Factors influencing employee perceptions of customer service climate

This study examines the relationships between certain organizational variables and employees' perceptions of the customer service climate in their organization. In addition, the role of organizational commitment in this process is examined. Results indicate that rewarding employees for service excellence, allowing their voice to be heard by upper management, providing employees with the information and technology needed to do their jobs, providing adequate training to customer contact employees, allowing employees enough time to get their tasks done, and providing a work environment conducive to getting work done are all positively associated with employee perceptions of customer service climate. Based on mediated regression and a LISREL analysis, these relationships are all found to be partially mediated by organizational commitment. These results are consistent with previous customer service research, which has found organizational support and rewards to be positively related to customer service. We extend this literature by showing that organizational commitment may be a key variable linking organizational support and rewards to customer service. Implications of these findings are discussed and suggestions for further research are offered.Lincoln National Corporation     

Customer orientation of frontline employees and organizational commitment

This study investigates the effect of alignment between employee and firm customer orientation (FCO) on the organizational commitment of frontline service employees. Furthermore, the study examines how the size and nature of the discrepancy between employee customer orientation (ECO) and FCO affects organizational commitment. The results suggest that organizational commitment is stronger when employee and FCO are matched than when they are not. Furthermore, organizational commitment is slightly stronger when ECO exceeds FCO 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.     

国有企业员工编制身份与组织承诺——内在薪酬感知的调节作用

国有企业作为社会经济发展的奠基石,肩负着艰巨的历史使命和现实重任,而国有企业员工作为企业发展的第一要素,员工组织承诺对企业的发展具有十分重要的影响。文章从身份视角切入,基于社会认同威胁理论,探讨员工编制身份如何影响组织承诺,以及这一影响过程是否受内在薪酬感知的调节作用。281份有效问卷的研究结果表明：员工编制身份对组织承诺有正向影响;内在薪酬感知在“编制身份-组织承诺”关系中部分起负向调节作用,即内在薪酬感知能够部分减少“双轨制”带来的员工价值认同、回报以及继续留在组织意愿的差距。内在薪酬感知的具体调节作用存在差异,即内在薪酬管理并不如预想中有效。文章对国有企业雇佣制度的理论研究和管理实践具有一定的启示意义。     

Organizational Ethical Standards and Organizational Commitment

Organizations interested in employee ethics compliance face the problem of conflict between employee and organizational ethical standards. Socializing new employees is one way of assuring compliance. Important for longer term employees as well as new ones, however, is making those standards visible and then operable in the daily life of an organization. This study, conducted in one large organization, found that, depending on organizational level, awareness of an organization's ethical standards is predicted by managerial adherence to and organizational compliance with those standards and/or discussions with peers. Regardless of level, organizational commitment was predicted most strongly by managerial adherence to organizational standards. These findings have theoretical implications for the fields of business ethics, organizational identity and organizational socialization and practical implications for the implementation of ethics policies.     

Sectoral Differences in Value Congruence and Job Attitudes: The Case of Nursing Home Employees

Drawing on a survey of nursing staff of nursing homes in a Midwestern state in the United States, the study examines how the relationships between employee–organization value congruence and job attitudes vary between nonprofit and for-profit organizational types. Statistical comparison of the levels of employee value congruence and job attitudes does not suggest significant difference between the two types of employees. Although value congruence is found positively associated with nursing home employees’ job satisfaction and organizational commitment, and negatively associated with intent to quit, consistent with prior research, the difference in the magnitude of the relationships between the two types of employees is not found. These findings suggest inconsistency with conventional wisdom of profiling employee value according to organizational ownership type.     

From organizational values to mobilization of human resources

This study examines the relationship of perceived organizational values to employee mobilization behaviours as mediated by perceived organizational support (POS) and affective organizational commitment. Firstly, a scale comprising three types of perceived organizational values (interpersonal values, formal values, and individual well‐being‐centered values) was developed and validated using a sample of 580 employees. Secondly, the relationships among variables were examined using structural equations modeling on an independent sample of 260 employees. POS mediated the relationship between employees' perceptions that their organization values the individual well‐being of its members and their affective organizational commitment, which in turn mediated the relationship between POS and individual mobilization behaviours. The contributions of these findings to advancing scholarship and practice are discussed. Copyright © 2010 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A meta-analysis of the relationship between perceived organizational support and job outcomes: 20 years of research

Anecdotal comments from practitioners and extant empirical research suggests a tenuous link between perceived organizational support and desired employee outcomes. Accordingly, in this study the authors conduct a meta-analysis examining the effects of perceived organizational support on four employee outcomes: organizational commitment, job satisfaction, performance, and intention to leave. The authors also examine the extent to which these effects are moderated by job type (frontline vs. non-frontline employee). Findings from the study indicate that perceived organizational support has a strong, positive effect on job satisfaction and organizational commitment; a moderate, positive effect on employee performance; and a strong, negative effect on intention to leave. Study findings also indicate that the effects of perceived organizational support are more pronounced for non-frontline employees.     

The influence of Islamic Work Ethic on employees’ responses to change in Kuwaiti Islamic banks

Significant attention has been paid recently to Islamic Work Ethic (IWE) particularly in organizational change literature. However, the nature of the relationship remains ambiguous. Research studies attempting to uncover IWE’s influence on characteristics of employees’ responses are still in its infancy. To tackle this gap, this study contributes to knowledge by developing a possible conceptual model identifying IWE’s influence on employees’ responses towards change in the shape of their commitment to change and organizational deviance. The testing of these relationships took place in the ever-developing Kuwaiti Islamic banking sector. Data was collected from 398 employees by distributing self-administered questionnaires. Outcomes revealed that the extent of IWE’s influence on employee commitment to change varied across different components. This result offers a unique understanding into IWE’s affiliation with employee attitudes to change, especially in the Islamic banking sector. Moreover, IWE was found to negatively influence employee engagement in organizational deviance. As such, this finding has not been established within the context of change previously. Due to such findings, several implications and future research directions emerge.     

Procedural justice in promotion decisions of managerial staff in Malaysia

Previous research indicates that procedural justice in promotion decisions has affected employees' organizational commitment, intent to leave and career satisfaction. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of procedural justice in promotion decisions on managers' commitment, specifically organizational commitment, intent to leave, career satisfaction and job performance in multinational companies in Malaysia. Data were obtained from a sample of managers with more than 10 years of service in the organization through in-depth interviews. The findings show that perceived procedural injustice in promotion decisions have an unfavourable impact on employee commitment, job performance and career satisfaction. The intent to leave is also higher, especially among young managerial staff.     

The Influence of Corporate Psychopaths on Corporate Social Responsibility and Organizational Commitment to Employees

This study investigated whether employee perceptions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) were associated with the presence of Corporate Psychopaths in corporations. The article states that, as psychopaths are 1% of the population, it is logical to assume that every large corporation has psychopaths working within it. To differentiate these people from the common perception of psychopaths as being criminals, they have been called “Corporate Psychopaths” in this research. The article presents quantitative empirical research into the influence of Corporate Psychopaths on four perceptual measures of CSR and three further measures of organizational commitment to employees. The article explains who Corporate Psychopaths are and delineates the measures of CSR and organizational commitment to employees that were used. It then outlines the research conducted among 346 corporate employees in Australia in 2008. The reliability of the instrument used is commented on favorably in terms of its statistical reliability and its face and external validity. Results of the research are described showing the highly significant and negative influence of Corporate Psychopaths on all of the measures of CSR and of organizational commitment to employees used in the research. When Corporate Psychopaths are present in leadership positions within organizations, employees are less likely to agree with views that: the organization does business in a socially desirable manner; does business in an environmentally friendly manner and that the organization does business in a way that benefits the local community. Also, when Corporate Psychopaths are present in leadership positions within organizations, employees are significantly less likely to agree that the corporation does business in a way that shows commitment to employees, significantly less likely to feel that they receive due recognition for doing a good job, to feel that their work was appreciated and to feel that their efforts were properly rewarded. The article argues that academics and researchers in the area of CSR cannot ignore the influence of individual managers. This is particularly the case when those managers have dysfunctional personalities, or are actually psychopaths. The article further argues that the existence of Corporate Psychopaths should be of interest to those involved in corporate management and corporate governance because their presence influences the way corporations are run and how corporations affect society and the environment.     

The Effects of Employee Attitudes on Workplace Charitable Donations

ABSTRACT

The objectives of this paper are to examine the effects of employee attitudes toward the employer on workplace monetary donations at two levels: (1) to see if there is a significant difference between the attitudes of employees who make workplace contributions and those who do not; and (2) to examine whether awareness of employer charitable contributions moderate the relationship between employee attitudes and donating behavior. Employee attitudes include organizational commitment and job satisfaction. The research questions are examined in the context of workplace contributions made to a regional branch of United Way. The results indicate that organizational commitment scores exhibited by employees who made workplace contributions, and who were aware that their employer was also making corporate donations were significantly higher than the commitment for employees who did not make workplace contributions. No significant relationships were found for job satisfaction.     

Antecedents and consequences of role stress of retail sales persons

Given the central proposition in services marketing that service excellence is largely determined by the interaction between customer contact personnel and customers, we examine the antecedents and consequences of role stress in a retail context both from the employee and the customer perspective. We investigate the impact of the service control versus the empowerment model on role ambiguity and role conflict and we look at the effect of these role stressor on commitment towards the organization and to delivering service quality by retail sales persons. Finally, we explore the impact on customer perceived service quality. Empirical findings reveal, among other things, that both formalization and empowerment reduce role ambiguity. Role ambiguity in turn is negatively associated with both organizational commitment and commitment to quality. The latter type of commitment has a positive impact on customer perceived quality.     

Does Sleep Really Matter? Examining Sleep among Salespeople as Boundary Role Personnel for Key Job Factors

ABSTRACT

Purpose: Sleep deprivation among employees has become commonplace in the workforce. In the United States, the number of hours individuals sleep per night has declined by an hour and a half per night since the 1960s. As of 2005, seventy-four percent of individuals were getting less than eight hours of sleep per night on weekdays. There are negative ramifications to the organization when employees are sleep deprived such as lost productivity, increased accident rate, and increased absenteeism.

Originality/Value/Contribution of the paper: Although prior research has investigated the impact that sleep deprivation has on unique job positions (e.g., shift workers, transportation), no research has investigated how sleep impacts business-to-business sales employees. Due to the responsibilities of business-to-business sales employees, this type of position should not just be lumped in with other organizational employees. For example, business-to-business sales employees are boundary spanning employees that are responsible for generating revenue for the organization. These sales employees are also more likely to be physically, socially, and psychologically separated from the organization since they frequently work outside of the office. Because of these distinctive roles, this study examines if differences based on sleep duration exist for business-to-business sales employees for two individual and five organizational factors. The two individual factors consisted of grit and happiness while the five organizational factors consisted of perceived organizational support, perceived supervisory support, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and turnover intentions.

Methodology/Approach: Data was collected from 320 business-to-business sales employees using a cross industry survey. The survey was conducted using a Qualtrics panel. Sleep duration was broken into two groups with one group consisting of business-to-business sales employees who sleep, on average, seven or more hours per night and the other group consisting of business-to-business sales employees who sleep, on average, six or less hours per night. The sleep duration groups were determined based on prior research that found adults should regularly sleep seven or more hours per night in order to support optimal health. There were one hundred thirty-four respondents who slept six hours or less and one hundred eighty-six respondents who slept seven or more hours, on average, per night.

Findings: The research question developed was answered by examining the differences between means for the two individual constructs and the five key organizational constructs. Differences in sleep duration for six of the seven sales constructs. There were significant differences between those that slept seven or more hours per night from those that slept six or less for grit, perceived organizational support, perceived supervisory support, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and turnover intentions. Results found that business-to-business sales employees that slept seven or more hours per night exhibited more grit than those that slept six or less hours per night. In addition, business-to-business sales employees that slept six or less hours per night had higher perceptions of both organizational and supervisory support than those that slept seven or more hours per night. Furthermore, business-to-business sales employees that slept six or less hours per night displayed higher job satisfaction and organizational commitment than sales employees that slept seven or more hours per night. Finally, business-to-business sales employees that slept seven or more hours per night indicated higher levels of turnover intentions than sales employees that slept six or less hours per night. There were no significant differences between the two sleep groups for sales employee happiness. Although some of these results may appear to be counterintuitive, conservation of resources theory can be used to explain these findings.

Research Implications: This exploratory study showcases the importance of good sleep among business-to-business sales employees. This study draws on the conservation of resources theory literature to explain the counterintuitive findings. This theory posits that individuals will retain and guard against resource depletion. Additionally, as resources become depleted, other resources are valued to a greater extent. In this study, the resource being depleted is the condition of sleep. When business-to-business sales employees experience a lower average amount of sleep per night (i.e., six hours or less), they perceive higher levels of support, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment than business-to-business sales employees who experience a higher average amount of sleep per night (i.e., seven hours or more). Although this study provides a good initial examination of how sleep impacts sales organizations, this study also highlights the need for additional business-to-business sales employee sleep research. This is the first study that has examined how sleep duration impacts business-to-business sales employees.

Practical Implications: This study is important to sales research because it highlights the impact that poor sleep of business-to-business sales employees has on the organization. For sales organizations, we provide guidance on ways a sales organization can help promote healthy sleep for their business-to-business sales employees. Some examples of guidance provided can be categorized into four primary categories. These categories include (1) proper sleep education, (2) sales management training, (3) creating a sleep friendly workplace environment, and (4) creating specific workplace policies to minimize sleep disturbances such as setting reasonable work hours and sleep accommodating travel schedules.     

The Effects of Performance Rating, Leader–Member Exchange, Perceived Utility, and Organizational Justice on Performance Appraisal Satisfaction: Applying a Moral Judgment Perspective

The performance appraisal process is increasingly seen as a key link between employee behaviour and an organization’s strategic objectives. Unfortunately, performance reviews often fail to change how people work, and dissatisfaction with the appraisal process has been associated with general job dissatisfaction, lower organizational commitment, and increased intentions to quit. Recent research has identified a number of factors related to reactions to performance appraisals in general and appraisal satisfaction in particular. Beyond the appraisal outcome itself, researchers have found that appraisal reactions are affected by perceptions of fairness and the relationship between the supervisor and the employee. To explain the relationships among these factors, the present article proposes a moral cognition perspective. We suggest that employees judge a performance appraisal from the perspective of its moral justifiability, and that appraisal reactions will be determined, at least in part, by the perceived moral justifiability of the process. The proposal was supported by results from a survey of government employees using measures of performance ratings, leader–member exchange, perceived utility, and organizational justice.     

Relationship between employees’ beliefs regarding training benefits and employees’ organizational commitment in a petroleum company in the State of Qatar

The study examined the relationship between the beliefs of senior staff Qatari national employees regarding training benefits as measured by the benefits of employee training, and employees’ organizational commitment as measured by the three‐component model of organizational commitment. This relationship was assessed through a quantitative associational research design. From the study site, Qatar Petroleum, a total of 283 responses were analysed using stepwise regression analysis. The findings suggest that there is a positive relationship between employees’ beliefs regarding training benefits and employees’ organizational commitment.     

工会承诺、组织承诺和员工绩效——被企业所有制类型跨层次调节的中介模型

基于我国工会维稳与维权的双重角色,要发挥工会预防劳资矛盾激化的功能,并履行集体劳动争议代表的责任,需要研究工人是否对工会有承诺,以及这种承诺与组织承诺和员工绩效的关系。鉴于不同所有制企业工会的差异,文章基于角色理论、认知理论和交换理论,针对员工的工会承诺、组织承诺和绩效之间的关系展开研究,研究中使用了32家企业共709个员工样本的嵌套数据建立了不同所有制企业跨层次被调节的中介模型进行假设验证。研究结果表明：工会承诺正向影响组织承诺,组织承诺在工会承诺和员工绩效关系中起中介作用,并且该中介作用在公有制企业中较强,在非公有制企业中较弱。文章最后对实证分析部分进行了讨论,并指出未来研究方向。     

Building the bottom line by developing the frontline: Career development for service employees

Service firms must remember that the way they treat their employees is exactly how those employees will, in turn, treat customers. As such, taking good care of frontline personnel should be a top management concern. One way that service employees can be shown they are valued members of the organization entails the implementation of thoughtful and organized career development programs, initiatives which help increase employees’ job satisfaction and feelings of empowerment in their customer-facing roles. Before they can become enthusiastic about meeting the needs of their customers, employees have to feel that their own needs are being met within the organization. In this regard, firm investment in frontline employee career development programs will be money well spent: they are capable of reducing employee turnover and increasing customer satisfaction, loyalty, and profitability. This article provides a conceptual model of career development which should prove useful to service managers in evaluating their own career development efforts. Also presented herein is a framework for tying together many disparate areas of career development that have heretofore been handled separately in the services literature.     

The effects of organizational training on organizational commitment

This empirical study investigated the impact of organizational training on employee commitment focusing on employees' emotional and affective responses towards their organization. Organizational training is conceptualized within a multidimensional framework consisting of motivation for training, access to training, benefits from training and support for training. The hypothesis of this study has been built on a resource‐based view, social exchange theory and psychological contract theory. Field research was conducted through surveys with 298 participants of four‐ and five‐star hotels operating in Izmir, Turkey. Confirmatory factor analyses were used to analyse the quality of the training scales and multiple regression analyses were conducted to test the hypotheses of the study. The results revealed that all dimensions of training positively affected employee commitment. Implications have been presented for both researchers and human resource practitioners as to how to utilize organizational training factors to increase employee commitment.     

包容型领导对员工创新行为的影响：基于组织和谐的中介作用及组织创新氛围的调节作用

员工创新行为是组织塑造竞争优势的重要环节。尽管已有研究表明领导风格能够对员工创新行为产生显著影响,但目前对于二者之间的作用机制和边界条件却知之甚少。文章基于国内新能源行业422名在职人员的有效调查问卷数据,构建并检验一个被调节的中介效应模型。实证研究结果表明：包容型领导对员工创新行为具有显著正向影响;组织和谐能够在包容型领导与员工创新行为关系中起中介作用;组织创新氛围在包容型领导和组织和谐之间起着正向的调节作用,组织创新氛围越强,包容型领导对组织和谐的影响程度随之增强。文章解释了包容型领导对员工创新行为的作用机理,不仅打开了二者之间的“黑箱”,也为员工在组织中如何有效增强创新行为提供了管理启示和对策建议。     

Duties Owed to Organizational Citizens – Ethical Insights for Today’s Leader

Organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) has been widely recognized as a contributor to improving organizational performance and wealth creation. The purpose of this article is to briefly summarize the motives of many employees who exercise OCB and to identify the ethical duties owed by organizational leaders to the highly committed employees with whom they work. After reviewing the nature of OCB and the psychological contracts made with highly committed employees, we then use Hosmer’s framework of ten ethical perspectives to identify how OCB is viewed from each of those ethical viewpoints. We offer six propositions about OCB that relate to building employee commitment and trust.