Contributions, Limitations and Future Study

6.3.1 Contributions

Important contributions of this study should be noted. First, a new construct, brand psychological ownership, is discussed by this study to understand the mental process of employees who participate in brand-related activities. Second, scale developments of corporate branding, brand psychological ownership, and brand citizenship behavior are conducted by this research. Researchers can utilize these measurement items to investigate the phenomenon in the future study. As for the scale developments, five factors of corporate branding obtained from the process of scale

development include communication and evaluation of corporate branding, departmental coordination of corporate branding, leadership and interaction with stakeholders of corporate branding, training and selection of corporate branding, and vision and culture of corporate branding. Three factors of brand psychological ownership obtained by this study include identification and belongingness of brand, brand self-efficacy, and brand accountability. Three factors of brand citizenship behavior obtained by this study include sportsmanship and endorsement of brand, helping behavior of brand, and consideration and enhancement of brand. In fact, the practical phenomena of corporate branding, brand psychological ownership, and brand citizenship behavior have existed for several years, and concepts related to corporate branding, brand psychological ownership, and brand citizenship behavior have been discussed by many practitioners and researchers. Therefore, the indicators of corporate branding, brand psychological ownership, and brand citizenship behavior obtained from the processes of the scale development can be utilized by academics and practitioners to explore new knowledge.

Third, discriminant and convergence validity are also investigated by this study to prove that brand psychological ownership, organizational psychological ownership, organizational commitment, and organizational citizenship behavior are different constructs. Fourth, the relationship between brand psychological ownership and brand

citizenship behavior is investigated by this research to prove that employees’positive cognitions contribute to employees’ positive behavior. Fifth, the multilevel relationships have been investigated. The relationship between corporate branding and brand psychological ownership is investigated by this research to prove that practices of corporate branding can make employees perceive the ownership of brand-related activities, thus producing brand psychological ownership. The relationship between corporate branding and brand citizenship behavior is investigated by this research to prove that corporate branding can make employees produce brand extra-role behavior, improving customers’perception toward the corporate brand. Sixth, the effect of organization-level brand CB on brand equity is empirically tested. The factors of brand citizenship behavior which positively affect brand equity can help researchers and practitioners to understand what kinds of brand citizenship behavior contribute to brand equity. The results can shed some lights on fostering brand equity. Seventh, three types of data from supervisors, employees and customers are utilized by this study to attenuate the bias of common method variance. Eighth, multilevel approaches adopted by this study allowed this study to examine the effects of organization-level variables on individual-level variables while keeping the organization-level variables for the predictors, thus obtaining estimates which are less biased than the traditionally used of single-level analysis method. Ninth, the multilevel mediating role of brand

psychological ownership is identified by this research that brand psychological ownership plays an important role in the process of corporate branding. It reveals that managers have to consider the mental process of customer-facing employees in the process of corporate branding.

6.3.2 Limitations and Future Study

Several limitations and future study are discussed as follows. First, the data in this research was collected from 35 franchise organizations not randomly selected from Taiwan markets; therefore, the generalizability of research results to the whole industry or other industries are limited. In the future, data could be collected using a random sample and/or from different industries to further examine the differences.

Second, Schwab (2005) argued that researchers should use longitudinal data to examine causal relationships to reduce the CMV bias. However, the individual-level data utilized by this study was collected at one period of time thus longitudinal data may be utilized in a future study. Third, this study only utilized two-levels of hierarchical linear modeling for the analysis, while a future study may utilize three-level analyses (e.g., strategy) to investigate the relations between brand-centered strategy, corporate branding, brand psychological ownership, and brand citizenship behavior comprehensively. Fourth, this study only investigated the relation between brand psychological ownership and brand citizenship behavior in individual-level

analyses, and a future study may investigate individual-level relations with other constructs, such as person-brand fit, and brand commitment to obtain a more complete understanding of corporate branding. Fifth, this study focuses on the positive effects of brand psychological ownership; a future study can investigate the negative effects of brand psychological ownership to get a comprehensive understanding. Sixth, this study utilizes store types as the organization-level control variable and gender, age, education as the individual-level control variables; researchers can utilize scale, organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and social desirability as control variables in the future study. Seventh, researchers can collect the data of brand equity from the secondary data in the future. Eighth, researchers can investigate how franchise organizations interact with multiple stakeholders in the future study.

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