Relationship-specific motives and cultural values in the crossborder franchisor-franchisee relationship from the Puerto Rican franchisee's perspective

The purpose of this study is fourfold: (1) to establish research questions and hypotheses regarding franchisor-franchisee relationship and the moderation effect of cultural values; (2) to develop a database of franchising in Puerto Rico; (3) to perform a survey to test the hypotheses; and (4) to establish a future research agenda. This study is based on three social exchange theories: power dependence, interdependence and relational exchange, and on Hofstede's cultural values dimension. The objectives of this study are to determine the antecedents and outcomes of franchisee's trust, commitment, and satisfaction with the franchisor, and to establish whether strategies to develop trust, commitment, and satisfaction in franchisees should be standardized when franchisees have different cultural values. The use of one country sample is based on the assumption that the Puerto Ricans franchisees will show distinctive heterogenic cultural values.; The objective is an extension of similar studies in other business relationships, such as the manufacturer-distributor, and the first that include the cultural moderation in a franchisor-franchisee relationship. Structural equation modeling was used to test the relational part of the conceptual model and moderated regression analysis to test the cultural moderation section.; The results of the data collected from a sample of 172 Puerto Rican franchisees of U.S. franchise systems supported ten of thirteen hypotheses of the relationship part of the conceptual model, and weakly supported one of thirteen hypotheses of the cultural moderation part. The supported hypothesis were: franchisor's opportunistic behavior and participative communication are antecedents of franchisee's trust; relationship benefits of belonging to the franchise system and franchisee's trust are antecedents of franchisee's commitment; and franchisee's performance and franchisee's trust are antecedents of franchisee's satisfaction. The main contribution of the study is the support of the outcomes of franchisee's satisfaction: willingness to collaborate with voluntary franchise systems initiatives, willingness to advocate on behalf of the franchise system, and anticipated continuity in the franchise system. The only supported hypothesis of the cultural moderation part was the moderation of power distance in the relationship between franchisor's use of coercive power and franchisee's trust in the franchisor. The final chapter discusses the contributions, limitations and future research.