Why can some service employees provide service of a consistently high quality while others cannot?

摘要

Service quality differs from level of service quality in terms of inconsistency among multiple service transactions. It also differs in statistical terms of the dispersion of the quality provided by a service employee, and is distinct from the average level of service quality. There are variations in terms of consistency among employees in delivering service quality. Service quality creates service failure and consequently triggers customer dissatisfaction and defection. The article addresses why some service employees provide consistently high-quality service while others do not. Based on signal detection theory, the article explains how personnel and workplace characteristics viz., job tenure, expertise, and self-efficacy affect service quality variation. Service quality variation is defined as the degree to which service provided by an employee varies across customers. The concept of service quality variation was operationalized by asking sets of customers to evaluate the service quality of each employee, and statistical variance used to represent service quality variation. (53 refs.)