THE ROLE OF EMPLOYEES IN HIGH CONTACT SERVICE ENVIRONMENTS

摘要

A critical component of service strategy in high contact service environments is management of the interaction (service encounters) between service employees and customers. Service encounter management begins with a strong foundation of training and development of employees and attention to work and job design. This study investigates relationships among employee development, employee outcomes such as productivity and satisfaction, customer satisfaction, and financial performance, addressing the link between internal and external performance measures for a high contact service. Three alternative models of the construct relationships are estimated and compared. The results of this study illustrate the importance of employee development in high contact services, and that developing service strategies for these environments should account for the significant linkages among the internal and external performance measures of interest.