Search results

To discover new explanatory variables for employee turnover in call centres, this study seeks to examine the impact of customer verbal aggression on employee turnover intention and the mediating role of employees' emotional exhaustion. Furthermore, it aims to analyse the moderating effect created by perceived organisational support (POS) in a team climate on the relationship between customer verbal aggression and employees' emotional exhaustion.

The authors used a deductive logic approach to develop hypotheses and analytical frameworks. Interviews and questionnaires were employed to collect data from two call centres, 81 units, and 1,112 employees in China. Finally, the data were analysed and the hypotheses were tested via descriptive analysis and hierarchical linear modeling analysis using SPSS and HLM, respectively.

First it was found that customer verbal aggression significantly predicted employee turnover intention. Second, that employees' emotional exhaustion fully mediated the relationship between customer verbal aggression and employee turnover intention. Third, the correlation between customer verbal aggression and employee emotional exhaustion was found to be weaker for teams with higher levels of emotional POS, but not weaker for those with higher levels of instrumental POS.

These results suggest that service‐oriented enterprises (such as call centres) should consider employee turnover intention from the perspective of customer behaviour and improve the climate of organisational support to more efficiently reduce employee turnover.

Previous studies on workplace behaviours in call centres focused on customer relationship management. However, research concerning employee emotions during customer interactions is lacking. This study examined the influence of customer verbal aggression on the emotional exhaustion of call centre employees and the resultant turnover intention stemming from the conservation of resources theory. The results extend the Price–Mueller turnover model and explain how a team climate of organisational support can affect employee emotions..

The central purpose of this study is to develop and test a model which examines the effects of customer verbal aggression on emotional dissonance, emotional exhaustion, and job outcomes such as service recovery performance, job satisfaction, and turnover intentions. The model also investigates the impact of emotional dissonance on emotional exhaustion and the effects of emotional dissonance and exhaustion on the above‐mentioned job outcomes.

Data were gathered from a sample of frontline hotel employees in Northern Cyprus via self‐administered questionnaires. A total number of 204 questionnaires were obtained.

As hypothesized, emotional dissonance and emotional exhaustion were found to be significant outcomes of customer verbal aggression. The results demonstrated that emotional dissonance amplified exhaustion. The results further revealed that customer verbal aggression and emotional dissonance intensified turnover intentions. As expected, emotional exhaustion reduced service recovery performance and job satisfaction and aggravated turnover intentions.

The cross‐sectional design of the study constrains the ability to make causal inferences. Therefore, future studies using longitudinal designs would be beneficial in establishing causal relationships. Although the paper controlled for common method bias via Harman's single‐factor test, future studies using multiple sources for data collection would minimize such a problem.

Hotel managers need to arrange training programmes to enable their employees to cope with the actions of boisterous and boorish customers. Having empowerment in the workplace seems to be an important weapon in managing such customers. In addition, managers should recruit and select the most suitable individuals for frontline service positions so that such employees can cope with difficulties associated with customer verbal aggression, emotional dissonance, and emotional exhaustion.

Empirical evidence pertaining to the consequences of customer verbal aggression in the hospitality management and marketing literatures is meagre. Thus the study partially fills this gap in the research stream of customer verbal aggression.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the mechanisms that link customer verbal aggression with service sabotage. Additionally, this study also tests whether emotional dissonance mediates the relationships between customer verbal aggression and the revenge motive, and between customer verbal aggression and service sabotage.

This study investigated flight attendants from six airlines in Taiwan. A total of 1,000 questionnaires were distributed, resulting in the return of 504 valid questionnaires, yielding a valid response rate of 50.4 percent.

The findings demonstrate that: emotional dissonance mediates the relationship between customer verbal aggression and revenge motive; emotional dissonance mediates the relationship between customer verbal aggression and service sabotage; customer verbal aggression is positively related to the revenge motive; revenge motive positively relates to service sabotage.

This study has investigated the following: how customer verbal aggression causes revenge motive via the mediation of emotional dissonance, how customer verbal aggression results in service sabotage via the mediation of emotional dissonance. The results provide a basis for making suggestions regarding service management as a reference for airlines.

This paper aims to examine the widespread effects of service actors’ verbal aggression on witness customers’ intentions toward the service organizations through their self-conscious emotions. The moderating roles of the witness customers’ empathic tendencies and the source of aggression are also examined.

In two scenario-based experiments and by adopting a multifoci approach, severity of mistreatment (aggression vs incivility vs no-mistreatment) and source of mistreatment (employee-to-employee and customer-to-customer) were manipulated to test distinctive effects of witnessing aggression on self-conscious emotions and intentions.

This study shows that witnessing aggression during service experiences negatively influences customers’ intentions towards the service organization through self-conscious emotions. Moreover, empathic tendencies of customers make these effects more pronounced. It is also shown that witnessing employee-to-employee aggression has a stronger effect on self-conscious emotions and intentions than customer-to-customer aggression.

This paper uncovers the distinctive effects of aggressive behaviors of service actors on self-conscious emotions from the third-party perspective. It is also shown that empathic tendencies can be detrimental to service organizations in certain conditions.

The results warn service managers against verbal aggression because of its negative effects on witness customers. It is suggested that they should try to clarify the incident and restore justice in front of the witnesses.

This paper is one of the first attempts to investigate the distinctive effects of witnessing aggression during service experiences and the roles of self-conscious emotions and emphatic tendencies.

The purpose of this research is to investigate the direct and moderating effect of negative affectivity (NA) (Study 1) and self‐efficacy (Study 2) on the relationship between customer verbal aggression and three forms of emotion‐focused coping strategies: behavioral disengagement, seeking emotional support, and venting negative emotions.

Two samples of service workers were recruited from northern Israel in 2007‐2008 (n=178 and n=516), and data were collected using self‐reported questionnaires. Research hypotheses were tested using hierarchical regression analyses.

The results show that under high levels of exposure to customer aggression, employees with high NA were more likely to use behavioral disengagement than low‐NA individuals, employees with low NA were less likely to vent negative emotions than high‐NA individuals, and employees with high self‐efficacy were less likely to use venting and emotional support than employees with low self‐efficacy. In addition, self‐efficacy was found to reduce the negative impact of customer aggression on emotional exhaustion.

Through appropriate training programs, service organizations can foster their employees' sense of trust in their own ability to cope with customer misbehavior and consequently reduce reliance on dysfunctional coping strategies.

While it has been established that verbal abuse from customers constitutes a common experience for many service workers, little is known about the manner in which workers cope with this particular job stressor and even less about the individual differences that may explain coping behaviors in this context. The present paper begins to bridge this gap and contributes to existing literature by showing that in addition to being predictors of dysfunctional coping strategies, both NA and self‐efficacy may play a moderating role in the relationship between customer aggression and coping behaviors.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of a loss of face on the psychological well-being of frontline employees (FLEs) in an Eastern cultural context (Thailand) when subjected to customer aggression. Importantly, it adopts a contingency approach and examines moderating effects by which social status, a “customer is always right” organisational philosophy and a public/private context impact the nature of the association between customer aggression and loss of face. Finally, it examines the moderating effect of regulation of emotion on the association between loss of face on psychological well-being.

A survey, administered to 319 FLEs in retail stores in Thailand, asked them to recall a recent experience dealing with customer aggression. The data were analysed using structural equation modelling and a moderator regression.

Customer aggression expressions are associated with FLEs’ loss of face, which in turn affects FLEs’ emotional exhaustion and anxiety. FLEs social status and a “customer is always right” organisational philosophy moderate the association between customer aggression and loss of face, and FLEs’ loss of face is greater when their physical well-being is threatened publicly rather than in private. In addition, regulation of emotion was found to increase the negative impact of loss of face on emotional exhaustion.

The way FLEs respond to customer aggression during service encounters, as well as the FLEs’ status and the context, can intensify their loss of face and psychological well-being. This has implications for the extent to which organisations impose a “customer is always right” dictum on FLE, as well as the need for counselling and peer support immediately following customer aggression incidents.

This study is the first to investigate the moderating effects of social status, a “customer is always right” philosophy and public/private context on the expression of customer aggression and FLEs’ accompanying loss of face. In other words, rather than simply examining what causes face loss, the authors shift the focus from the “Is” question to “When” – i.e., under what contingency condition is there more or less face loss?

This research aims to examine the cognitive appraisals of frontline employees (FLEs) when dealing with aggressive customers and the impact on their well-being, as well as several moderator effects, in a collectivist, Eastern culture.

A critical incident technique reveals the cognitive appraisal of FLEs who had recently experienced customer aggression. Data were collected through qualitative, in-depth interviews with 35 FLEs in customer-facing roles in Thailand.

The FLEs perceived threats to self-esteem, physical well-being, goal completion at work, fairness or equity and sense of control when dealing with customer aggression. These cognitive appraisals affected their psychological well-being in the form of negative affectivity, anxiety, depression and stress. Importantly, factors that moderate (exacerbate or weaken) the impact of customer aggression on cognitive appraisal, and cognitive appraisal on psychological well-being were revealed, including “customer is always right” philosophy, social status, public versus private context and social support.

Organisations should pay more attention to FLEs’ psychological well-being and how they interpret and deal with customers’ misbehaviour and aggression. The research identifies factors that moderate the impact of customer aggression on psychological well-being.

This is the first empirical paper that has examined how FLEs cope with customer aggression in a collectivist, south-east Asian context where social norms calibrate FLEs’ responses to customer aggression. It is also the first research that adopts a contingency approach to understanding how FLEs cope with customer aggression – i.e. when faced with customer aggression, under what contingency conditions do FLEs cognitive appraisals have a stronger or weaker impact on their psychological well-being?

The purpose of this study is to examine whether emotional deviance in response to customer aggression and employees’ feelings of anger is likely to be influenced by perceived job autonomy. To date, studies on emotional labor have focused primarily on emotional regulation strategies. Little is known about the factors that may serve to increase emotional deviance (i.e. situations in which felt and expressed emotions match but are at odds with organizational display rules).

Three samples of service workers were recruited from northern Israel, and data were collected using self-reported questionnaires. Research hypotheses were tested using hierarchical regression analyses.

Study 1 revealed that under conditions of frequent exposure to customer aggression, more perceived job autonomy was associated with more frequent instances of emotional deviance. The results of Study 2 and Study 3 demonstrated that the relationship between anger and emotional deviance was stronger for employees reporting high levels of perceived job autonomy.

Given the potentially negative impact of emotional deviance on customer satisfaction, organizations should find a balance between satisfying employees’ desire for control and discretion and ensuring employee compliance with display rules.

This study contributes to the existing literature by pointing out that job autonomy may have a “dark side”, in the sense that it provides employees with a certain level of perceived freedom, which might then be extended to include freedom from rule compliance, especially when negative emotions are experienced.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the mediating role of emotional dissonance in the customer aggression‐job‐induced tension relationship and the role of job autonomy in buffering against the negative consequences of emotional dissonance.

In total, three samples of service workers were recruited from Northern Israel between the years 2007 and 2008 and data were collected with self‐reported questionnaires. Research hypotheses were tested with hierarchical regression analyses.

The present results show that emotional dissonance is significantly associated with a decreased sense of well‐being, even after controlling for negative disposition. The results also confirm that customer aggression relates to job‐induced tension through its influence on emotional dissonance, and that emotional dissonance is less likely to increase job‐induced tension and emotional exhaustion when the level of job autonomy is high.

The findings suggest that when intense emotional labor is required, helping service providers feel that they have control in their jobs may contribute to a better coping with its aversive effects.

Although it has been established that emotional dissonance plays a crucial role in explaining tension and psychological health‐related problems among service workers, an understanding of the factors at work that may protect employees from its negative consequences, is limited. This paper sheds light on the role of autonomy as a resource for service workers and especially for those whose jobs habitually require interactions with verbally abusive customers.

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.

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.

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.

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).