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A General Model for Understanding Organizational Buying BehaviorAuthor(s): Frederick E. Webster, Jr. and Yoram WindSource: The Journal of Marketing, Vol. 36, No. 2 (Apr., 1972), pp. 12-19Published by: American Marketing AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1250972.

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General Mode l o rUnderstandingrganizatio uying ehaviorFREDERICK. WEBSTER,R.andYORAMWIND

The authors suggest a model of industrialand institutionalbuyingbehavioras an organizationaldecision-making process. The majordimensionsof the model are defined and someimplications or marketingstrategyare developed.

ABOUT THEAUTHORS.FrederickE. Webster, Jr. is acting associate dean,directorof the MBAprogram,and associate professorof businessadministrationf the AmosTuckSchool ofBusinessAdministration, artmouthCollege, Hanover,NewHampshire.YoramWind is associate professorof marketingatthe WhartonSchool of Financeand Commerce,Uni-versityof Pennsylvania, hiladelphia, ennsylvania.

Journal of Marketing, Vol. 36 (April, 1972), pp. 12-19.

NDUSTRIAL and institutional marketers have oftenbeen urged to base their strategies on careful ap-praisal of buying behavior within key accounts and inprincipal market segments. When they search theavailable literature on buyer behavior, however, theyfind virtually exclusive emphasis on consumers, not in-

dustrial buyers. Research findings and theoretical dis-cussions about consumer behavior often have little rele-vance for the industrial marketer. This is due to severalimportant differences between the two purchase pro-cesses. Industrial buying takes place in the context ofa formal organization influenced by budget, cost, andprofit considerations. Furthermore, organizational (i.e.,industrial and institutional) buying usually involvesmany people in the decision process with complex inter-actions among people and among individual and organi-zational goals.Similar to his consumer goods counterpart, the indus-trial marketer could find a model of buyer behavioruseful in identifying those key factors influencing re-sponse to marketing effort. A buyer behavior modelcan help the marketer to analyze available informationabout the market and to identify the need for additionalinformation. It can help to specify targets for market-ing effort, the kinds of information needed by variouspurchasing decision makers, and the criteria that theywill use to make these decisions. A framework foranalyzing organizational buying behavior could aid inthe design of marketing strategy.The model to be presented here is a general model.It can be applied to all organizational buying and suf-fers all the weaknesses of general models. It does notdescribe a specific buying situation in the richness ofdetail required to make a model operational, and itcannot be quantified. However, generality offers acompensating set of benefits. The model presents acomprehensive view of organizational buying that en-ables one to evaluate the relevance of specific variablesand thereby permits greater insight into the basic pro-cesses of industrial buying behavior. It identifies theclasses of variables that must be examined by any stu-dent of organizational buying, practitioner, or academi-cian. Although major scientific progress in the studyof organizational buying will come only from a carefulstudy of specific relationships among a few variables

12

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A General Model for UnderstandingOrganizationalBuying Behavior 13within a given class, this general model can help toidentify those variables that should be studied. It canbe useful in generating hypotheses and provides aframework for careful interpretation of research resultsthat makes the researcher more sensitive to the complexi-ties of the processes he is studying.

TraditionalViewsTraditional views of organizational buying have lacked

comprehensiveness. The literature of economics, pur-chasing, and, to a limited degree, marketing has em-phasized variables related to the buying task itself andhas emphasized rational, economic factors. In theseeconomic views, the objective of purchasing is to obtainthe minimum price or the lowest total cost-in-use (as inthe materials management model'). Some of the modelsfocussing on the buying task have emphasized factorsthat are not strictly economic such as reciprocal buy-ing agreements2 and other constraints on the buyer suchas source loyalty.3Other traditional views of organizational buying errin the opposite direction, emphasizing variables suchas emotion, personal goals, and internal politics thatare involved in the buying decision process but notrelated to the goals of the buying task. This nontaskemphasis is seen in models which emphasize the pur-chasing agent's interest in obtaining personal favors,4in enhancing his own ego,5 or in reducing perceivedrisk.6 Other nontask models have emphasized buyer-salesman interpersonal interaction7 and the multiplerelationships among individuals involved in the buyingprocess over time.8 The ways in which purchasingagents attempt to expand their influence over the buy-ing decision have also received careful study.9 These

TABLE1CLASSIFICATION AND EXAMPLES OF VARIABLES INFLUENCING

ORGANIZATIONAL BUYING DECISIONS

Task NontaskIndividual desire to obtain personalvalueslowest price and needsSocial meetings to set informal, off-the-specifications job interactions

policy regarding methodsofOrganizational local supplier personnelpreference evaluationEnvironmental anticipated political climatechangesin prices in an election year

views have contributed to an understanding of the buy-ing process, but none of them is complete. To theextent that these models leave out task or nontaskvariables they offer incomplete guidelines for the indus-trial market strategist and researcher. The tendencyin interpreting research results based on these simplemodels is to overemphasize the importance of some vari-ables and to understate or ignore the importance ofothers.

An Overview of a General ModelThe fundamental assertion of the more comprehen-sive model to be presented here is that organizationalbuying is a decision-making process carried out by in-dividuals, in interaction with other people, in the con-text of a formal organization.'o The organization, inturn, is influenced by a variety of forces in the environ-ment. Thus, the four classes of variables determiningorganizational buying behavior are individual, social,organizational, and environmental. Within each class,there are two broad categories of variables: Those di-rectly related to the buying problem, called task vari-ables; and those that extend beyond the buying problem,called nontask variables. This classification of variablesis summarized and illustrated in Table 1.The distinction between task and nontask variablesapplies to all of the classes of variables, and subclasses,to be discussed below. It is seldom possible to identify

a given set of variables as exclusively task or nontask;rather, any given set of variables will have both taskand nontask dimensions although one dimension may bepredominant. For example, motives will inevitably haveboth dimensions-those relating directly to the buyingproblem to be solved and those primarily concerned withpersonal goals. These motives overlap in many impor-tant respects and need not conflict; a strong sense ofpersonal involvement can create more effective buyingdecisions from an organizational standpoint.Organizational buying behavior is a complex process(rather than a single, instantaneous act) and involvesmany persons, multiple goals, and potentially conflicting

1Dean S. Ammer, Materials Management (Homewood,Illinois: Richard D. Irwin, Inc., 1962), pp. 12 and 15.2Dean S. Ammer, Realistic Reciprocity, Harvard Busi-ness Review, Vol. 40 (January-February,1962), pp. 116-124.3Yoram Wind, Industrial Source Loyalty, Journal ofMarketing Research,Vol. 7 (November, 1970), pp. 450-457.4For a statement of this view, see J. B. Matthews,Jr., R.D. Buzzell, T. Levitt, and R. Frank,Marketing: An Intro-ductory Analysis (New York: McGraw-HillBook Com-pany, Inc., 1964), p. 149.5For an example, see William J. Stanton, Fundamentalsof Marketing,SecondEd. (New York: McGraw-HillBookCompany,Inc., 1967), p. 150.

6Theodore Levitt, Industrial Purchasing Behavior: AStudy of Communications Effects (Boston: Division ofResearch, Graduate School of Business Administration,Harvard University, 1965).7Henry L. Tosi, The Effects of Expectation Levels andRole Consensuson the Buyer-Seller Dyad, Journal ofBusiness, Vol. 39 (October,1966), pp. 516-529.8Robert E. Weigand, Why Studying the PurchasingAgent is Not Enough, JOURNALOF MARKETING,ol. 32(January, 1968), pp. 41-45.9George Strauss, Tactics of Lateral Relationship, Ad-ministrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 7 (September, 1962),pp. 161-186.10The complete model is presented and discussed in detailin Frederick E. Webster, Jr. and Yoram Wind, Organi-zational Buying Behavior (Englewood Cliffs, New Jer-sey: Prentice-Hall, Inc., in press).

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14 Journal of Marketing,April, 1972decision criteria. It often takes place over an extendedperiod of time, requires information from many sources,and encompasses many interorganizational relationships.The organizational buying process is a form of prob-lem-solving, and a buying situation is created whensomeone in the organization perceives a problem-adiscrepancy between a desired outcome and the presentsituation-that can potentially be solved through somebuying action. Organizational buying behavior includesall activities of organizational members as they definea buying situation and identify, evaluate, and chooseamong alternative brands and suppliers. The buyingcenter includes all members of the organization who areinvolved in that process. The roles involved are those ofuser, influencer, decider, buyer, and gatekeeper (whocontrols the flow of information into the buying center).Members of the buying center are motivated by a coim-plex interaction of individual and organizational goals.Their relationships with one another involve all thecomplexities of interpersonal interactions. The formalorganization exerts its influence on the buying centerthrough the subsystems of tasks, structure (communica-tion, authority, status, rewards, and work flow), tech-nology, and people. Finally, the entire organization isembedded in a set of environmental influences includingeconomic, technological, physical, political, legal, andcultural forces. An overview of the model and a dia-grammatic presentation of the relationships among thesevariables are given in Figure 1.

EnvironmentalnfluencesEnvironmental influences are subtle and pervasive aswell as difficult to identify and to measure. They in-fluence the buying process by providing information aswell as constraints and opportunities. Environmentalinfluences include physical (geographic, climate, orecological), technological, economic, political, legal, andcultural factors. These influences are exerted through avariety of institutions including business firms (sup-pliers, competitiors, and customers), governments,trade unions, political parties, educational and medicalinstitutions, trade associations, and professional groups.The nature of these institutional forms will vary signifi-cantly from one country to another, and such differencesare critical to the planning of multinational marketingstrategies.As Figure 1 illustrates, environmental influences havetheir impact in four distinct ways. First, they definethe availability of goods and services. This functionreflects especially the influence of physical, technologi-cal, and economic factors. Second, they define the gen-eral business conditions facing the buying organizationincluding the rate of economic growth, the level of na-tional income, interest rates, and unemployment. Eco-nomic and political forces are the dominant influences

on general business conditions. Some of these forces,such as economic factors, are predominantly (but notexclusively) task variables whereas others such as politi-cal variables may be more heavily nontask in nature.

Third, environmental factors determine the values andnorms guiding interorganizational and interpersonal re-lationships between buyers and sellers as well as amongcompetitors, and between buying organizations and otherinstitutions such as governments and trade associations.Such values and norms may be codified into laws, or theymay be implicit. Cultural, social, legal, and politicalforces are the dominant sources of values and norms.Finally, environmental forces influence the informationflow into the buying organization. Most important hereis the flow of marketing communications from potentialsuppliers, through the mass media and through otherpersonal and impersonal channels. Information flowsreflect a variety of physical, technological, economic, andcultural factors.

The marketing strategist, whose customers are or-ganizations, must carefully appraise each set of envir-onmental factors and identify and analyze the institu-tions that exert those influences in each of the marketsegments served. This kind of analysis is especiallyimportant in entering new markets. For example, eco-nomic factors as revealed in measures of general busi-ness conditions must be continually assessed where mar-ket prices fluctuate and buyers make decisions to buildor reduce inventories based on price expectations. Simi-larly, the impact of technological change in marketsserved must be considered as the basis for strategicdecisions in the areas of product policy and promotion.The necessity of analyzing institutional forms is mostreadily apparent when markets are multinational inscope and require specific consideration of governmentpolicies and trade union influences. Environmental fac-tors are important determinants of organizational buy-ing behavior, but they can be so basic and pervasive thatit is easy, and dangerous, to overlook them in analyzingthe market.

OrganizationalInfluencesOrganizational factors cause individual decision mak-ers to act differently than they would if they were func-tioning alone or in a different organization. Organiza-tional buying behavior is motivated and directed by theorganization's goals and is constrained by its financial,

technological, and human resources. This class of vari-ables is primarily task-related. For understanding theinfluence of the formal organization on the buyingprocess, Leavitt's classification of variables is most help-ful.11 According to Leavitt's scheme, organizations aremultivariate systems composed of four sets of interact-ing variables:Tasks-the work to be performed in accomplishing theobjectives of the organization.Structure-subsystems of communication, authority,status, rewards, and work flow.

1 Harold J. Leavitt, Applied OrganizationChangein In-dustry: Structural, Technical, and Human Approaches,in New Perspectives in Organization Research, W. W.Cooper,H. J. Leavitt, and M. W. Shelly, II, eds. (NewYork: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1964), pp. 55-71.

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A General Model for UnderstandingOrganizationalBuying Behavior 15

Suppliers Customers Government LaborUnions Trade Professional Other OtherSocialAssociations Groups Business Firms Institutions

Information about Suppliers Availability of General Business Values and Norms(MarketingCommunications) Goodsand Services Conditions

ORGANIZATIONAL ORGANIZATIONAL ORGANIZATIONAL ORGANIZATIONALTECHNOLOGY STRUCTURE GOALS & TASKS ACTORS

TECHNOLOGY ORGANIZATIONOF MEMBERSOF THERELEVANTFOR THE BUYINGCEN- BUYINGTASKS BUYINGCENTERTER ANDTHE PUR-PURCHASING CHASINGFUNCTION

Technological MemberConstraints& Group Group CharacteristicsTechnology Structure Tasks & Goals,Available o Leadershipthe Group

ACTIVITIES INTERACTIONS SENTIMENTS[oMM-

ACTIVITIES INTERACTIONS SENTIMENTS

BUYINGDECISIONS

1. Individual 2. GroupBUYING DECISION PROCESS Decision- DecisionMaking Unit Making Unit

FIGURE1. A model of organizational buying behavior.

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16 Journal of Marketing,April, 1972Technology-problem-solving inventions used by thefirm including plant and equipment and programsfor organizing and managing work.People-the actors in the system.Each of these subsystems interacts with, and is de-

pendent upon, the others for its functioning. Together,these four interacting sets of factors define the informa-tion, expectations, goals, attitudes, and assumptions usedby each of the individual actors in their decision making.This general model defines four distinct but interrelatedsets of variables that must be carefully considered in thedevelopment of marketing strategies designed to in-fluence that process: buying tasks, organization struc-ture, buying technology, and the buying center.BuyingTasks

Buying tasks are a subset of organizational tasks andgoals that evolves from the definition of a buying situa-tion. These are pure task variables by definition. Thespecific tasks that must be performed to solve the buyingproblem can be defined as five stages in the buying de-cision process: (1) Identification of need; (2) establish-ment of specifications; (3) identification of alternatives;(4) evaluation of alternatives; and (5) selection of sup-pliers.12 Buying tasks can be further defined accordingto four dimensions:

(1) The organizational purpose served-e.g., whetherthe reason for buying is to facilitate production,or for resale, or to be consumed in the perform-ance of other organizational functions.(2) The nature of demand, especially whether demandfor the product is generated within the buyingorganization or by forces outside of the organiza-tion (i.e., derived demand) as well as othercharacteristics of the demand pattern such as sea-sonal and cyclical fluctuations.(3) The extent of programming; i.e., the degree ofroutinization at the five stages of the decisionprocess.(4) The degree of decentralization and the extent towhich buying authority has been delegated tooperating levels in the organization.Each of these four dimensions influences the nature ofthe organizational buying process and must be con-sidered in appraising market opportunities. At each ofthe five stages of the decision process, different membersof the buying center may be involved, different decisioncriteria are employed, and different information sources

may become more or less relevant. Marketing strategiesmust be adjusted accordingly. There are rich researchopportunities in defining the influence of different mem-

bers of the buying center at various stages of the buyingprocess.18OrganizationalStructure

The formal organizational structure consists of subsys-tems of communication, authority, status, rewards, andwork flow, all of which have important task and nontaskdimensions. Each of these subsystems deserves carefulstudy by researchers interested in organizational buying.The marketing literature does not include studies in thisarea. A beginning might be several rigorous observa-tional or case studies.

The communication subsystem performs four essentialfunctions: (1) Information; (2) command and instruc-tion; (3) influence and persuasion; and (4) integra-tion.14 The marketer must understand how the com-munication system in customer organizations informsthe members of the buying center about buying prob-lems, evaluation criteria (both task and nontask related),and alternative sources of supply. He must appraisehow commands and instructions (mostly task-related)flow through the hierarchy defining the discretion andlatitude of individual actors. The pattern of influenceand persuasion (heavily nontask in nature) defines thenature of interpersonal interactions within the buyingcenter. Organizational members may differ in the extentto which they prefer either commands and instructionsor more subtle influence and persuasion to guide theactions of subordinates. The integrative functions ofcommunication become critical in coordinating the func-tioning of the buying center and may be one of theprimary roles of the purchasing manager.The authority subsystem defines the power of organi-zational actors to judge, command, or otherwise act toinfluence the behavior of others along both task andnontask dimensions. No factor is more critical in un-derstanding the organizational buying process becausethe authority structure determines who sets goals andwho evaluates (and therefore determines rewards for)organizational performance. The authority structureinteracts with the communication structure to determinethe degree of decentralization in the decision process.

The status system is reflected in the organization chartand defines the hierarchical structure of the formalorganization. It also expresses itself in an informalstructure. Both the formal and the informal organiza-tion define each individual's position in a hierarchy with

'2A modified version of this model is presented in P. J.Robinson, C. W. Faris, and Y. Wind, Industrial Buyingand Creative Marketing (Boston: Allyn & Bacon, Inc.,1967), p. 14.

lSFor research on the influenceof organizationalactors andinformation sources at various stages of the decisionprocess, see Urban B. Ozanne and Gilbert A. Churchill,Adoption Research: Information Sources in the Indus-trial Purchasing Decision, in Marketing and the NewScience of Planning, Robert L. King, ed. (Chicago, Ill.:American Marketing Association, Fall, 1968), pp. 352-359; and Frederick E. Webster, Jr., Informal Com-munication in Industrial Markets, Journal of MarketingResearch, Vol. 7 (May, 1970), pp. 186-189.14Lee Thayer, Communicationand CommunicationSystems(Homewood, Ill.: Richard D. Irwin, Inc., 1968), pp. 187-250.

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A General Model for Understanding Organizational Buying Behavior 17respect to other individuals. Job descriptions definepositions within the organization and the associateddimensions of responsibility and authority. Knowingthe responsibility, authority, and the position in theinternal status hierarchy of each member of the buyingcenter is a necessary basis for developing an accountstrategy for the organizational customer. A completetheory of organizational buying will permit accuratepredictions of an organizational actor's influence basedupon his position and role.The rewards system defines the payoffs to the individ-ual decision maker. It is intimately related to theauthority system which determines the responsibilitiesof organizational actors for evaluating other individ-uals. Here is the mechanism for relating organizationaltask accomplishment to individual nontask objectives.Persons join organizations in anticipation of the re-wards given by the organization and agree to worktoward organizational objectives in return for those re-wards. A careful analysis of the formal and socialreward structure of the organization as it affects and isperceived by the members of the buying center can bemost helpful in predicting their response to marketingeffort. The key fact is that people work for organiza-tions in order to earn rewards related to personal goals,both economic and noneconomic.15

Every buying organization develops task-related pro-cedures for managing the work flow of paperwork,samples, and other items involved in the buying deci-sion process. The flow of paperwork also has nontaskaspects which reflect the composition of the buyingcenter as well as the authority and communication sub-systems of an organizational structure. Needless to say,marketers must understand the mechanical details ofbuying procedures. Such procedures also provide docu-mentation of the buying process that can provide usefuldata for the academic researcher.BuyingTechnology

Technology influences both what is bought and thenature of the organizational buying process itself. Inthe latter respect, technology defines the managementand information systems that are involved in the buyingdecision process, such as computers and managementscience approaches to such aspects of buying as makeor buy analysis. More obviously, technology definesthe plant and equipment of the organization, and these,in turn, place significant constraints upon the alternativebuying actions available to the organization. It is acommon failing of industrial marketing strategy, espe-cially for new product introductions, to underestimatethe demands that will be placed upon existing technologyin customer organizations.'6 A new material, for ex-ample, may require new dies and mixing equipment, new

skills of production personnel, and substantial changesin methods of production.BuyingCenter

The buying center is a subset of the organizationalactors, the last of the four sets of variables in the Lea-vitt scheme. The buying center was earlier defined asconsisting of five roles: users, influencers, deciders,buyers, and gatekeepers. Since people operate as partof the total organization, the behavior of members ofthe buying center reflects the influence of others as wellas the effect of the buying task, the organizational struc-ture, and technology.This interaction leads to unique buying behavior ineach customer organization. The marketing strategistwho wishes to influence the organizational buying processmust, therefore, define and understand the operation ofthese four sets of organizational variables-tasks,structure, technology, and actors-in each organizationhe is trying to influence. The foregoing commentsprovide only the skeleton of an analytical structurefor considering each of these factors and its impli-cations for marketing action in a specific buying situa-tion. The marketer's problem is to define the locus ofbuying responsibility within the customer organization,to define the composition of the buying center, and tounderstand the structure of roles and authority withinthe buying center.

Social (Interpersonal)InfluencesThe framework for understanding the buying decisionprocess must identify and relate three classes of vari-ables involved in group functioning in the buying center.First, the various roles in the buying center must beidentified. Second, the variables relating to interper-sonal (dyadic) interaction between persons in the buy-ing center and between members of the buying centerand outsiders such as vendors' salesmen must beidentified. Third, the dimensions of the functioning ofthe group as a whole must be considered. Each ofthese three sets of factors is discussed briefly in thefollowing paragraphs.Within the organization as a whole only a subset oforganizational actors is actually involved in a buyingsituation. The buying center includes five roles:Users-those members of the organization who use thepurchased products and services.Buyers-those with formal responsibility and author-ity for contracting with suppliers.Influencers-those who influence the decision processdirectly or indirectly by providing informationand criteria for evaluating alternative buyingactions.Deciders-those with authority to choose among al-ternative buying actions.Gatekeepers-those who control the flow of informa-tion (and materials) into the buying center.

Several individuals may occupy the same role; e.g.,there may be several influencers. Also, one individual

15Yoram Wind, A Reward-BalanceModel of Buying Be-havior in Organizations, in New Essays in MarketingTheory, G. Fisk ed. (Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 1971).16Frederick E. Webster, Jr., New Product Adoption inIndustrial Markets: A Framework for Analysis, JOUR-NALOF MARKETING,Vol. 33 (July, 1969), pp. 35-39.

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18 Journal of Marketing,April, 1972may occupy more than one role; e.g., the purchasingagent is often both buyer and gatekeeper.To understand interpersonal interaction within thebuying center, it is useful to consider three aspects ofrole performance: (1) Role expectations (prescriptionsand prohibitions for the behavior of the person occupy-ing the role and for the behavior of other persons towarda given role); (2) role behavior (actual behavior in therole); and (3) role relationships (the multiple and re-ciprocal relationships among members of the group).Together, these three variables define the individual'srole set. An awareness of each of these dimensions isnecessary for the salesman responsible for contactingthe various members of the buying center. It is espe-cially important to understand how each member expectsthe salesman to behave toward him and the importantongoing relationships among roles in the buying center.As illustrated in Figure 1, the nature of group func-tioning is influenced by five classes of variables-theindividual members' goals and personal characteristics,the nature of leadership within the group, the structureof the group, the tasks performed by the group, andexternal (organizational and environmental) influences.Group processes involve not only activities but alsointeractions and sentiments among members, which haveboth task and nontask dimensions. Finally, the outputof the group is not only a task-oriented problem solu-tion (a buying action) but also nontask satisfaction andgrowth for the group and its members.In analyzing the functioning of the buying center,it helps to focus attention on the buyer role, primarilybecause a member of the purchasing department ismost often the marketer's primary contact point withthe organization. Buyers often have authority formanaging the contacts of suppliers with other organiza-tional actors, and thus also perform the gatekeeperfunction. While the buyer's authority for selection ofsuppliers may be seriously constrained by decisions atearlier stages of the decision process (especially thedevelopment of specifications), he has responsibility forthe terminal stages of the process. In other words,the buyer (or purchasing agent) is in most cases thefinal decision maker and the target of influence attempts

by other members of the buying center.In performing their task, purchasing agents use avariety of tactics to enhance their power which varywith the specific problems, the conditions of the organi-zation, and the purchasing agent's personality. Thetactics used by purchasing agents to influence their rela-tionships with other departments can be viewed as aspecial case of the more general phenomenon of lateralrelationships in formal organizations-those amongmembers of approximately equal status in the formalorganizational hierarchy.17 These include rule-orientedtactics (e.g., appealing to the boss for the enforcementof organizational policy; appealing to rules and formalstatements of authority); rule-evading tactics (e.g.,compliance with requests from users that violate or-

ganizational policies); personal-political tactics (e.g.,reliance on informal relationships and friendships to getdecisions made and an exchange of favors with othermembers of the buying center); educational tactics(e.g., persuading other members of the organization tothink in purchasing terms and to recognize the impor-tance and potential contribution of the purchasing func-tion); and finally, organizational-interactional tactics(e.g., change the formal organizational structure and thepattern of reporting relationships and informationflows).Buyers who are ambitious and wish to extend thescope of their influence will adopt certain tactics andengage in bargaining activities in an attempt to becomemore influential at earlier stages of the buying process.These tactics or bargaining strategies define the natureof the buyer's relationships with others of equal organi-zational status and structure the social situation that

the potential supplier must face in dealing with thebuying organization. An understanding of the natureof interpersonal relationships in the buying organiza-tion is an important basis for the development of mar-keting strategy.The Influenceof the Individual

In the final analysis, all organizational buying be-havior is individual behavior. Only the individual asan individual or a member of a group can define andanalyze buying situations, decide, and act. In thisbehavior, the individual is motivated by a complex com-bination of personal and organizational objectives, con-strained by policies and information filtered through theformal organization, and influenced by other membersof the buying center. The individual is at the centerof the buying process, operating within the buying cen-ter that is in turn bounded by the formal organizationwhich is likewise embedded in the influences of thebroader environment. It is the specific individual whois the target for marketing effort, not the abstract or-ganization.The organizational buyer's personality, perceived roleset, motivation, cognition, and learning are the basicpsychological processes which affect his response to thebuying situation and marketing stimuli provided bypotential vendors. Similar to consumer markets, it isimportant to understand the organizational buyer'spsychological characteristics and especially his predis-positions, preference structure, and decision model asthe basis for marketing strategy decisions. Some initialattempts to develop categories of buying decision makersaccording to characteristic decision styles ( normativeand conservative ) have been reported.'s Cultural,

17Same reference as footnote 9.

18David T. Wilson, H. Lee Mathews, and Timothy W.Sweeney, Industrial Buyer Segmentation: A Psycho-graphic Approach, paper presented at the Fall, 1971Conferenceof the American Marketing Association. Seealso Richard N. Cardozo, Segmenting the IndustrialMarket, in Marketingand the New Science of Planning,Robert L. King ed. (Chicago: American Marketing As-sociation, 1969), pp. 433-440.

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A General Model for UnderstandingBuying Behavior 19organizational, and social factors are important influ-ences on the individual and are reflected in his previousexperiences, awareness of, attitudes and preferencetoward particular vendors and products and his par-ticular buying decision models.The organizational buyer can, therefore, be viewed asa constrained decision maker. Although the basic mentalprocesses of motivation, cognition, and learning as wellas the buyer's personality, perceived role set, preferencestructure, and decision model are uniquely individual;they are influenced by the context of interpersonal andorganizational influences within which the individual isembedded. The organizational buyer is motivated by acomplex combination of individual and organizationalobjectives and is dependent upon others for the satis-faction of these needs in several ways. These other peo-ple define the role expectations for the individual, theydetermine the payoffs he is to receive for his perform-ance, they influence the definition of the goals to bepursued in the buying decision, and they provide infor-mation with which the individual attempts to evaluaterisks and come to a decision.Task and Nontask Motives

Only rarely can the organizational buyer let purelypersonal considerations influence his buying decisions:In a situation where all other things are equal, theindividual may be able to apply strictly personal (non-task) criteria when making his final decision. In theunlikely event that two or more potential vendors offerpr6ducts of comparable quality and service at a com-parable price, then the organizational buyer may bemotivated by purely personal, nontask variables such ashis personal preferences for dealing with a particularsalesman, or some special favor or gift available fromthe supplier.The organizational buyer's motivation has both taskand nontask dimensions. Task-related motives relate tothe specific buying problem to be solved and involve thegeneral criteria of buying the right quality in the rightquantity at the right price for delivery at the right timefrom the right source. Of course, what is right is adifficult question, especially to the extent that importantbuying influencers have conflicting needs and criteria forevaluating the buyer's performance.Nontask-related motives may often be more important,although there is frequently a rather direct relationshipbetween task and nontask motives. For example, thebuyer's desire for promotion (a nontask motive) cansignificantly influence his task performance. In otherwords, there is no necessary conflict between task andnontask motives and, in fact, the pursuit of nontask ob-jectives can enhance the attainment of task objectives.Broadly speaking, nontask motives can be placed intotwo categories: achievement motives and risk-reductionmotives. Achievement motives are those related to per-

sonal advancement and recognition. Risk-reduction mo-tives are related, but somewhat less obvious, and providea critical link between the individual and the organiza-tional decision-making process. This is also a key com-ponent of the behavioral theory of the firm19 whereuncertainty avoidance is a key motivator of organiza-tional actors.The individual's perception of risk in a decision situa-tion is a function of uncertainty (in the sense of a

probabilistic assessment) and of the value of variousoutcomes. Three kinds of uncertainty are significant:Uncertainty about available alternatives; uncertaintyabout the outcomes associated with various alternatives;and uncertainty about the way relevant other personswill react to various outcomes.20 This uncertainty aboutthe reaction of other persons may be due to incompleteinformation about their goals or about how an outcomewill be evaluated and rewarded.

Information gathering is the most obvious tactic forreducing uncertainty, while decision avoidance and low-ering of goals are means of reducing the value of out-comes. A preference for the status quo is perhaps themost common mode of risk reduction, since it removesuncertainty and minimizes the possibility of negativeoutcomes. This is one explanation for the large amountof source loyalty found in organizational buying and isconsistent with the satisficing postulate of the be-havioral theory of the firm.The individual determinants of organizational buyerbehavior and the tactics which buyers are likely to usein their dealings with potential vendors must be clearlyunderstood by those who want to affect their behavior.

SummaryThis article has suggested the major dimensions andmechanisms involved in the complex organizational buy-ing process. The framework presented here is reason-ably complete although the details clearly are lacking.It is hoped that these comments have been sufficient to

suggest a general model of the organizational buyingprocess with important implications for the developmentof effective marketing and selling strategies as well assome implicit suggestions for scholarly research. Themodel is offered as a skeleton identifying the majorvariables that must be appraised in developing the in-formation required for planning strategies. Hopefully,the model has also suggested some new insights into animportant area of buying behavior presently receivinginadequate attention in the marketing literature.19Richard M. Oyert and James G. March, A BehavioralTheory of the Firm (Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice-Hall, 1963).M2Donald F. Cox, ed., Bisk Taking and Information Han-dling in Consumer Behavior (Boston: Division of Re-search,GraduateSchoolof Business Administration,Har-

vard University, 1967).