Pei Liu, Yu Ma, Xin Li, Caodie Peng and Yaoqi Li
Frontline service employees are often subjected to customer mistreatment and considerable studies have tested outcomes of customer mistreatment. However, the importance of its…
Abstract
Purpose
Frontline service employees are often subjected to customer mistreatment and considerable studies have tested outcomes of customer mistreatment. However, the importance of its antecedents is particularly underestimated. This meta-analytic paper aims to develop an overarching framework that identifies the antecedents of customer mistreatment as well as potential boundary conditions to account for observed variations reported in extant studies.
Design/methodology/approach
Comprehensive electronic and manual searches were performed to retrieve relevant studies on customer mistreatment, which yielded 125 articles, including 141 independent samples. Altogether, these studies included 40,151 participants. The data were analyzed through random-effect meta-analytic methods in R using the psychmeta package.
Findings
Three types of antecedents were identified. In particular, regarding employees’ demographic characteristics, age was found to be negatively correlated with customer mistreatment. Employees’ personality traits such as agreeableness, conscientiousness, positive affectivity, emotion regulation ability and self-efficacy were found to be negatively correlated with customer mistreatment, while neuroticism and negative affectivity were positively correlated with customer mistreatment. In terms of contextual factors, perceived social support and service climate were negatively related to customer mistreatment, whereas job demands were positively related to customer mistreatment. Moreover, the power distance culture and types of service industries moderated some relationships.
Originality/value
This meta-analytic research, drawing upon the perpetrator predation framework, proposed a new and comprehensive framework to explain why customer mistreatment occurs. It not only promoted the advancement of literature on customer mistreatment but also provided effective and targeted guidance for helping frontline service employees reduce such negative experience.
Details
Keywords
Jun Xie, Caodie Peng, Lin Wang and Xiaoping Chu
The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of supervisor-subordinate guanxi (SSG) on managers’ feedback-seeking behavior in the context of Chinese organizations…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of supervisor-subordinate guanxi (SSG) on managers’ feedback-seeking behavior in the context of Chinese organizations, especially the mediating role of psychological expectations and the moderating role of political skill.
Design/methodology/approach
The study sample comprised matched surveys from 252 supervisor-subordinate dyad in the People’s Republic of China. The subordinate managers completed measures of SSG, performance enhancement expectations, impression management expectations and political skill. The supervisors were asked to rate managers’ feedback-seeking behavior.
Findings
Result show that SSG was positively related to managers’ feedback-seeking behavior. Performance enhancement expectations and impression management expectations partially mediated supervisor-subordinate guanxi’s influence on managers’ feedback-seeking behavior. Political skill positively moderated the relationships between SSG and managers’ feedback-seeking behavior in such a way that the relationships were stronger for managers higher in political skill than lower.
Research limitations/implications
The paper not only helps for deeper understanding of managers’ feedback-seeking behavior but also provides a new perspective for exploring effective governance of Chinese local managers.
Originality/value
This study provides preliminary evidence of the mediation effect of psychological expectations and the moderating effect of political skill in the relationship between SSG and managers’ feedback-seeking behavior. Additionally, the findings highlight the necessity of study on managers’ feedback-seeking behavior in the context of China to help advance the theoretical understanding of the mechanisms that underlie the effect of SSG on managers’ feedback-seeking behavior.