Search results
1 – 10 of 11Sally Rao Hill and Alastair G. Tombs
The purpose of this study is to further our understanding of the effects of service employees’ accents on service outcomes and to investigate the boundary conditions of service…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to further our understanding of the effects of service employees’ accents on service outcomes and to investigate the boundary conditions of service type, service criticality and accent-service congruence.
Design/methodology/approach
This study reports on three scenario-based experiments with between-subject designs to assess customer reactions to service employees with nonstandard accents.
Findings
The findings revealed that the three service-related extraneous factors investigated in this study influence the direction and strength of accent’s impact. Service employees’ nonstandard accents generally negatively influence customers’ satisfaction with a service provider and purchase intentions. This effect is stronger for credence services than for experience services. While customer satisfaction with the service encounter tends to stay the same regardless of service criticality, they have less purchase intention in high service criticality situations when they deal with service employee with a nonstandard accent. Accent-service congruence enhances both satisfaction and purchase intention.
Research limitations/implications
This study makes contributions to the accent in service interaction literature by enabling the authors to have a more complete understanding of how accent effects drive customer satisfaction and purchase intention. Future studies can take customer-related factors such as customer-service employee relationships, customers’ ethnic affiliation and ethnocentrism into consideration when examining the effects of accent in service interactions.
Practical implications
Service managers need to be aware when nonstandard accents’ negative effects will elevate – credence service and service with higher criticality are better provided by service employee with a standard accent. A nonstandard accent that matches the service improves customer satisfaction and purchase intention and could be used to its advantage.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the service literature about service employees’ interaction with customers and is particularly relevant in multicultural societies with increasingly diverse workforces.
Details
Keywords
Bo Edvardsson, Pennie Frow, Elina Jaakkola, Timothy Lee Keiningham, Kaisa Koskela-Huotari, Cristina Mele and Alastair Tombs
The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of context in service innovation by developing a conceptual framework that illuminates the key elements and trends in context…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of context in service innovation by developing a conceptual framework that illuminates the key elements and trends in context change.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper adopts a service ecosystem lens for understanding how elements and trends in context foster service innovation. A conceptual framework identifying the role of context change in fostering service innovation is developed and justified through illustrations across industry settings of health, retailing, banking and education.
Findings
Context change is conceptualized by three trends – speed, granularity and liquification – that provide an analytical foundation for understanding how changes in the elements of context – space, resources and institutional arrangements – can foster service innovation. The analysis indicates emerging patterns across industries that allow exploring scenarios, grounded in emerging trends and developments in service innovation toward 2050.
Practical implications
Managers are offered a framework to guide service innovation and help them prepare for the future. The paper also suggests areas for further research.
Originality/value
The paper contributes with a new conceptualization of context change to identify and explain service innovation opportunities. Managers are offered a framework to guide service innovation and help them prepare for 2050. The paper also suggests areas for further service innovation research, zooming in on contextual changes to prepare for 2050.
Details
Keywords
Alastair Tombs and Sally Rao Hill
The primary objective of this article is to investigate customer reactions to service employees with accents that differ from a non-native accent taking into account customer…
Abstract
Purpose
The primary objective of this article is to investigate customer reactions to service employees with accents that differ from a non-native accent taking into account customer emotions.
Design/methodology/approach
This article reports on a study with a 2 (accent of service employee: Australian or Indian) × 2 (service employee’s competency: competent or incompetent) × 2 (customer’s affective state: positive or negative) between-subject experimental design to uncover the effects of service employees’ accent on customers’ reactions.
Findings
The findings revealed that hearing a service employee with a foreign accent was not enough on its own to influence customer responses. However, when the service employee is incompetent or the customer was in a negative affective state, a foreign accent appeared to exacerbate the situation.
Research limitations/implications
While the findings indicate that accents are used a cue for customers to evaluate service employees, further research should also take service types, service outcomes, customer-service employee relationships, customers’ ethnic affiliation and ethnocentrism into consideration when examining the effect of accents.
Practical implications
Service managers need to be aware that accents will exacerbate perceptions of already difficult service situations. Providing competent service will help breakdown stereotypes and improve the acceptance of diversity at the customer–employee interface.
Originality/value
This article contributes to the service literature about service attributes and is particularly relevant to economies such as the USA, Canada, the UK, New Zealand and Australia where immigrants are a large part of the service work force.
Details
Keywords
Alastair G. Tombs, Rebekah Russell-Bennett and Neal M. Ashkanasy
– This study aims to test service providers’ ability to recognise non-verbal emotions in complaining customers of same and different cultures.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to test service providers’ ability to recognise non-verbal emotions in complaining customers of same and different cultures.
Design/methodology/approach
In a laboratory study, using a between-subjects experimental design (n = 153), we tested the accuracy of service providers’ perceptions of the emotional expressions of anger, fear, shame and happiness of customers from varying cultural backgrounds. After viewing video vignettes of customers complaining (with the audio removed), participants (in the role of service providers) assessed the emotional state of the customers portrayed in the video.
Findings
Service providers in culturally mismatched dyads were prone to misreading anger, happiness and shame expressed by dissatisfied customers. Happiness was misread in the displayed emotions of both dyads. Anger was recognisable in the Anglo customers but not Confucian Asian, while Anglo service providers misread both shame and happiness in Confucian Asian customers.
Research limitations/implications
The study was conducted in the laboratory and was based solely on participant’s perceptions of actors’ non-verbal facial expressions in a single encounter.
Practical implications
Given the level of ethnic differences in developed nations, a culturally sensitive workplace is needed to foster effective functioning of service employee teams. Ability to understand cultural display rules and to recognise and interpret emotions is an important skill for people working in direct contact with customers.
Originality/value
This research addresses the lack of empirical evidence for the recognition of customer emotions by service providers and the impact of cross-cultural differences.
Details
Keywords
Sally Rao Hill and Alastair Tombs
The primary objective of this paper is to investigate the attitudes, feelings and perceptions of Australian consumers towards service frontline employees with accents that differ…
Abstract
Purpose
The primary objective of this paper is to investigate the attitudes, feelings and perceptions of Australian consumers towards service frontline employees with accents that differ from Standard Australian English, taking into consideration service‐country image and customer emotions.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper reports on a qualitative study designed to uncover the attitudes and perceptions of Australians towards service personnel with foreign accents.
Findings
The findings revealed that hearing a service provider with a foreign accent, particularly in services encounters without face‐to‐face contacts, often evokes a negative predisposition to certain accents, reduces the customers' level of tolerance and increases the perception of the service provider's lack of understanding. This negative stereotype bias seems to be moderated by the accent (a proxy of ethnicity) and service‐country image and influenced by customer emotions in the service interaction.
Research limitations/implications
Future studies could also use a controlled experimental design where accent could be used as a sensory cue to further test the validity and reliability of the current findings while controlling for factors such as ethnic background, employment, education and age. Further research should also take service types and service outcomes into consideration in examining the effect of accents on customer service evaluation.
Practical implications
Accent as a service employee attribute influences customers' evaluation of the service encounter because of the stereotype customers have. Training in language skills, cross‐cultural interpersonal skills and authority to deviate from the script should be given to minimise the negative effect of service employee accent. Service firms also need to develop strategies to manage customer emotions and reactions.
Originality/value
This paper contributes to the service literature about service employee attributes and is particularly relevant to economies such as the USA, Canada, the UK, New Zealand and Australia where immigrants are a large part of the service workforce.
Details
Keywords
Catherine Demangeot, Amanda J. Broderick and C. Samuel Craig
Naveen Donthu, Satish Kumar, Chatura Ranaweera, Marianna Sigala and Riya Sureka
In 2020, the Journal of Service Theory and Practice (JSTP), previously titled Managing Service Quality, celebrates its 30th anniversary. This study provides a retrospective of the…
Abstract
Purpose
In 2020, the Journal of Service Theory and Practice (JSTP), previously titled Managing Service Quality, celebrates its 30th anniversary. This study provides a retrospective of the evolution and contribution of the journal to service research by identifying its major trends, research constituents, factors contributing to citations and thematic structure over its 29 active years (1991–2019). The paper concludes by providing directions and ideas for progressing service research
Design/methodology/approach
The study uses the Scopus database to extract JSTP's bibliographic data. It employs bibliometric methods to study the trends of the journal, such as the citation structure and most-contributing authors, institutions and countries. Bibliographic coupling and keyword co-occurrence analyses are used to study the intellectual structure of the journal. Regression analysis discloses the factors influencing citations of JSTP articles. Factors explaining the citation count of JSTP articles include article age, number of author keywords, article length, title length and number of references.
Findings
JSTP's influence has grown significantly in the scientific community, which is evidenced by findings relating to the citation counts, the thematic scope/variety and authorship features of the JSTP papers published during the last 30 years. JSTP attracts publications from around the globe, but most contributions come from the United States, United Kingdom and Australia. Although JSTP has continuously evolved with new and varied themes, a bibliographic coupling analysis clustered JSTP articles into five major clusters.
Research limitations/implications
The limitations of the Scopus database may impact the study's results.
Originality/value
This study is the first to provide a comprehensive review of JSTP since its launch. It is useful to the editorial board and other JSTP stakeholders as well as service scholars alike.
Details
Keywords
Jonathan J. Baker, Treasa Kearney, Gaurangi Laud and Maria Holmlund
This conceptual study explicates the dynamic, interlinked relationship between two of the most popular theories in marketing today: psychological ownership (PO) and engagement…
Abstract
Purpose
This conceptual study explicates the dynamic, interlinked relationship between two of the most popular theories in marketing today: psychological ownership (PO) and engagement. The study is set in the sharing economy (SE), where platform business success depends on high levels of engagement by users, both individuals and collectives. The study argues individual PO (iPO) acts as the antecedent to engagement within a dyad of brand and user, and collective PO (cPO) as the antecedent to collective engagement by communities of users.
Design/methodology/approach
This conceptual study synthesizes PO theory and engagement theory to produce a PO–engagement framework. The authors adopt a dual-level perspective encompassing individual- and group-level phenomena in the SE and employ examples from practice to illustrate their arguments.
Findings
PO acts as the antecedent to the positively valenced disposition and engagement activities of actors in the SE. iPO manifests as engagement within a dyad of brand and user. Outcomes include brand love and contributions to brand reputation and service offerings. Collective PO manifests as engagement within a community or collective. Outcomes include community-oriented peer-to-peer (P2P) sharing for the benefit of others.
Originality/value
This study offers a dynamic framework of PO and engagement in the SE, the PO–engagement framework. The authors contribute to PO and engagement literature studies in marketing by illustrating how a platform user's attachment to targets in the SE motivates emergence of PO, and how different types of engagement manifest from different types of PO.
Details
Keywords
This study aims to explore the scope of consumers’ defective co-creation behaviour in professional service encounters. One of the founding premises of service-dominant logic…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to explore the scope of consumers’ defective co-creation behaviour in professional service encounters. One of the founding premises of service-dominant logic (Vargo and Lusch, 2004, 2008) is that consumers co-create the value they derive from service encounters. In practice, however, dysfunctional consumer behaviour can obstruct value co-creation. Extant research has not yet investigated consumers’ defective co-creation behaviour in highly relational services, such as professional services, that are heavily reliant on co-creation.
Design/methodology/approach
To investigate defective co-creation in professional services, 164 critical incidents were collected from 38 health-care and financial service providers using the critical incident technique within semi-structured, in-depth interviews. Thematic coding was used to identify emergent themes and patterns of consumer behaviour.
Findings
Thematic coding resulted in a comprehensive typology of consumers’ defective co-creation behaviour that both confirms the prevalence of previously identified dysfunctional behaviours (e.g. verbal abuse and physical aggression) and identifies two new forms of consumer misbehaviour: underparticipation and overparticipation. Further, these behaviours can vary, escalate and co-occur during service encounters.
Originality/value
Both underparticipation and overparticipation are newly identified forms of defective co-creation that need to be examined within the broader framework of service-dominant logic (SDL).
Details