The service industry is characterized by opening operation systems and face-to-face service delivery, in which front- line service employees’attitudes and behaviors can make great influence on customers ‘ satisfaction and loyalty. In addition, because of the unpredictable and rapidly changing nature of customers’needs and expectations, employees’initiative and proactive behavior in service delivery play an increasingly significant role for customers’evaluation of service encounters and service organizations profitability and growth. Therefore, the topic of how to enhance front- line service employees’initiative and proactive customer service behavior has becoming extremely meaningful, both theoretically and practically. Given this and the significant impact of leadership styles on employees' attitudes and behaviors, in our study, we examined the relationship between servant leadership and hospitality service employees’proactive customer service performance. Meanwhile, drawing on social exchange theory and social learning theory, we investigated the mediating effect of work engagement in this relationship. Furthermore, we also examined the moderating role of sensitivity to favorable interpersonal treatment in strengthening the direct relationship between servant leadership and work engagement and the indirect relationship between servant leadership and proactive customer service performance via work engagement. Data for this research was collected from full-service hotels located in the capital city(Lanzhou) of Gansu province of China.Thirty-six hotels were randomly selected and invited to participate in this study and eleven of them agreed. Then, three surveys were conducted with three waves of data collection to reduce the concerns of common method bias.Using this time-lagged data,we found that servant leadership positively influences service employees'proactive customer service performance. Employees'work engagement partially mediates the relationship between servant leadership and their proactive customer service performance. Furthermore, our findings also indicated that sensitivity to favorable interpersonal treatment strengthens the direct effect of servant leadership on work engagement and the indirect effect of servant leadership on proactive customer service performance via work engagement such that these relationships are stronger when sensitivity to favorable interpersonal treatment is high than low. Our study has several theoretical and managerial implications.On the one hand,our study extends servant leadership literature by taking proactive customer service performance into consideration, which also provides a new measure of how to enhance front-line employees'service performance. Based on social exchange theory and social learning theory, we also find an effective mediator (i.e., work engagement) in the relationship between servant leadership and proactive customer service performance. Meanwhile, the boundary condition for this relationship was also found. On the other hand, to improve proactive customer service performance, hospitality organizations should pay more attention to servant leadership management styles and employees'work engagement.Furthermore,the characteristics of employees'sensitivity to favorable interpersonal treatment should also be improved to enhance the positive effects of servant leadership on work engagement and proactive customer service performance.Finally,several limitations of our research are discussed to provide meaningful directions for future research.%文章以社会交换理论与社会学习理论为基础,以工作投入为中介和人际友好敏感性为调节,基于一个被调节的中介模型探索了服务型领导对员工主动性顾客服务绩效的影响机制.通过3个时间段11家酒店222份领导-下属配对问卷调查,研究发现:(1)服务型领导对员工主动性顾客服务绩效有显著的正向影响;(2)员工工作投入在服务型领导与主动性顾客服务绩效之间发挥着部分中介作用;(3)员工人际友好敏感性对服务型领导与员工工作投入之间的关系具有显著的正向调节效应,即员工人际友好敏感性越高,二者之间的正向关系越强;(4)员工人际友好敏感性对服务型领导与员工主动性服务绩效之间通过工作投入的间接关系具有显著的正向调节作用,即员工人际友好敏感性越高,这种正向的间接关系就越强.
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