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The Management of Customer-Contact Service Employees: An Empirical Investigation

The Management of Customer-Contact Service Employees: An Empirical Investigation The authors develop and test a model of service employee management that examines constructs simultaneously across three interfaces of the service delivery process: manager-employee, employee-role, and employee-customer. The authors examine the attitudinal and behavioral responses of customer-contact employees that can influence customers’ perceptions of service quality, the relationships among these responses, and three formal managerial control mechanisms (empowerment, behavior-based employee evaluation, and management commitment to service quality). The findings indicate that managers who are committed to service quality are more likely to empower their employees and use behavior-based evaluation. However, the use of empowerment has both positive and negative consequences in the management of contact employees. Some of the negative consequences are mitigated by the positive effects of behavior-based employee evaluation. To increase customers’ perceptions of service quality, managers must increase employees’ self-efficacy and job satisfaction, and reduce employees’ role conflict and ambiguity. Implications for the management of customer-contact service employees and directions for further research are discussed. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Journal of Marketing SAGE

The Management of Customer-Contact Service Employees: An Empirical Investigation

Journal of Marketing , Volume 60 (4): 19 – Oct 1, 1996

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References (64)

Publisher
SAGE
Copyright
© 1996 American Marketing Association
ISSN
0022-2429
eISSN
1547-7185
DOI
10.1177/002224299606000406
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

The authors develop and test a model of service employee management that examines constructs simultaneously across three interfaces of the service delivery process: manager-employee, employee-role, and employee-customer. The authors examine the attitudinal and behavioral responses of customer-contact employees that can influence customers’ perceptions of service quality, the relationships among these responses, and three formal managerial control mechanisms (empowerment, behavior-based employee evaluation, and management commitment to service quality). The findings indicate that managers who are committed to service quality are more likely to empower their employees and use behavior-based evaluation. However, the use of empowerment has both positive and negative consequences in the management of contact employees. Some of the negative consequences are mitigated by the positive effects of behavior-based employee evaluation. To increase customers’ perceptions of service quality, managers must increase employees’ self-efficacy and job satisfaction, and reduce employees’ role conflict and ambiguity. Implications for the management of customer-contact service employees and directions for further research are discussed.

Journal

Journal of MarketingSAGE

Published: Oct 1, 1996

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