Abstract:
This thesis examines four relationship building characteristics within a franchise relationship
that are essential to the formation and on-going successful partnership. The main focus is to
specifically explore these relationship building characteristics that enhance the franchisorfranchisee
relationship, by placing particular emphasis on trust, compliance, communication
and power. Ensuring that the franchisors standards have and are being complied with, and
that each participant is able to realise their shared and mutual goals of financial success, that
enables the franchise network to grow.
There were twelve participants interviewed for this study, these interviews where semistructured
which allowed participants to openly discuss each question based on their
individual experiences. Through the use of Atlas software, specific codes were generated to
identify common themes across the interviews. These codes were further classified into
specific themes and categories that assisted the researcher in correctly deducing results
from the data obtained.
The research findings showed that the foundation of the franchise relationship is trust,
communication and the judicious use of power. Once these relationship building
characteristics have been established it will allow individual and shared goals to be achieved
in the relationship. Trust and communication are closely linked, the one cannot exist without
the other. Power shifts are experienced between the parties and is dependent on the
situation, the knowledge and experience of the franchisor or franchisee. Compliance is
independent and governed by terms and conditions stipulated within the franchise
agreement, other than through opportunistic behaviour, compliance is not influenced by the
other relationship building characteristics. The study found that although trust and
compliance are important to a successful relationship, they are not reliant on each other
these two characteristics are mutually exclusive. Compliance is particularly interesting as this
characteristic is one of the elements which is controlled by the signed contractual agreement.
Communication and knowledge exchange relied on there being a trustful relationship, in
which knowledge could be exchanged between both parties.
