Unraveling the impact of customer mistreatment on highway toll collectors' turnover intentions: the roles of stress symptoms, affective commitment, and neuroticism

In the service industry, highway toll collectors serve as a distinctive frontline workforce who frequently encounter mistreatment from customers. Unfortunately, these behaviors have not received the attention and resolution they deserve, resulting in significant physical and psychological stress for toll collectors and exacerbating turnover rates. The study highlights how customer mistreatment affects toll collectors' turnover intentions by performing the sequential mediating roles of stress symptoms and affective commitment and assumes that neuroticism exacerbates the stress symptoms resulting from customer mistreatment based on affective events theory. The model was tested using data collected from 230 highway toll collectors in Zhuhai, China. All hypotheses received support. This study holds both theoretical and practical implications for future research.

The effects of workplace friendship network centrality on deep acting

We integrated social network theory with conservation of resource theory to predict that workplace friendship network centrality provides service employees with critical psychological resources that foster deep acting: positive affect and positive self-perception. In Study 1, we conducted a survey (N = 105) in a Korean banking firm, revealing that these resources mediate the relationship between workplace friendship network centrality and deep acting. Studies 2 and 3, both experimental studies, investigated the hypothesized causal relationships. In Study 2 (N = 151), we found that workplace friendship network centrality increases the intention toward deep acting. Further, Study 3 (N = 140) confirmed the direct effects of friendship network centrality on positive affect and self-perception. By providing insights into the structural antecedents of emotional labor, we inform managers in service organizations of the value of creating avenues for their employees to form and maintain friendships within the organization.

The impact of interaction on the adoption of electric vehicles: Mediating role of experience value

The widespread adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) largely depends on the acceptance of the public. Previous studies pay more attention to the factors affecting EV adoption from the customer perspective but lack the perspective of the interaction between sellers and customers. Based on a survey of 1,014 respondents in China, this work developed a research model analyzing the effect of interaction on the intention to purchase EVs and using experience value (EPV) as the mediating variable. The results showed that the functional experience value (FEV) was positively affected by the environment-customer interaction (ECI). The FEV, emotional experience value (EEV), and social experience value (SEV) were all positively affected by salesman-customer interaction (SCI). In addition, they all had positive impacts on purchasing intention (PI). We further analyzed the differences in the interaction between the different business models. Compared with multi-business model car companies, the ECI for single-business model car companies had a more positive impact on the PI. However, the impact of ECI for single-business model companies on PI was negative. The SCI of single-business model car companies positively impacted the PI, whereas the SCI of multi-business model car companies had no significant impact on the PI. These findings provide insight into further understanding the mechanism of interactions affecting EV adoption and help perfect future promotion strategies.

State and Order of Service Orientation Knowledge in Hospitality and Tourism Research: Systematic Literature Review

This article offers a systematic review of research trends and methodology, with a focus on the state and order of knowledge regarding service orientation in hospitality and tourism research. A search algorithm was created through Web of Science and Scopus using search words related to service orientation and criteria regarding hospitality and tourism, yielding 154 articles. Duplicates and articles that did not focus on hospitality and tourism or did not have service orientation as their focus were removed, leaving 50 articles that were reviewed thoroughly and are the bases of the results. The review’s main findings are that discussion of service orientation seems to be selective in categorizations and bound mostly to employee hospitableness, therefore leaving out organizational culture, strategy, and process. There is, however, evidence in recent literature that scholars are taking a more holistic view of the phenomena. Most articles contribute to knowledge-building through the third order of knowledge, leaving little room to define concepts or gather mutual understandings through empirical data. Based on our findings, we recommend conscious and continuous building of tools and methods that will contribute to a more in-depth and holistic understanding and measurement of service orientation in hospitality and tourism.

Computational Modeling of the Value Co-Creation Process in Customer Service: An Application of the NK Model

There has been an increasing interest to explore and gain knowledge about customer engagement behavior among academia and practitioners. Particularly, the value co-creation process in customer services is essential to explore the interaction structure. In this study, we applied the computational simulation of the NK model to identify the value co-creation process between service employees and customers in the service context. To specifically explore the dynamic interaction among them, we identified what kind of service is provided for what type of customers and when service performance improves according to the degree of interaction between service employees and customers. The simulations show that the greatest service value can be achieved when employees and customers jointly perform local search (90%) and long jump (10%). However, if both employees and customers jointly perform local search only, the service value can be stuck in a local optimum. In cases where employees and customers make their independent improvement, either through local search or long jump, the overall service value varies depending on the complexity of interactions between employees and customers. For example, the improvement in service value is the worst when employees and customers make long jumps at independent timings in high complex interactions. Our computational simulations offer visible experimental-based insights into understanding the value co-creation process with customers and promising results for customer service studies.

A Postdigital Perspective on Service Work: Salespeople’s Service Encounters in the Connected Store

Covid-19 has disrupted global markets, accelerated the digital transformation of frontline service, and changed how service organisations, frontline service employees, and consumers interact. This article explores how digitalisation is changing retail service work from a postdigital perspective. The article draws on an ethnography of salespeople’s service encounters in speciality chain stores between July 2015 and August 2021. Using a practice theory framework (the theory of practice architectures), the article explores what conditions form salespeople’s service encounters in connected stores and how retail organisations’ digitalisation of frontline service changes salespeople’s practice of service encounters. The contributions of this article to the ongoing debate over the digitalisation of service work are twofold. On the theoretical plane, the article provides an alternative framework to labour process theory for exploring and describing service work organised around digital technologies. Secondly, it uncovers the conditions that are changing salespeople’s practice of service encounters, along with attributes associated with service work and emotional labour skills. The research shows that the connected service encounter is characterised by postdigital dialogue that involves new roles and skills in frontline service work. Overall, the findings contribute to a better understanding of how digitalisation changes action and interaction in service encounters from an employee perspective.

Modeling the Joint Effect of Leader and Follower Authenticity on Work and Non-Work Outcomes

Recent theoretical and empirical work has developed the concept of authenticity, both as it relates to leader authenticity and as it relates to authenticity in followers. The present study examines perceptions of employee authenticity and perceived leader authenticity and highlights the utility of jointly examining the congruence between the two to predict individual-level outcomes. The present study utilized Qualtrics Panels to recruit three waves of survey participants. A total of 420 participants responded to all three time points. Polynomial regression, response surface modeling, and a block variable approach with indirect effects were used to test our hypotheses. Results supported the effect of authenticity congruence on individual-level work-related outcomes. Leader-member exchange was found to be a mediating variable between leader-follower authenticity congruence and outcomes in the work and non-work domains.

"Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda". Workers' Proactivity in the Association between Emotional Demands and Mental Health

The present study aimed to explore the mediating role of hostile customer relations in the association between emotional dissonance and workers’ mental health. Moreover, the moderating role of proactive personality as a buffer against hostile customer relations was assessed. Emotional demands become crucial within professions that involve a direct relationship with clients and, if poorly managed, can negatively affect workers’ health and performance. Accordingly, data were collected on a sample of n = 918 mass-retail employees working for one of the leading Italian supermarket companies. Most participants were women (62.7%) with a mean age = 40.38 (SD = 7.68). The results of a moderated mediation analysis revealed that emotional dissonance was related to more hostile customer relations that, in turn, were associated with higher rates of mental health symptoms. Proactive personality emerged as a protecting factor that prevented the onset of conflicts with clients, particularly among workers experiencing high levels of emotional dissonance. The identification of resources enabling management of emotional demands could suggest suitable adaptive strategies for customer-facing roles, thus preventing the occurrence of adverse mental health symptoms.