Customer-oriented front-line employees' voice behaviours in the hospitality industry: a comprehensive literature review

Abstract

Purpose

Using employee voice to advocate for customers' requirements, improves hospitality service. Organizations must understand what motivates or deters employee customer-oriented voice behaviour (COVB) to achieve its goals and enhance performance. This research investigates the predictors and outcomes of COVB of front-line employees (FLEs) in the hotel industry.

Design/methodology/approach

The study used the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines to steer the article search, screening, and inclusion. The research identified the extant studies conducted in both, high/low power distance countries that met the search criteria using the databases of SCOPUS, Web of Science, EBSCOHost and through snowballing of references.

Findings

The content analysis of 55 selected studies identified four themes that explain FLEs’ COVB in the hospitality industry. These four themes include customer-related, employee-related, organizational and leadership factors. Moreover, it was found that theoretical frameworks of the most of published studies are dominated by social exchange and conservation resource theories.

Practical implications

This study suggests hospitality firms to develop management strategies to foster FLEs COVB especially long-term personality trainings for FLEs is suggested for innovative and novel ideas.

Originality/value

This is the first study, as per our knowledge, on the hospitality industry that has been conducted to analyse and synthesize the literature related to FLEs’ COVB.

Citation

Memon, K.R., Ghani, B. and Han, H. (2024), "Customer-oriented front-line employees' voice behaviours in the hospitality industry: a comprehensive literature review", Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/JHTI-01-2024-0020