, show a positive and significant effect, which is in line with the previous regression analysis.

Furthermore, the analysis shows that there is a significant effect of Line in

Organization on Employee Brand Commitment (Coeff = -0.34; p < 0.01). This indicates that there is a difference between people who work in the front office or in the back office. Employees who work in the back office, so without daily contact with customers, seem to experience less brand commitment than employees who work in the front office.

A closer inspection of the conditional effects of internal branding on employee brand commitment show that only for high levels of management’s non-verbal communications, the effect becomes positive. See Table 7. When probing the interactions, the slope linking internal branding and employee brand commitment is positive among low and high levels of

management’s non-verbal communications. Even though the slope is more positive for higher levels of management’s non-verbal communications, this means that for both low and high levels of management non-verbal communications, internal branding mechanisms result in a higher employee brand commitment. This slope can be found in Appendix D.

(41)

41 This results show evidence for a significant interaction effect between Management’s Non-Verbal Communications and Internal Branding. When Management’s Non-Verbal Communications increase with 1 unit, the effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment will increase with 0.27 units. Therefore, this analysis provides support for hypothesis 3. In other words, there is evidence that internal branding mechanisms are more effective when they are complemented with the non-verbal communications of managers.

5.3.4 Overview of hypotheses

Table 8 summarizes the hypotheses and the results of the statistical analysis. Figure 2 shows the significance of the tested relationships.

Table 7: Conditional effect of IB (X) on EBC (Y) at levels of MNVC (M)

MNVC Effect SE t p LLCI ULCI

-1.19 -0.4789 0.3086 -1.5519 0.1249 -1.0938 0.1359

-0.49 -0.2894 0.2408 -1.2020 0.2331 -0.7690 0.1902

0.21 -0.4401 0.1945 -0.5134 0.6092 -0.4873 0.2876

0.51 -0.0186 0.1856 -0.1003 0.9204 -0.3884 0.3512

0.61 0.0085 0.1845 0.0458 0.9636 -0.3590 0.3759

Table 8: Hypotheses and outcomes

Hypothesis Outcome

Hypothesis 1: There is a small positive effect of Internal

Branding on Employee Brand Commitment. Supported

Hypothesis 2: There is a positive effect of Management’s

Non-Verbal Communications on Employee Brand Commitment. Supported

Hypothesis 3: The relationship between Internal Branding and Employee Brand Commitment is moderated by Management’s Non-Verbal Communications, so that the effect of Internal Branding on Employee Brand Commitment is stronger for higher levels of Management’s Non-Verbal Communications.

(42)

42 6. Discussion

Previous studies have examined the importance of internal branding in delivering the brand promise. Moreover, prior research examined the effectiveness of internal branding

mechanisms on a variety of outcomes, of which employee brand commitment is one of them. However, Vallaster and de Chernatony (2005) question the effectiveness of internal branding mechanisms when they are not complemented with the non-verbal communications. Terglav et al. (2016) also highlight the importance of management’s non-verbal communications, and state that managers’ non-verbal communications may have a positive effect on employee brand commitment. However, this effect has never been empirically examined, so it still remains unclear whether non-verbal communications are important to increase employees’ brand commitment. Moreover, it has never been examined whether internal branding activities are still effective when they are not complemented with the right non-verbal communications of managers. In this study, the effectiveness of internal branding is being examined. Moreover, this study aims to find evidence for the importance of management’s non-verbal communications to both the internal branding process and to predict employee brand commitment. Management’s Non-Verbal Communications Internal Branding Employee Brand Commitment 0.25* 0.59*** 0.27*

Note: Statistical significance *p <0.05, **p <0.01, ***p < 0.001 Figure 2: Significance of relationships

(43)

43 In this chapter, the results from the analyses will be interpreted and will be discussed in detail. Moreover, a link to existing literature will be made and theoretical and managerial implications will be discussed. Furthermore, the strengths and limitations of this study will be addressed. Finally, suggestions for further research will be highlighted.

6.1 Discussion of results

6.1.1. Discussion of pre-analysis results

In the pre-analysis, a frequency test, a reliability analysis, a factor analysis, and a normality check where performed. The frequency test was conducted in order to find errors and discover missing data. Here, a score of 6 at Internal Branding was also considered as missing data. Unfortunately, 17 cases were removed from the dataset in order to keep the dataset reliable and valid. This resulted in 86 valid responses.

With this 86 cases, a reliability analysis was performed on the items of Internal Branding, Management’s Non-Verbal Communications and Employee Brand Commitment. The goal of this analysis was to prove the internal consistency of the measures, and especially the reliability of the Internal Branding scale. Since this scale consisted of multiple items from different scales (Punjaisri & Wilson, 2011; Buil et al., 2016), it was necessary to check the Cronbach’s Alpha for this measure. All the measurement scales showed a strong internal consistency. This means that this scales can be used in future studies. In particular the Internal Branding scale can be used in future studies, because internal branding can be measured on more dimensions and less interesting items are being kept out of the scale of Punjaisri and Wilson (2011).

However, because this scale has been put together from different measurement scales, it was necessary to do a factor analysis to check whether some items had cross-loadings with

Referenties

GERELATEERDE DOCUMENTEN

The purpose of this study was to investigate the moderating effect of industry regulations on the relationship between corporate social performance (CSP) and corporate

Now we will introduce the Erd˝ os-R´ enyi graphs and a proposition regarding the neighbourhood sizes of these graphs, which will be useful in the rest of this thesis.. 2.2 Erd˝

Labs, inquiry learning spaces (ILS), apps and learning resources will include rich meta- data on top of their content that can be used for effective filtering and recommendation..

In 2006, Wilhelm and colleagues reported on their attempt to communicate with a complete locked-in patient. Through food imagery, the patient manipulated her salivary pH and could

With Annika Bengtzon there appears to be a certain level of negotiation between her identity as a mother and her identity as a journalist, but her maintenance of and ability to

In the reflection session, participants will generally list most of the lessons that through its setup are built into the play: international trade in water-intensive products gives

convergence. In our models convergence is achieved within 5 iterations. The tables A.8 , A.9 and A.10 show the estimates for the random effects business sector and SIC code. Also

The post-surgical histopathological assessment of the lesion revealed the presence of a 15 mm, grade 2 (on the Bloom-Richardson scale), infiltrating