Employee critical psychological states as determinants of employee brand equity in banking: a multi-group analysis

Abstract

The objective of the study is to investigate the moderating role of affective sentiments of brand psychological ownership of an employee in the relationship among the cognitive sentiments of employee brand understanding and employee brand equity of conventional and Islamic banks. Survey method was adopted to collect data from respondents from conventional and Islamic banks. Data were collected from 279 employees from the banking sector using two-stage probability sampling. Disproportionate stratified random sampling and simple random sampling were employed to collect responses. To analyze the data, multi-group analysis was applied using PLS-SEM technique through SmartPLS 3.0. Results demonstrated that congruence between brand image and individuals has a moderating effect on the relationship between brand confidence and employee brand equity in conventional banking. Responsibility to maintain brand image has a moderating effect on the relationship between brand knowledge and employee brand equity in conventional banking. In case of Islamic banking, only congruence between brand image and individuals exhibited a moderating role on the relationship between brand knowledge and employee brand equity. The importance of brand understanding of employees and psychological ownership of a brand has been widely discussed in branding literature. However, only a few studies investigated the relationship between dimensions of employee brand understanding and the employee brand psychological ownership with employee brand equity. The cognitive and affective sentiments of both exogenous latent constructs, their relationships, and the interaction effect of cognitive and affective sentiments were seldom discussed in branding literature. This study covers the in-depth view and investigation of brand understanding of employ¬ees and the affective and cognitive sentiments of brand psychological ownership with em¬ployee behavior toward a brand. This study also uncovers the moderating role of affective sentiments of brand psychological ownership on the relationship between cognitive senti¬ments of employee brand understanding and employee brand equity. This study will help researchers analyze the in-depth role of affective and cognitive sentiments on brand sup¬portive related behavior of employees.