This study attempts to answer the question “Does psychological capital drive the effort of marketers?” Using a survey data set collected from 364 marketers working for various types of firms in Ho Chi Minh City, we found that each component of psychological capital has a direct and positive impact on job effort of marketers. | 136 | Nguyễn Thị Mai Trang | 136 - 147 Does Psychological Capital Drive the Effort of Marketers? NGUYỄN THỊ MAI TRANG University of Economics and Law, Vietnam National University – HCMC ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Article history: Received: Nov. 19, 2013 Received in revised form March 12, 2014 Accepted: March 31, 2014 This study attempts to answer the question “Does psychological capital drive the effort of marketers?” Using a survey data set collected from 364 marketers working for various types of firms in Ho Chi Minh City, we found that each component of psychological capital has a direct and positive impact on job effort of marketers. These findings suggest that firms could enhance the effort of marketers in performing their job by establishing a human resource management system focusing not only the human capital but also on the psychological capital of marketers. Keywords: job effort, marketer, psychological capital JED April 2014| 137 1. INTRODUCTION Psychological capital is a type of human resources that can create competitive advantage for firms (Nguyen & Nguyen, 2012). It is defined as an individual’s psychological state of development (Luthans et al., 2005). Research has shown that psychological capital enhances job performance (Luthans et al., 2005; Luthans et al., 2008), and quality of work life (Nguyen & Nguyen, 2012). However, to the best of our knowledge, little attention has been paid to the role of psychological capital in job effort of marketers, especially in transitioning markets like Vietnam. At the marketing professional level, determining such relationships and mediators is of importance for firms. By thorough understanding of these relationships, firms are able to design appropriate personnel policies that recruit marketers with a high psychological capital, and nurture such a type of capital together with their knowledge and skills. For that reason, the purpose of this study is to investigate the role of psychological capital .
