Cathy A. Enz

The Role of Emotions in Service Encounters

This article advances our understanding of the influence of affect in consumers’ responses to brief, nonpersonal service encounters. This study contributes to the services marketing literature by examining for mundane service transactions the impact of customer-displayed emotion and affect on assessments of the service encounter and the overall experience. Observational and perceptual data from customers were matched with frontline employees in 200 transaction-specific encounters. The results of this study suggest that consumers’ evaluations of the service encounter correlate highly with their displayed emotions during the interaction and postencounter mood states. Finally, the findings indicate that frontline employees’perceptions of the encounter are not aligned with those of their customers. The managerial implications of these findings are briefly discussed.

The Role of Value Congruity in Intraorganizational Power.

To understand better the differences in power between subunits, this paper examines the relationship between perceived departmental power and the extent to which departments appear to share important organizational values with top management. Critical contingency perspectives on intraorganizational power are used as a catalyst for exploring similarity of organizational values as an additional determinant of power. Interview and survey data from a quick-service restaurant chain and a robotics company are used to provide support for the role of perceived similarity in values for determining power. Perceived value congruity between department members and top managers, examined from the perspectives of both groups, was found to account for unique variance in departmental power when controlling for the effects of critical contingencies. An objective measure of the similarity of values between department members and top managers, however, was unrelated to departmental power.

Grooming future hospitality leaders: a competencies model.

Abstract Competency models can be useful tools for identifying and grooming future leaders. Rather than base leadership assessment on personality traits or other unrelated characteristics, competency models specify the actions and behavior needed for successful leaders. While some hotel companies have begun to identify leadership compentencies, the hotel industry does not have an overall competency model. Starting with competency models from other industries and the assessments from a pilot study, the authors complied a list of 99 competencies or skills (grouped into eight overarching factors comprising 28 dimensions) that might contribute to leadership success in the hospitality industry. Those compentencies were rated on a five-point scale, ranging from not at all important to extremely important, in a survey of 137 industry leaders. The competency labeled “self management” was the top dimension (of the 28)—composed of ethics and integrity, time management, flexibility and adaptability, and self development. Second in importance was competency in strategic positioning, comprising awareness of customer needs, commitment to quality, managing stakeholders, and concern for the community. (However, concern for the community was rated least important compared to the other three dimensions in that category). Industry knowledge, leadership, and interpersonal skill were factors that, while important, were ranked lower by the respondents.

Adoption of Information Technology in U.S. Hotels: Strategically Driven Objectives

Using two unique, independent samples of U.S. hotels, this study examines the utilization of information technology (IT) in all hotel sectors, from deluxe to budget, to reveal strategic differences and similarities. Overall, the findings suggest that the U.S. lodging industry has focused on employing technologies that improve employee productivity and enhance revenue but has not given strategic priority to technologies designed to improve guest services. The hotel sector, lodging type, size/complexity of the property, and independent versus chain affiliation influenced the number and type of technologies adopted. Luxury and upscale hotels adopted more IT than economy and budget hotels. Similarly, IT development was greatest for certain lodging types such as convention hotels, conference centers, and casinos, and lowest for other types, such as motels and bed-and-breakfasts. Chain-affiliated properties typically adopted more technologies than independent hotels.

The Impact of Top Management Actions on Employee Attitudes and Perceptions

Popular approaches to organizational leadership note that productivity and innovation in U.S. organizations could be greatly improved if top managers placed more emphasis on organizational values and culture. Recent findings in transformational leadership research prescribe top management to develop and share a vision for the organization, model that vision, encourage innovativeness, support employee efforts, and allow employees input into decisions concerning their jobs (Bass, 1985; Kouzes & Posner, 1988). These actions should act to improve productivity by increasing positive attitudes and clarifying the roles of the employees. This study examined the relationships between these five actions and employee commitment, job satisfaction, and role ambiguity. Results suggest that top-management actions are strongly related to all three of these outcomes. The results also suggest that the effects of certain actions vary for different organizational settings.

Best Hotel Environmental Practices

As the four environmental champions here demonstrate, operating a “green” hotel is not only good practice but good business.

Best practices in human resources.

A landmark study based at Cornell University found a substantial number of hotel companies engaged in innovative human-resources (HR) practices. Several firms developed a bundle of practices that include such elements as employee empowerment, interactive CD-based training, performance evaluations, and guest surveys. Illustrative of those efforts is Cendants five-prong diversity initiative, which has encouraged more than 50 minority entrepreneurs to become franchisees. Many of the best practices, however, focused on one of five types of HR practice: (1) leader development, (2) training and knowledge building, (3) employee empowerment, (4) employee recognition, and (5) cost management. For instance, the Minneapolis-St. Paul Hilton decided to grant front-desk employees the power to solve any problem or grant any guest request on their own authority. Leadership-development programs are chiefly intended to permit promotion from within, while training practices and empowerment practices are gauged to improve employee skills. Controlling costs or enhancing revenues are the goals of the cost-management-practice champions. The goal for many of the practices is to improve morale, reduce turnover, increase productivity, and boost guest satisfaction.

The Impact of Strategic Orientation on Intellectual Capital Investments in Customer Service Firms

This study examines the influence of intellectual capital on performance in customer service firms pursuing different strategic orientations (e.g., low-cost leader, differentiation). Grounding these arguments in the resource-based view and using 538 hotels in the lodging industry, this article employs an economic-based production model to empirically explore the performance effects of investing in three different types of intellectual capital: systems capital (operational knowledge), customer capital (brand and marketing knowledge), and human capital (knowledge from both service and professional employees). In addition, the authors account for key controls, including the physical asset, cost of living, customer demand, market segment, and company affiliation. Results reveal that for firms pursuing a differentiation strategy only, investments in both service employees and professional employees enhance performance. However, investments in systems capital and customer capital enhance performance for all the firms studied. The authors discuss the implications of this study for research in the services arena.

Managing for Excellence

A study of the U.S. lodging industrys best practices found that managers use innovation to create customer value. A resounding majority of best practices arose at the corporate level, with a minority at the property level. Of those coming from properties, most came from upscale, full-service hotels, rather than limited-service or budget properties. However, there is no evidence that innovation is inherently a function of corporate offices or upscale hotels. Relatively few best practices were in the areas of design or information technology, while many appeared in human resources, marketing, and operations. Virtually all innovations began with one persons idea and survived only because of that persons initiative. The idea must then be spread throughout and integrated with existing operations, which makes communication essential. Finally, lodging companies need to develop ways to measure the outcomes of their innovative practices. In many cases a given practice was thought to have improved employee moral...

The Value Orientations of Minority and Non-Minority Small Business Owners

This study examines value orientations of minority and non-minority small business owners and contrasts their perceived similarity with corporate customers. Six categories of organizational values, including the values of collectivism, duty, rationality, novelty, materialism, and power are examined. Analyses of a sample of 252 small business firms indicate that minority owners differ from non-minority owners in their value orientations; and are significantly different from non-minority owners in the degree to which they perceive organizational value similarity with customers. However, the levels of perceived value similarity with corporate customers did not vary among the minority groups (i.e. blacks, Hispanics, Asians, and Native Americans). An implication is that value orientation may be an important component in the process of aligning the minority business firm with its environment. Further, a value system may be guiding the behavior of the minority small business owners against the overwhelming odds of racial/ethnic dissimilarities.