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Service productivity and service quality: A necessary trade-off?

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  • Calabrese, Armando

Abstract

This paper is about service productivity and perceived service quality. Both a high service productivity and a high customer perceived quality are two main drivers of good performances in service companies and they simultaneously occur as a consequence of a synergy of several drivers such as employees' competences and motivation, organizational efficiency, technical devices availability, information technologies employment, etc. In scientific literature a trade-off between productivity and perceived service quality is asserted and several cases derived both by market observations and academic research could bear such trade-off out. But, is it possible to state that, under some circumstances, such a trade-off between productivity and perceived service quality could be avoided? And if yes, why such certified substitution should not work?

Suggested Citation

  • Calabrese, Armando, 2012. "Service productivity and service quality: A necessary trade-off?," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(2), pages 800-812.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:proeco:v:135:y:2012:i:2:p:800-812
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijpe.2011.10.014
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    12. Christoph Pross & Christoph Strumann & Alexander Geissler & Helmut Herwartz & Nadja Klein, 2018. "Quality and resource efficiency in hospital service provision: A geoadditive stochastic frontier analysis of stroke quality of care in Germany," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(9), pages 1-30, September.
    13. Jayanath Ananda & Nicholas Pawsey, 2019. "Benchmarking service quality in the urban water industry," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 51(1), pages 55-72, February.
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    15. Ajay Kumar Behera & Narayan C. Nayak & Harish C. Das, 2016. "Performance of Indian Service Industries Due to IT Adoption," Global Business Review, International Management Institute, vol. 17(5), pages 1073-1093, October.
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