Just going through the motions? An empirical investigation of control, compliance, and performance in franchisor-franchisee relationships

Recent channels research differentiates two forms of compliance-consummate and perfunctory compliance; yet research stops short of examining how these nuances of compliance impact financial performance. This study fills this void. We assess our research model with longitudinal data collected from 119 franchisees in the United States. The results indicate outcome and behavioral control have differential effects on perfunctory versus consummate compliance. Further, we find that relationship age moderates the control-compliance relationship significantly, with behavioral control increasing consummate compliance in the early stages of franchisor-franchisee relationships and outcome control increasing consummate compliance in the later stages. Lastly, we find, unexpectedly, that consummate compliance decreases franchisee financial performance whereas perfunctory compliance enhances franchisee performance.