Service Skills and Service Quality

ABSTRACT

Though various types of service skills and knowledge have been suggested for inclusion in service training programs that are designed to improve the competence of frontline service providers, there has been no empirical work to investigate the structural relationships among various types of service skill. In this study, a total of twelve types of service skill are identified. A measurement model for service skills is developed accordingly and tested with the use of hotel service. The results of confirmatory factor analysis reveal acceptable model fit, suggesting that these twelve types of service skill can be classified into two categories: technical versus functional. Performance on technical skills is found to have greater impact on service quality.     

Burnout and Service Employees' Willingness to Deliver Quality Service

ABSTRACT

Employees are vital for enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty in service organizations because their proactive involvement is an essential part of delivering the services offered. With the recent rapid growth of tourism in the Macau SAR, service employee workloads are clearly increasing, and consequently one would expect that the incidence of job burnout is rising. This study uses the well-known Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) to investigate the relationship between service employees' burnout and their willingness to deliver quality services. Self-administered questionnaires from 110 operational staff in three hotels in Macau have been analyzed. The results indicate that job burnout reduces staff's willingness to deliver quality services and that this effect is moderated by individual staff's level of affective organizational commitment, and their perceptions of the extent of organizational and supervisor support provided by the organization. Based on these results, practical managerial strategies to improve service performance are identified.     

旅行社经理人工作倦怠及其变化研究——基于2006年和2009年的跨年度调查

工作倦怠是职业健康心理学的一个独立的研究领域。旅行社经理人工作倦怠研究还未涉及。文章运用MBI工作倦怠问卷,通过2006年和2009年两次问卷调查,对旅行社经理人的工作倦怠状况及其在近3年内的发展变化进行了研究。研究结果发现：1）旅行社经理人具有轻微的工作倦怠,且旅行社经理人体验到的情感耗竭最高,对个人成就感降低的感知较低,对去人性化的感知最低;2）通过对比,旅行社经理人工作倦怠感的总体程度显著下降。     

旅行社服务公平感的结构维度及其对关系质量的影响

本文主要探索旅行社服务公平感的结构维度,先后展开了两次调查,对数据进行了信度、效度分析和因子分析后,得到了包括"结果公平、程序公平、人际公平和信息公平"的4个维度的旅行社服务感量表,然后在此基础上探索了旅行社服务公平感4个维度对关系质量的影响.研究发现,旅行社服务公平感的各个维度对关系质量有显著影响.     

对饭店服务质量问题的再认识

客人对饭店服务的感知是其评价服务质量的标准.由于一线员工与客人直接接触,很长时间以来,人们在谈到服务质量问题时,往往只强调一线员工的操作质量,最多不过将管理者履行监督职能的质量纳入其中,而事实上,员工只是处于饭店服务产品生产链最末端的人.本文在分析饭店服务质量与客人预期之间差距的基础上,提出了提高企业决策质量、管理质量、执行质量和沟通质量,满足客人服务期待的建议与措施.     

Measuring Personal Service Quality

Abstract

This study examined the personal service quality of international tourism hotels in China by measuring international hotel customer's satisfaction level and their perceived importance evaluation of personal service attributes. Six international hotels in Beijing and three departments (reception, food and beverage, and housekeeping) in each hotel were selected in this study. Responses from 472 customers were used for the data analysis of this study. It was found that customers identified friendliness and willingness to provide service in all three departments as service attributes with which they were very satisfied. Foreign language ability was identified as the least satisfactory in the reception and food and beverage departments. Customers also regarded friendliness and willingness to provide service as very important.     

The Effect of Service Climate on Perceived Service Value and Behavioral Intentions: The Mediating Role of Service Quality

The purpose of the current study is to assess the influence of employees’ perceived service climate on customers’ perceived service value and behavioral intention. Furthermore, the paper investigates the extent to which service quality mediates the relationship among employees’ perceived service climate, customers’ perceived service value, and behavioral intention. Data were collected from convenience samples of 400 customers and 375 hotel employees. The results of structural equation modeling indicated that: (1) employees’ perceived service climate has a positive and significant influence on service quality, customers’ perceived service value, and behavioral intention and (2) service quality has a positive and significant influence on customers’ perceived service value and behavioral intention. Additionally, this study revealed that the indirect effect of employees’ perceived service climate on customers’ perceived service value and behavioral intention through service quality is more than the direct effect of employees’ perceived service climate, customers’ perceived service value, and behavioral intention.     

An Examination of Job Satisfaction of General Managers Based on Hotel Size and Service Type

ABSTRACT

Because of the flatter organizational structure and decentralized hierarchical configuration of limited-service and extended-stay hotels, managerial job responsibilities may differ between these types of hotels and their full-service counterparts. As job responsibilities vary, so too might approaches to ensuring job satisfaction. This study examined how hotel size and service type affect the job satisfaction of general managers. After hypotheses testing and an analysis of the item correlations, it was concluded that neither hotel size nor service type significantly impacted general manager job satisfaction and gender, age, educational level, and longevity in the hospitality industry or as a hotel manager all had minimal impact on job satisfaction.     

饭店服务质量的测量与改进

饭店服务质量是饭店的生命。为了改进饭店的服务质量，基于Parsuraman提出的SERVOUAL方法，本文提出了饭店服务质量的满意度测量法，然后，采用鱼刺图对饭店服务质量问题进行分析并提出改进方案，新悦饭店的示例表明，本文所提出的方法是有效的。     

服务公平性、服务质量、组织形象对游客行为意向的影响——基于博物馆服务的实证研究

本文以博物馆游客为调研对象,探讨服务公平性、服务质量、顾客满意感、信任感与组织形象的关系,分析顾客感知的服务质量、顾客满意感、信任感、组织形象对博物馆游客行为意向的影响。结构方程模型分析结果表明：在博物馆服务环境中,（1）服务公平性包括交往公平性、程序公平性、结果公平性和信息公平性等4个组成部分;服务公平性4个组成成分对顾客感知的服务质量、满意感、信任感有直接或间接的影响,对组织形象有间接的影响;（2）顾客满意感和顾客感知的服务质量直接影响组织形象;（3）组织形象和顾客信任感对游客行为意向有直接的影响。论文的研究结论对指导博物馆的营销管理有一定的理论和实践意义。     

How Service Quality Affects Customer Loyalty in the Travel Agency: The Effects of Customer Satisfaction,Service Recovery,and Perceived Value

This study develops a conceptual model of the effects of service quality on customer loyalty that reflects the mediating role of customer satisfaction and the moderating role of service recovery and perceived value, and applies this model to the travel industry. A survey and analysis confirm that customer satisfaction is positively influenced by service quality, and customer loyalty is positively influenced by customer satisfaction. Furthermore, customer loyalty is indirectly influenced by service quality through the mediator of customer satisfaction. The relationship between service quality and customer satisfaction is found to be stronger for customers who have a positive experience of service recovery; and the correlation between customer satisfaction and customer loyalty is stronger for customers who perceive high service value.     

旅游区服务质量问题产生原因分析及控制途径

文章从旅游区服务质量标准制定的两大过程、四个环节出发,分析了目前服务质量问题产生的根源,提出了相应的措施,为有效控制旅游区服务质量提供思路.     

服务失败后自我建构与质量预期对满意和口碑的影响

当顾客遭遇由个别雇员引发的服务失败时,顾客会产生怎样的心理反应?文章基于服务失败情境探讨了顾客的自我建构倾向与服务质量预期对满意度与负面口碑传播的影响。研究运用实验法模拟(餐厅)服务情境,结果发现,当服务失败源于个别雇员的不当行为时,如果顾客对企业的服务持有相对负面的质量预期,那么自我建构类型为互依型的顾客(vs.独立型自我建构)更倾向于认为企业对雇员的服务质量具有可控性,会对企业更不满意;但在负面口碑传播上,独立型自我建构的顾客却反而更有可能通过口碑传播服务失败经历(vs.互依型自我建构)。文章在此基础上主要讨论了自我建构对服务失败研究以及企业实践的启示,并指出未来可进一步研究的内容。     

Service Quality Measurement and Triadic Interaction

Abstract

The authors recognise the importance of the service quality encounter and the critical roles played by three direct stakeholders: customers, front-line staff and operational managers, in the assessment of restaurant service quality. The paper therefore argues the merits of adopting a triadic perspective on restaurant service quality assessment and presents the details of a comparative analysis of stakeholder perceptions of service quality performance that was undertaken in three full-service restaurants in Manchester, U.K. The results showed that service providers tended to overrate the quality of service in full-service restaurants, if customer perceptions are used as the standard of comparison. Managers' ratings showed the least convergence with those of customers whilst there was a high degree of convergence between the perceptions of front-line service providers and customers on many of the dimensions. With the exception of the tangible dimension, there were statistically significant differences in service quality performance between the perceptions of stakeholders. Overall, the results have highlighted areas of particular concern and priority which require more in-depth research with qualitative methods; they therefore support the adoption of a triadic perspective in the assessment of restaurant service quality performance.     

An Empirical Study of the Effect of Customer Participation on Service Quality

Abstract

Using 185 completed surveys from hotel customers in Tianjin, China, the authors conducted a multiple regression analysis of the effects of information collection, participation in service design and standard build-up, interaction with employees, and “word of mouth” communication with hotel customers. It was found that these four dimensions of customer participation had a direct relationship with service quality.     

The Effect of Length of Stay on Travelers' Perceived Satisfaction with Service Quality

SUMMARY

Consumer satisfaction related to service quality during the vacation experience is of paramount importance to the travel and tourism industry. This study tests empirically the effects the number of nights spent on a vacation have on the levels of satisfaction recent travelers report for three service aspects of the travel destination: perceived satisfaction with tourism service providers; perceived “freedom from defects” of tourism services; and perceived reasonableness of the cost of tourism services. Differentiation in satisfaction scores between “short-term visitors” (i.e., those who stayed from one to six nights) and “long-term visitors” (i.e., those who stayed seven or more nights) were examined. Significant differences between the two groups of visitors were present for (1) perceived satisfaction with industry professionals delivering the service experience at the travel destination, (2) perceived satisfaction with “freedom from defects” of the actual services at the destination, and (3) perceived reasonableness of the cost of services at the travel destination. Suggestions for how tourism industry professionals can make use of this information are presented.     

Examining the Relationships among Motivation,Service Quality and Loyalty: The case of the National Museum of Natural Science

This study explores causal relationships between push and pull motivations, perceptions of service quality and loyalty intention, and examines the moderating role of membership status in the National Museum of Natural Science, the largest museum in Taiwan. Data were collected from 405 paid admission visitors, with a quota and systematic sampling, from two stages of pre- and post-visit corresponding with two questionnaires. The results demonstrate that push and pull motivations impact on service quality perceptions, which in turn influence museum loyalty; the effect of pull motivation on service quality perceptions in the nonmember group was stronger than in the member group; the effect of service quality perceptions on loyalty in the member group was stronger than in the nonmember group. Museum managers could tailor and advertise existing museum products and services to different types of visitors; assuring the museum's continued operation and success.     

Service Problems,Service Crises and Service Disasters

ABSTRACT

This paper discusses the need for tourism service organisations to implement effective ways of responding to their clients when a problem occurs in the delivery of a service. Failure to recognise or respond appropriately to a problem when it occurs can cause a crisis which requires more organisational resources and skills to overcome, and if this is not achieved the original problem may result in desertion of the company by its clients, or adverse publicity impacting severely on the company's success. The paper presents a short illustrative case study. The paper suggests that organisations may learn from analysing service problems how to adopt adaptive strategies to minimse the negative consequences of future service failures. It indicates the need for further studies to improve the responsive of organisations to service problems.     

Service Failure,Tipping Behavior,and the Effect of Service Industry Experience

The relationship between tipping and the service provided is not always linear. Factors such as demographic profile of the consumer, industry norms, and social norms affect the amount of tip. Results from the current study reveal that tipping varies when service failure occurs due to servers’ fault or organizational failure. Consumers with prior professional experience in the restaurant industry can distinguish between causes of failure, and tip accordingly. Consumers with prior professional restaurant experience were found to tip significantly more than those consumers that do not have prior hospitality experience. Tip rates for service failure due to organization failure tend to be higher compared with the service failure due to servers’ mistakes indicating that consumers do not penalize a server when the organization has caused the service failure.     

员工心理受权与酒店服务质量关系的实证研究

授权管理措施是服务性企业提高服务质量的有效方法，而授权管理措施在企业内部的成功实施最终还要取决于服务人员的受权心态，即员工心理受权。作者在广州市两家四星级酒店进行了一次实证研究，探讨员工心理受权与服务质量关系以及培训、奖励等人力资源管理措施对员工心理受权的影响。数据分析的结果表明：员工心理受权包括工作意义、工作能力和个人影响力3个组成成分；员工心理受权的3个组成成分之间存在相互影响的关系；员工感知的个人影响力和工作能力分别对服务质量产生不同的影响；培训和奖励措施不仅影响员工心理受权，还对服务质量产生积极的影响。本项研究结果对酒店管理人员建立完善的培训和奖励体系，增强员工的心理受权感，进而提高服务质量有一定的指导意义。