Is competence set expansion in the information service industry a planned behavior? The moderating effects of action control style

Abstract

Technological advancement has brought dramatic changes to most industries. As a result, the pressure to compete has intensified tremendously. This is especially evident in the information service (IS) industry where the need of companies to expand their employees` competence set (CS) becomes critical. This study investigated whether CS expansion in the IS industry is a planned behavior moderated by individual style of action control. A mail survey was carried out to collect data from the IS companies in Taiwan. A total of 190 valid samples were obtained. The results of analyses showed that our proposed model provided a good fit to the data. Attitude tendency (AT), subjective norms (SN), and computer/information technology (IT) self-efficacy positively affected employees` intentions of expanding the CS. Moreover, we found that the action control style moderated the effects of AT, SN, and computer/IT self-efficacy on behavioral intention. The implications of this study as well as its limitations are discussed.