Investigating the employee–customer relationship in a utilitarian context

Figures & data

Table 1. Dyadic data examining the ES-CS relationship since Brown and Lam (2008)

Author (Year)	Type of Service Environment Hedonic = H, Utilitarian = U Relationship = R	Theoretical Framework(s)	Sample	Matching Dyadic data	Analysis	CS at store level	Number of Items for CS	ES-CS Link	ES-SQ or SQ-CS link
Chi and Gursoy (2009)	H: Hotels	Service Profit Chain (SPC)	3,346 customers 2,023 employees 50 units	No	SEM with aggregation to unit level	Yes	(3) e.g., I am very satisfied with my stay at X	+	Not tested
Homburg et al. (2009)	H: Travel Agencies	SPC Social Identity	597 customers 258 employees 109 units	Yes	HLM	Yes	(3) e.g., All in all I am very satisfied with this travel agency.	Ns	Not tested
Evanschitzky et al. (2011)	H: DIY retailer	Generalised Exchange Theory	20,742 customers 933 employees (3 months’ difference between data collection)	No	SEM with aggregation to employee level	Yes	(2) e.g., Overall, how satisfied are you with X?	+	Not tested
Grandey et al. (2011)	U: Warehouse retailer	Emotional Contagion Performance Motivation SPC	328 stores No numbers specified	No	HLM with aggregation to store level of both ES and CS	Yes	(12) Overall satisfaction from the Gallup Workplace Audit (GWA)	+	Not tested
Kantabutra (2011)	H: Retail Apparel	Leadership	126 stores No numbers specified	No	Multiple Regression with aggregation to store level	Yes	(14) Based on Hackl et al. (2000) study	Ns	Not tested
Yee et al. (2011)	H: e.g., Beauty/fashion/jewellery	SPC	210 Stores 630 participants (Customer and Employees)	No	SEM	Yes	(4) Based on Oliver (1997)	+	ES-SQ: Ns SQ-CS: +
Chuang et al. (2012)	R: Sales/Insurance/financial Services/Hairdressers	Transformational Leadership Emotion regulation	52 Stores 204 Managers 204 Employees 204 Customers	Yes (Triadic)	HLM	Yes	(3) e.g., Overall, I am satisfied with the decision to come to this store	+	Not tested
Evanschitzky, Sharma et al. (2012)	R: Financial Services	Relationship Marketing SPC	18 Employees 188 Customers	Yes	Multi-level regression and HLM	Yes	(2) e.g., Overall how satisfied are you with X?	+	SQ-CS: + ES-SQ: not tested
Evanschitzky, Von Wangenheim et al. (2012)	H: DIY/garden store	SPC	Customers: 144,965 (yr:2001), 100,351 (yr:2002), 161,922 (yr:2003) Employees: 7,668 (yr:2001), 6,040 (yr:2002), 2,755 (yr:2003)	No	3SLS regression	Yes	(2) e.g., Overall, how satisfied are you with X?	+	Not tested
Jeon and Choi (2012)	R: Private education	Emotional Contagion	227 Employees 227 Customers	Yes	SEM	Yes	Does not specify how many items. Items were adopted from Bettencourt (1997).	+ Tested CS-ES link – Ns	Not tested
Gazzoli et al. (2013) *	H: Restaurant Chain	Customers Orientation	1,117 customers 186 employees	No	SEM with aggregation to employee level	Yes	(3) Adapted from Oliver (1997)	+ and fully mediated by interaction quality	ES-SQ: + SQ-CS: +
Gounaris and Boukis (2013)	H: Retail Banking	Emotional Contagion SPC Social Exchange	604 customers 183 employees 15 units	No	HLM	Yes	Does not specify number of items, items were adopted from Fornell (1992).	+	ES-SQ: + SQ-CS: not tested
Jung & Yoon (2013)	H: Restaurant	Employee Satisfaction Customer Satisfaction	69 employees 258 customers	Yes	SEM	Yes	(4) e.g., Overall, I am satisfied with my experience at this restaurant	+	Not tested
Hur et al. (2015) *	R: Care homes	Emotional Contagion SPC	282 Employees 282 Customers	Yes	SEM	Yes	(4) e.g., I am satisfied with this social care service and its performance	+	Not tested
Zablah et al. (2016)	H: Retail Apparel	Social Exchange Theory SPC	49,272 customers 1,470 employees	No	Cross-lagged panel data analysis	Yes	(3) e.g., I am completely satisfied with X	+ (Finds reciprocal relationship with CS to ES link predominant)	Not tested
Wu (2017)	R: Financial Services	Emotional Labour	322 Employees 322 Customers	Yes	SEM	Yes	(5) e.g., This bank is a good firm to do business with	+	Not tested

* The authors refer to employee satisfaction as job satisfaction and service quality as interactive quality or internal quality.

Table 2. Items, loadings & reliabilities

Construct	Item wording	Loading	Std Error	CR(ω)	AVE	Alpha
Customer Level	How satisfied were you with the service you received from the employee at the checkout in terms of …
Customer Satisfaction	Providing an accurate service for me	0.910	0.012	0.942^†	0.825	0.958^†
	Willingness to help me	0.932	0.011
	Making me feel secure about my transactions	0.952	0.009
	Showing sincere interest in me	0.798	0.019
Service Quality	Employees give me personal attention	0.768	0.019	0.877^†	0.666	0.914^†
	The store offers high-quality service	0.910	0.016
	Employees are not too busy to respond to me	0.687	0.034
	I believe the store offers excellent service	0.880	0.022
Employee Level
Employee Satisfaction	Generally speaking, I am very satisfied with this job	0.834	0.054	0.921	0.664	0.920
	I like my job	0.888	0.039
	There are no fundamental things I dislike about my job	0.795	0.043
	I like my job more than many employees of other companies	0.664	0.081
	I consider this employer as first choice	0.790	0.048
	I am generally satisfied with the kind of work I do in this job	0.895	0.028

†: This is a level specific α and ω value as per Geldhof et al. (2014). Employee satisfaction is modelled at one level only.

Table 3. Inter-construct correlations

	CS^c	SQ^c	ES^e
CS^c	0.908
SQ^c	0.489	0.816
ES^e	−0.020	0.026	0.821

The diagonal holds the square root of the Average Variance Extracted (AVE). c denotes measurement at customer level and e denotes measurement at employee level. p values are as follows (CS – SQ, p = 0.000; CS-ES, p = 0.932; SQ-ES, p = 0.855).

Figure 1. Structural model

Table 4. Structural model results

Within-Level
Effect	Standardised Coefficient	Standard Error	p-value
Hypotheses
H2: SQ – CS	0.433	0.063	0.000
H4a: Price competitiveness – SQ	0.406	0.052	0.000
H4b: Price competitiveness – CS	0.160	0.060	0.007
Controls:
Customer Age – SQ	−0.101	0.045	0.026
Spend – SQ	−0.096	0.052	0.068
Spend – CS	0.068	0.031	0.028
Between-Level
Effect	Standardised Coefficient	Standard Error	p-value
Hypotheses
H1: ES-CS	−0.063	0.257	0.807
H3: ES-SQ	0.060	0.466	0.898
Controls:
Employee Gender – ES	−0.014	0.116	0.905
Employee Age – ES	−0.331	0.077	0.000

Brown, S., & Lam, S. (2008). A meta-analysis of relationships linking employee satisfaction to customer responses. Journal of Retailing, 84(3), 243–255. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretai.2008.06.001

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Chi, C., & Gursoy, D. (2009). Employee satisfaction, customer satisfaction, and financial performance: An empirical examination. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 28(2), 245–253. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhm.2008.08.003

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Homburg, C., Wieseke, J., & Hoyer, W. D. (2009). Social identity and the service profit chain. Journal of Marketing, 73(2), 38–54. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1509/jmkg.73.2.38

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Evanschitzky, H., Groening, C., Mittal, V., & Wunderlich, M. (2011). How employer and employee satisfaction affect customer satisfaction: An application to franchise services. Journal of Service Research, 14(2), 136–148. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/1094670510390202

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Grandey, A., Goldberg, L., & Pugh, D. (2011). Why and when do stores with satisfied employees have satisfied customers? The roles of responsiveness and store busyness. Journal of Service Research, 14(4), 397–409. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/1094670511410304

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Kantabutra, S. (2011). Examining store manager effects in consumer and staff satisfaction: Evidence from Thailand. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 18(1), 46–57. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretconser.2010.09.010

 Google Scholar

Hackl, P., Scharitzer, D., & Zuba, R. (2000). Customer satisfaction in the Austrian food retail market. Total Quality Management, 11(7), 999–1006. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1080/09544120050135524

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Yee, R., Yeung, A., & Cheng, T. (2011). The service-profit chain: An empirical analysis in high-contact service industries. International Journal of Production Economics, 130, 236–245. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijpe.2011.01.001

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Oliver, R. L. (1997). Satisfaction: A behavioral perspective on the consumer. McGraw-Hill.

 Google Scholar

Chuang, A., Judge, T. A., & Liaw, Y. J. (2012). Transformational leadership and customer service: A moderated mediation model of negative affectivity and emotion regulation. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 21(1), 28–56. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1080/1359432X.2010.532911

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Evanschitzky, H., Sharma, A., & Prykop, C. (2012). The role of the sales employee in securing customer satisfaction. European Journal of Marketing, 46(3/4), 489–508. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1108/03090561211202576

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Evanschitzky, H., Von Wangenheim, F., & Wünderlich, N. V. (2012). Perils of managing the service profit chain: The role of time lags and feedback loops. Journal of Retailing, 88(3), 356–366. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretai.2012.01.003

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Jeon, H., & Choi, B. (2012). The relationship between employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction. Journal of Services Marketing, 22(5), 332–341. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1108/08876041211245236

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Bettencourt, L. A. (1997). Customer voluntary performance: Customers as partners in service delivery. Journal of Retailing, 73(3), 383–406. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/S0022-4359(97)90024-5

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Gazzoli, G., Hancer, M., & Kim, B. (2013). Explaining why employee-customer orientation influences customers perceptions of the service encounter. Journal of Service Management, 24(4), 382–400. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1108/JOSM-09-2012-0192

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Gounaris, S., & Boukis, A. (2013). The role of employee job satisfaction in strengthening customer repurchase intentions. Journal of Services Marketing, 27(4), 322–333. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1108/08876041311330799

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Fornell, C. (1992). A national customer satisfaction barometer: The Swedish experience. Journal of Marketing, 56(1), 6–21. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1177/002224299205600103

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Jung, H. S., & Yoon, H. H. (2013). Do employees’ satisfied customers respond with an satisfactory relationship? The effects of employees’ satisfaction on customers’ satisfaction and loyalty in a family restaurant. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 34, 1–8. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhm.2013.02.003

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Hur, W.-M., Moon, T.-W., & Jung, Y. S. (2015). Customer response to employee emotional labor: The structural relationship between emotional labor, job satisfaction and customer satisfaction. Journal of Services Marketing, 29(11), 71–80. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1108/JSM-07-2013-0161

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Zablah, A. R., Carlson, B. D., Donavan, D. T., Maxham, J. G., III, & Brown, T. J. (2016). A cross-lagged test of the association between customer satisfaction and employee job satisfaction in a relational context. Journal of Applied Psychology, 101(5), 743–755. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1037/apl0000079

 PubMed Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Wu, L.-W. (2017). The bright side and dark side of co-production: A dyadic analysis. Management Decision, 55(3), 614–631. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1108/MD-11-2016-0789

 Web of Science ®Google Scholar

Geldhof, G. J., Preacher, K. J., & Zyphur, M. J. (2014). Reliability estimation in a multilevel confirmatory factor analysis framework. Psychological Methods, 19(1), 72–91. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1037/a0032138

 PubMed Web of Science ®Google Scholar