New Service Development Process

Abstract

To continue to grow, more and more U.S. service firms have looked overseas in recent years to find markets for their offerings. Thus, innovation in the global context has become a strategic imperative for many service firms. While the issue of how to foster service innovation has been an area of extensive research, the cross-national comparison of innovation practices particularly between developed and emerging countries has been only a nascent field of research. To address this gap in the literature we conducted a comparative study of new service development process and stages of the financial service firms in an emerging country, India, and a developed country, the United States. The results support the central argument of the article that significant cross-national differences do exist with regard to a firm's new service development process. The findings should be of value to managers faced with the tasks of selecting and managing service innovation in emerging markets, as well as those firms experiencing international competition.     

Does Service Employee Arrogance Discourage Sales of Luxury Brands in Emerging Economies?

Upscalex stores selling luxury brands from Western, developed countries are having a strong presence in many emerging markets. However, it is not uncommon to find that the service employees of these stores are arrogant and inhospitable. This article uses a dual attitudes perspective to show how service employee arrogance affects customers’ attitudes and purchase intentions toward luxury brands in emerging markets. Experimental findings show that arrogance produces dual attitudes, with positive implicit attitudes exerting a stronger influence than unfavorable explicit attitudes on purchase intentions. In addition, for customers with high self‐esteem, service employee arrogance has a negative effect on their purchase intentions. In line with the expectation disconfirmation model, when service employees change their arrogant attitudes and subsequently show hospitality, customers also change their expectations. When the improved service exceeds customers’ expectations, their explicit attitudes turn positive and exert a stronger influence on purchase intentions than when service employees are consistently hospitable.     

Revealing travellers’ satisfaction during COVID-19 outbreak: Moderating role of service quality

User-Generated-Content (UGC) has gained increasing attention as an important indicator of business success in the tourism and hospitality sectors. Previous literature has analyzed travelers' satisfaction through quantitative approaches using questionnaire surveys. Another direction of research has explored the dimensions of satisfaction based on online customers' reviews using the machine learning approach. This study aims to present a new method that combines machine learning and survey-based approaches for customers' satisfaction analysis during the COVID-19 outbreak. In addition, we investigate the moderating role of service quality on the relationship between hotels' performance criteria and customers' satisfaction. To achieve this, the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) was used for textual data analysis, k-means was used for data segmentation, dimensionality reduction approach was used for the imputation of the missing values, and fuzzy rule-based was used for the prediction of satisfaction level. Following that, a survey-based approach was used to validate the research model by distributing the questionnaire and analyzing the collected data using the Structural Equation Modeling technique. The result of this research presents important contributions from the methodological and practical perspectives in the context of customers' satisfaction in tourism and hospitality during the COVID-19 outbreak. The outcomes of this research confirm the significant influence of the quality of services during the COVID-19 crisis on the relationship between hotel services and travellers’ satisfaction.     

Web functionality,web content,information security,and online tourism service continuance

This paper aims at examining key information dimensions in association with online tourism service continuance from the consumer perspective. We propose a conceptual model and four hypotheses to articulate the relationships of the relevant constructs. The empirical results unveil that web functionality, web content, and information security positively influence consumers’ perceived value of online tourism services which in turn significantly mediates the effects of these determinants on continuance intention to use online tourism services. The present study makes contributions to research and practice with theoretical and managerial implications. The empirical findings deepen the understanding of consumer attitudes and key information determinants of online tourism services and provide insights for enhancing online travel and tourism services.     

Employee training and service quality in the hospitality industry

ABSTRACT

This study examines the relationship between employee training and service quality in the hospitality industry. The study tested the impacts of perceived access to training, perceived benefits of training and perceived support for training on service quality in the hospitality sector. Survey technique was used for the data collection. The research participants were frontline employees and their customers. The frontline employees responded to the training dimensions, while the customers’ completed the questions on service quality. One hundred and twenty useable surveys were included in this study. This study reveals a significant relationship between the employees’ perception of the benefits of training, support for training and service quality. This study offers some important management and theoretical implications.     

The effects of service quality,perceived value and trust in home delivery service personnel on customer satisfaction: Evidence from a developing country

The rapid growth of online purchasing in recent years has emphasized the accompanying role of home delivery service provided by delivery personnel in ensuring customer satisfaction. On-time delivery, better service, generating positive customer perceived value, and trust towards service providers are influential factors that contribute to customer satisfaction. The aim of the study was to investigate the effects of service quality of home delivery personnel and perceived value on customer satisfaction, with trust playing an intervening role. It was conducted in Dhaka, Bangladesh, a less developed country with a new but rapidly growing digital sector. Data was collected from 259 respondents who received home delivery service, using a structured questionnaire. The conceptual model was analysed using partial least square structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) with SmartPLS tool. The findings revealed that service quality, customer perceived value, and trust influenced customer satisfaction. The relationship between service quality and customer satisfaction and the relationship between customer perceived value and satisfaction were both partially mediated by trust. The findings contribute to the development and validation of a trust-based satisfaction model by extending the SERVQUAL model to incorporate perceived value in the presence of trust, while complying with expectation disconfirmation theory This study provides insights for managers to develop reliability and build trust in their service delivery personnel.     

Integration of standardization and customization: Impact on service quality,customer satisfaction,and loyalty

The basic objective of this study is to analyse the direct and indirect impacts of standardization and customization on customer satisfaction and loyalty through service quality. The service quality has two dimensions: technical quality and functional quality. A framework is developed by extending Grӧnroos’ model of service quality by including the antecedents of service quality. A questionnaire-based survey collected data from 315 customers of three service industries: healthcare, hospitality, and education. The data was analysed and the model validated using PLS-SEM. The findings show that: (1) integration of standardization and customization of service offerings is critical for improved service quality; (2) standardization has higher impact on service quality when compared to customization; (3) functional quality has higher impact on customer satisfaction when compared to technical quality; and (4) customer satisfaction has a significant effect on customer loyalty. The contribution of this study is the development of an integrated framework to analyse the roles of standardization and customization on service quality.     

中国和美国服务业出口竞争力比较分析

本文在界定服务业出口竞争力评价体系的基础上,对中、美两国服务业出口竞争力进行了4个方面的比较分析。通过比较两国服务业净出口额、服务业出口国际市场占有率、服务业贸易竞争优势指数和服务贸易显性比较优势指数4个指标得出:美国在技术密集型的服务业上有极强的出口竞争力,而中国在技术密集型服务业上具有显性比较劣势,并且中国在传统服务业运输和旅游业上的出口竞争力在逐渐减弱,但是中国技术密集型服务业的出口竞争力在增强。最后,本文借助波特的"钻石模型"对中国和美国服务业出口竞争力进行了进一步分析并提出了相应的对策建议。     

Service recommendations and customer evaluations in the international marketplace: Cultural and situational contingencies

As the international service market continues its phenomenal growth, understanding the nature of effective interpersonal interactions between service providers and their customers is increasingly important. However, cross-national theory and research on this topic remain limited. In response, the following study employs data from China and the United States to test whether the cultural congruency of benefits emphasized by the service provider interacts with the customer's value orientation and/or consumption objective to affect evaluations of service quality. Results indicate that the cultural congruency of provider recommendations affects evaluations. Preliminary evidence also suggests that this effect is moderated by consumption objective.     

Telecom market liberalization and service performance outcomes of an incumbent monopoly

Using data from a high-income, emerging market economy in the Middle East, this study examines changes in service performance outcomes of an incumbent monopoly during different periods in the phased liberalization of the country’s telecommunications market. The study draws on Structure-Conduct-Performance (SCP) theory and Social Exchange Theory (SET) to develop hypotheses about expected changes in four customer-based service performance outcomes—service quality perceptions, customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, and customer attitudes. These are tested using data collected in a longitudinal tracking study spanning different periods in the liberalization process. Results show that all four performance outcomes improved significantly during an early post-liberalization period when there was only one additional competitor in the market, but declined slightly during a later period when a second competitor entered the market. However, structural relationships among the outcomes themselves remained invariant across liberalization periods. Policy-making and theoretical implications of the results are outlined and discussed. Although the data come from a single industry in an emerging market economy, a particularly key implication is that while incumbent monopolies may initially harbor a preference for the comfort and ‘freedom’ that comes with being the only player in the market, under certain circumstances liberalization can actually benefit them through the impetus that it provides for their own service quality improvements.     

The impact of implicit and explicit communications on frontline service delivery staff

Using structural equation modelling employing partial least-squares estimation, data from staff in the consumer transport industry were analysed to explore the role of implicit and explicit communications on their service delivery behaviour. Both implicit and explicit communications were found to impact service delivery. Explicit communications had a direct impact on service delivery, whilst implicit communications (in the form of internal market orientation) operated through affective commitment and customer orientation. This study provides quantitative evidence of the roles of implicit and explicit communications on staff attitudes and behaviours, and offers insights into the management of communications with employees to ensure effective service delivery.     

跨文化交际能力融入高职旅游人才职业能力培养的探析

经济全球化已成为支配世界发展的新趋势,在这样的宏观背景下,培养具有国际化视野和服务意识,具备良好的英语表达能力和跨文化交际能力的高素质旅游人才资源必将促进我国旅游业实现可持续发展。目前我国大多数旅游院系尽管强调对学生跨文化交际能力的培养,但并没有将其融入到职业能力培养中。基于此,着重将论述将跨文化交际能力融入职业能力培养的积极意义。     

All's well that ends well: Effective recovery from failures during the delivery phase of e-retailing process

E-commerce retail has been on an exponential growth since late-1990s and now with COVID-19 crisis it is more popular and prevalent than ever before. But failures during the e-retailing process, specially when the business is under pressure, is a severe challenge with deteriorative impacts on customers' attitude and behavioral intention. While the majority of failures during e-retail process takes place at the ‘product delivery phase’ (the last phase of e-commerce process), little attention has been paid towards investigating how e-retailers can effectively recover from service failure encounters during the delivery phase. Seeking to address this gap, the present study draws on cognitive dissonance theory to examine the determinants of effective recovery from service failure encounters during the delivery phase of e-retailing. In doing so, a scenario-based experiment was conducted to collect data from 320 online customers. The findings provide empirical insights on how perceived recovery endeavor interacts with criticality of situation and brand equity to mitigate the negative consequences of service failure at delivery phase. The theoretical and managerial implications of the findings are discussed along with avenues for future research.     

Economic Transition

Abstract

Poland has become one of Eastern Europe's biggest success stories as an important emerging market and rapidly growing economy. However, transition from a centrally planned economy to a market economy has proven to be an enormous challenge in regard to the development and growth of small entrepreneurial ventures within the tourism and hospitality industry. The objective of this study is to examine the environment for growth and development of these enterprises after more than a decade of transition. The 2002 survey was conducted to examine various factors, such as: entrepreneurial disposition, entrepreneurial orientation, strategies, organizational factors, and environmental factors. A model of the entrepreneurial environment was used to analyze policy implications that can be used to assist in the growth and development of the tourism and hospitality industry in Poland and in the other countries in the region.     

Trade in tourism services: Explaining tourism trade and the impact of the general agreement on trade in services on the gains from trade

The article addresses two questions related with tourism as a service trade. Can tourism be explained as other export activities? Does service liberalisation have a positive or negative impact on tourism receipts in destination countries? Previous research has either focused on the demand side factors (i.e. factors of demand in the origin countries) or on tourism as a long-run factor of economic growth. The research shows that a complementary perspective such as that offered by trade in a supply side perspective can render additional insights towards understanding tourism. This approach can explain why countries have absolute and comparative advantage. Another finding is that tourism as an export can be explained by some of the same destination factors that explain other service exports. Using different panel estimators the importance of supply side factors that are to some extent exclusive to tourism are demonstrated: the general price competitiveness of the destination, tourism infrastructure and the provision of safety. The econometric models also confirm the relevance of other conventional explanatory factors of trade in services such as GDP per capita and internet usage. The last part of the article analyses the welfare gains from trade under the general agreement on trade in services (GATS). The revenue (tourism receipt) effect is decomposed into a volume (arrival) and price effect. Results suggest that liberalisers under the GATS gained especially from a volume effect with average higher growth rates in the number of arrivals. There is also found to be a positive effect on the average income earned per tourist from being a liberaliser.     

Tourism development,environmental pollution and economic growth: A theoretical analysis

We develop a two-sector dynamic model of a less-developed economy with an imported traded good sector and with a non-traded tourism service sector serving international tourists. Revenue earned from tourism finances imports. The model takes care of the negative effect of tourism development on environmental pollution. Environmental quality and capital stock accumulates over time. We analyse comparative steady-state effects and show that tourism development raises the level of capital stock as well as national income but lowers the quality of environment in the new steady-state equilibrium leading to a relative expansion (contraction) of the capital (labour) intensive non-tourism (tourism) sector. Pollution abatement policy produces a completely opposite effect; and so tourism development policies are to be accompanied by pollution abatement policies in order to ensure green growth.     

Internationalization and HRM strategies across subsidiaries in multinational corporations from emerging economies—A conceptual framework

The rapid rise of multinational Corporations (MNCs) from emerging economies has led to greater interest and urgency in developing a better understanding of the deployment and diffusion of managerial strategies from their perspective and without assuming the prevailing Western ethnocentric orthodoxy. This paper develops a conceptual framework of global HR strategies and practices in MNCs from emerging economies across their subsidiaries in both developed and developing markets. Using data from a pilot study of an Indian MNC, it provides insights and guidance into the motives, strategic opportunities and constraints in cross-national transfer of HR policies and practices in a multi-polar world.     

Developing a Framework for Understanding a Tourism Service Setting

ABSTRACT

This study aims to extend current typologies in physical environments as applied to service marketing. The physical setting in which service delivery is undertaken creates expectations of the level of service. Thus, the design of the service environment should be carefully undertaken to ensure consistency with service expectations. This is a report/study which demonstrates that many organizations fail to adequately capture the servicescape in tourism settings as evidenced by low accuracy in classification by the participants.     

Leveraging employee emotional intelligence in casino profitability

Drawing on the link between service quality and casino profitability, this paper describes the roles of frontline employees in delivering casino service quality and analyses how management can nurture employee emotional intelligence's (EEI) contribution to casino revenue growth. This study is conceptual in nature. The analysis builds from identifying the emotional contents embracing service encounter involving casino frontline employees and customers. The identification area approaches from emotional work performed by employees, referred to as emotional labor, the emotional service delivered by casinos, customer attributed emotions and emotional contagion. The study comprehensively analyses how EEI can manage and regulate emotionally charged service encounters which subsequently affect customers’ perception of employee behaviours and service performance over service encounters. These encounter performance forms customers’ perception of casino service quality which leads to customer loyalty and ultimately casino profitability. This theory-focused study presents an additional venue with great potential for casinos to enhance business performance and financial growth, as well as providing new insights into the role of EEI in organizations for researchers in the relevant field.     

Interpersonal Stress Reactions and Service Quality Responses among Hospitality Industry Employees

Work stress is now recognised as a major issue in the human resource management arena, for both staff and management. Within the hospitality industry context, service quality issues are beginning to assume major importance in the success of many operations. This study has sought to understand interpersonal conflict work stress responses associated with hospitality industry employee-management conflict, together with approaches to service quality issues among a sample of Australian hospitality industry domain was the sole predictor of the clearer and more autonomous work role stress response, and the management service quality domain was the predictor of the better management communication stress response. Better communication by management presented as the dominant stress response, and was found to be particularly associated with femalae hospitality industry employees. Implications of these findings for both hospitality industry employees and for hospitality industry management are explored.