Examining the spillover effects of problems at home on proactive customer service performance in the hospitality industry: the overlooked side of the work-family interface

ABSTRACT

The present study explores the underlying mechanism of problems at home and proactive customer service performance (PCSP) in the hospitality industry. Integrating conservation of resources theory and boundary theory, it investigates the impact of hotel service employees’ problems at home on PCSP as well as the mediating role of thriving at work and the moderating role of home–work segmentation preferences. We employed a three-wave survey and achieved 316 valid employee–supervisor dyads from five hotels in Guangdong Province in southern China. The results demonstrate that problems at home have a negative effect on PCSP and that thriving at work mediates this association. Furthermore, home–work segmentation preferences could weaken the effect of problems at home on thriving at work and the indirect effect of problems at home on PCSP via thriving at work.

本研究结合资源保存理论和边界理论，引入工作繁荣作为中介变量和家庭-工作分割偏好作为调节变量, 探索了酒店服务业情境下员工的家庭纷扰对其顾客服务主动性行为的内在作用机制。我们利用三阶段的数据获取方式在中国广东省的五家酒店开展调研, 获取了316份有效的员工和主管配对数据。结果表明: 家庭纷扰负向影响员工的顾客服务主动性行为; 工作繁荣中介了家庭纷扰与顾客服务主动性行为的作用关系; 家庭-工作分割偏好不仅调节了家庭纷扰对工作繁荣的直接作用, 还调节了家庭纷扰通过工作繁荣对顾客服务主动性行为的间接作用。

KEYWORDS:

• Problems at home
• thriving at work
• home–work segmentation preferences
• proactive customer service performance

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by MOE (Ministry of Education in China) Project of Humanities and Social Sciences (Grant No. 17YJC630031), Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation (Grant No. 2019A1515011464), Guangdong Science and Technology Special Fund Project (Grant No. 2019ST002), Humanities and Social Sciences Innovation Team Major Project of Educational Commission of Guangdong Province (Grant No. 2016WCXTD003) and Research Institute for Guangdong-Taiwan Business Cooperation of Shantou University.

Conflict of interest

The author declares that there are no conflicts of interest.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Bao Cheng

Bao Cheng (PhD, Xiamen University) is an Assistant Professor at School of Business Administration, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics. His research interests include organizational behavior and tourism management. His academic research work has been published in various academic journals such as Journal of Business Ethics and International Journal of Hospitality Management.

Gongxing Guo

Gongxing Guo (PhD, Xiamen University) is an Associate Professor at Business School, Shantou University. His research interests include marketing and tourism management. His academic research work has been published in Journal of Business Ethics, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, and Journal of Consumer Marketing etcetera. Gongxing Guo is the correspondence author and can be contacted at: [email protected]. His address: No. 243 Daxue Road, Shantou 515063, Guangdong, China.

Yun Dong

Yun Dong is a PhD student at School of Hotel and Tourism Management, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Her research interests include hotel management and human resource management.

Yan Peng

Yan Peng is a PhD student of tourism management at School of Management, Xiamen University. Her research interests include organizational behavior, tourism management and hotel management. Her academic research work has been published in International Journal of Hospitality Management.