Customer orientation of frontline employees and organizational commitment

This study investigates the effect of alignment between employee and firm customer orientation on the organizational commitment of frontline service employees. Furthermore, the study examines how the size and nature of the discrepancy between employee customer orientation and firm customer orientation affects organizational commitment. The results suggest that organizational commitment is stronger when employee and firm customer orientation are matched than when they are not. Furthermore, organizational commitment is slightly stronger when employee customer orientation exceeds firm customer orientation than when the reverse is the case. The results suggest that efforts expended by firms in hiring and retaining customer-oriented service workers will be unlikely to yield optimal commitment benefits without simultaneous investments to improve firm-level customer orientation

An investigation of the antecedents of service delivery and organisational performance: a service culture perspective

Service quality has been shown to be critical for the success of service organisations. However, the quality of service delivered by an organisation is dependent on the behaviours of organisational members. Therefore, understanding the various processes that foster desirable service behaviour is important. While there have been many studies which deal with antecedents of service delivery, research adopting a cultural perspective and focusing on elements such as shared values and norms have been somewhat sparse. This is quite surprising given the amount of reference to the importance of a service culture. Recently, there have been calls for research into the cultural determinants of service quality and in particular service culture. This study answers the call by testing a multi-layer model of service culture and performance. The key objectives of the study relate to understanding how service culture leads to both customer-based and financial performance, as well as investigating the process of culture transmission from managers to employees. On the basis of data collected from management and employees, the study assesses service culture at the management and the employee levels, focusing simultaneously on assumptions, value, norms and behaviours. Two routes for culture transmission: the social contagion and behavioural routes are hypothesised and tested. The key findings are that shared service norms are the key impact point of culture transmission from management to employees as well as the key determinant of employee service delivery behaviour. The findings also show that proximity among managers and employees is crucial in the diffusion of service culture and hence in the leadership influencing process. Based on the findings, managerial implications for managing service employees are discussed as well as limitations and suggestions for future research

Antecedents of adaptive selling among retail salespeople: a multilevel analysis

The literature on adaptive selling behavior has grown rapidly over the years, with heavier emphasis placed on industrial/professional salespeople and less attention given to retail salespeople. This study contributes to addressing this imbalance by examining the effects of two salesperson factors (selling skills and affective commitment) and two company-level variables (empowerment and behavior-based control) on the adaptive selling behavior of retail salespeople. Using data obtained from a two staged sampling procedure (105 companies and 419 salespeople), we employ a multilevel analytical procedure to model the effects of the salesperson and organizational factors on adaptive selling behavior of retail salespeople. The results indicate that selling skills and affective commitment directly influence adaptive selling while empowerment and behavior based control only indirectly influence adaptive selling behavior. Based on the findings of this study, implications for managing retail salespeople as well as limitations and suggestions for future research are presented

How service quality and outcome confidence drive pre-outcome word-of-mouth

Existing research on word-of-mouth (WOM) referrals has rarely considered what drives consumers to engage in pre-outcome WOM (i.e., referrals before they have experienced the final service outcome). This study argues that WOM behavior that predates the service outcome is driven by the interplay between present experience (perceived quality of the service process) and anticipations of the future outcome (outcome confidence). Drawing upon perceived risk theory, the study explores how outcome confidence and service process quality independently predict WOM behavior and how outcome confidence moderates the impact of process quality on WOM behavior. We investigate these issues with customers of a driving school and use a multilevel modelling approach to test the hypotheses. The results show that consumers with higher levels of outcome confidence are more willing than low-confidence consumers to transmit pre-outcome WOM. However, the study also finds that outcome confidence compensates for process quality such that the effect of process quality diminishes when outcome confidence is high. The key managerial implication of the study’s finding is that managers can tactically use outcome confidence to compensate for low levels of process or employee service quality

Emotional intelligence in front-line/back-office employee relationships

Purpose—This research undertakes a simultaneous assessment of interdependence in the behaviours of front-line and back-office employees and their joint effect on customer-related organizational performance. It also tests for a moderating influence of the emotional intelligence of front-line salespeople and back-office employees. Design/methodology/approach—The sample comprises 105 front-line sales employees and 77 back-office employees. The customer-related organizational performance data come from a U.K. business-to-business (B2B) electronics company. With these triadic data, this study uses partial least squares to estimate the measurement and structural models. Findings—Salespeople’s customer orientation directly affects customer-related organizational performance; the relationship is moderated by salespeople’s emotional intelligence. The emotional intelligence of salespeople also directly affects the customer directed citizenship behaviour of back-office employees. Furthermore, the emotional intelligence of back-office staff moderates the link between the emotional intelligence of salespeople and back-office staff citizenship behaviour. Back-office staff citizenship behaviour in turn affects customer-related organizational performance. Originality/value—The emotions deployed by employees in interactions with customers clearly shape customers’ perceptions of service quality, as well as employee-level performance outcomes. But prior literature lacks insights into the simultaneous effects of front-line and back-office employee behaviour, especially in B2B settings. This article addresses these research gaps by investigating triadic relationships—among back-office employees, front-line employees and customer outcomes—in a B2B setting, where they are of particular managerial interest

Excellent product … but too early to say: Consumer reactions to tentative product reviews

This research explores the effects of tentativeness in online product reviews on consumers' product attitude certainty and behavioral intentions. Drawing on salience theory, attribution theory, and work in attitude certainty, I predict that, when consumers who have seen positive reviews of a product are exposed to a tentative review, their attitude certainty and willingness to purchase is reduced. I also predict that consumer reactions differ depending on the expertise of the review source as well as the product experience of the consumer.I also address confidence in information completeness as the metacognitive mechanism that explains the tentative review effect. Specifically, I argue that consumers who see a tentative review are sensitized to potentially missing information, which reduces their attitude certainty and willingness to purchase.Our hypotheses are tested in a series of experiments which demonstrate that tentativeness reduces attitude certainty and willingness to purchase but that the effect is attenuated when the reviewer is a novice and when the consumer has a high level of product experience. Based on the findings, I discuss our contributions to theory and suggest practical steps that firms can take to mitigate the effects of tentative reviews. </p

How and when does top management interaction with customers impact customer satisfaction?

Purpose: This paper investigates the effect of top management’s customer interactions (TMCI) on customer satisfaction. The study argues that TMCI’s overall relationship with customer satisfaction follows an inverted-U shape due to its positive and disruptive effects on the customer relationship efforts of frontline service/sales employees (FSEs). The paper further investigates the frontline competence of both FSEs and the top management team (TMT) as moderators of the impact of TMCI on customer satisfaction. Design/methodology/approach: The conceptual model was tested empirically using data from managers, frontline employees, and customers of microfinance firms. A multilevel structural equation modelling approach was used to test the hypothesized model. Findings: The results show that TMCI has a curvilinear relationship with customer satisfaction. The results also show that frontline employees’ collective efficacy attenuates this relationship by shifting the turning point of the curvilinear effect to the right. Furthermore, TMT frontline competence amplifies both the positive and negative effects of TMCI on customer satisfaction. Research limitations/implications: The study advances knowledge on the effects of TMCI on customer satisfaction and highlights the nuanced relationship between top management involvement and indicators of firm performance.  Practical implications: The findings show the importance of considering the frontline competence of both top management and frontline employees when encouraging TMCI in organizations.  Originality/value: To the best of the author’s knowledge, this study is one of the first to examine TMCI’s direct impact on customer satisfaction and propose the frontline competence of both top management and frontline employees as boundary conditions on this relationship. </p

Enforcement of service rules by frontline employees: A conceptual model and research propositions

Rule enforcement is a crucial part of the frontline service employee’s role that, if mishandled, can have serious consequences for employees, customers and the organization. However, there is very little knowledge about both its drivers and outcomes in the service literature. This study contributes to the organizational frontlines literature by developing a comprehensive framework of the drivers and consequences of service rule enforcement. Our conceptual model identifies organizational, individual, and situational variables that influence service rule enforcement and sheds light on the employee-related, customer-related, and organization-related consequences of rule enforcement. In conceptualizing service rule enforcement, we address the notions of enforcement/non-enforcement, the extent and consistency of enforcement, and rule enforcement styles. We also propose that rule enforcement can have both positive and negative consequences. Finally, we provide a research agenda that proposes ideas for future studies in this area. </p

The dual threat of COVID-19 to health and job security – Exploring the role of mindfulness in sustaining frontline employee-related outcomes

Navigating the increasingly uncertain business world requires organizations and employees to be highly adaptive to threats and changes. During COVID-19, the dual threats to health and job security have been especially salient for frontline employees. Drawing on the job demands-resources (JD-R) model, we investigated individual and organizational mindfulness as valuable resources, which influence employee outcomes of preventative behaviors, emotional exhaustion, and job performance both directly, and indirectly through threat appraisals. We find that individual and organizational mindfulness influence threat appraisals in a “counterbalanced manner”: individual mindfulness decreases threat appraisals, while organizational mindfulness heightens the perceived threat of contracting COVID-19. The threat to health further serves as a double-edged sword, predicting both emotional exhaustion and preventative behaviors, while job insecurity impairs all employee outcomes. Based on these findings, we provide key implications for research and practice, and future research directions

The effect of emotional positivity of brand-generated social media messages on consumer attention and information sharing

The literature has overlooked whether emotional positivity in social media messages posted by brands has the same effect on different types of consumer engagement behaviors on social media. Furthermore, whether brands’ emotional positivity plays a role in shaping the impact of message emotionality is unclear. To address these gaps, the authors develop and test a model of the impact of emotional positivity of social media messages posted by brands on consumers’ personal engagement and interactive engagement behaviors. The authors also examine whether and how brand emotional positivity interacts with message emotional positivity in triggering these responses. Based on a sample of 62,255 Twitter messages posted by brands the authors find that, in general, emotional positivity has an opposite effect in terms of stimulating personal engagement (likes) versus interactive engagement (retweets). Brand emotional positivity negatively moderates the link between message positivity and both types of user responses