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Between a rock and a hard place: Seizing the opportunity of demanding customers by means of frontline service behaviors

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  • Itani, Omar S.
  • Jaramillo, Fernando
  • Paesbrugghe, Bert

Abstract

Service businesses are increasingly facing more demanding customers as a result of a shift in power from the service providers' side to the customers' side. Related literature predominantly examines the negative side of this ongoing trend, while overlooking the positive side. The major aim of this paper is to examine how frontline employees — investment account managers — deal with the ongoing increase in customer demandingness. To address this, we draw on adaptability performance theory to test the facilitating effect of frontline employees' post-transaction service behaviors (SBs) — diligence, inducements, information communication, sportsmanship, and empathy — as a means of adaptation to higher levels of customer demand. Findings indicate that frontline employees adapt most of their SBs' intensities to match customers' demands. The results show that some SBs actually increase the effectiveness and efficiency of frontline employees' service performance, leading to an increase in customer value and satisfaction. Customer value is found as a mediator in some of the relationships between SBs and customer satisfaction. Contrary to the conception of the negative outcomes of customer demandingness, service firms need to consider taking advantage of customer demandingness by stressing the role of frontline employees in adapting to customers’ demands.

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  • Itani, Omar S. & Jaramillo, Fernando & Paesbrugghe, Bert, 2020. "Between a rock and a hard place: Seizing the opportunity of demanding customers by means of frontline service behaviors," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 53(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joreco:v:53:y:2020:i:c:s0969698919306113
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jretconser.2019.101978
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    3. Jung, Jin Ho & Brown, Tom J. & Zablah, Alex R., 2022. "How Customer Requests Influence Frontline Employee Job Outcomes: The Role of Personal Appraisal Tendencies and Situational Customer Demandingness," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 98(2), pages 315-334.
    4. Alghamdi, OmarA. & Agag, Gomaa, 2024. "Competitive advantage: A longitudinal analysis of the roles of data-driven innovation capabilities, marketing agility, and market turbulence," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    5. Gaan, Niharika & Shin, Yuhyung, 2023. "Sales employees’ polychronicity and sales-service ambidexterity: Mediation of work engagement and moderation of store manager support," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 75(C).
    6. Asante, Daniel & Tang, Chunyong & Asante, Eric Adom & Kwamega, Michael & Opoku-Danso, Alexander, 2023. "Leveraging perceived HPWS to improve service encounter quality in high-contact service industries," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    7. Ross Gilbert, Jonathan & Krush, Michael T. & Trainor, Kevin J. & Wayment, Heidi A., 2022. "The (quiet) ego and sales: Transcending self-interest and its relationship with adaptive selling," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 326-338.
    8. Li, Xiaodong & Liu, Zibing & Ren, Ai & Gong, Bengang, 2022. "What fuzzy requests bring to frontline employees: An absorptive capacity theory perspective," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).
    9. Gaan, Niharika & Shin, Yuhyung, 2023. "Supervisor incivility and frontline employees’ performance amid the COVID-19 pandemic: A multilevel moderated mediation analysis," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    10. Kamvysi, Konstantina & Andronikidis, Andreas & Georgiou, Andreas C. & Gotzamani, Katerina, 2023. "A quality function deployment framework for service strategy planning," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    11. Pangarkar, Aniruddha & Fleischman, Gary M. & Iacobucci, Dawn, 2022. "Enhancing frontline employee support during a product-harm crisis: Evidence and strategic managerial implications for firms," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).

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