Vincent P. Magnini

The service recovery paradox: justifiable theory or smoldering myth?

– The purpose of this study is to address the discrepancy between research that supports the service failure recovery and that which does not by examining customer satisfaction in the event of a service failure empirically., – The objective of the study was achieved by conducting role‐play experiments on undergraduate business students., – Analysis showed that a service recovery paradox is most likely to occur when the failure is not considered by the customer to be severe, the customer has had no prior failure with the firm, the cause of the failure was viewed as unstable by the customer, and the customer perceived that the company had little control over the cause of the failure., – This information should benefit service managers since service failures are common and typically trigger heightened customer attention. These findings may stimulate future research because the limitations of this study include the use of undergraduate business students and the examination of only one service setting. Nevertheless, this paper does demonstrate that, under the appropriate conditions, a customer can experience a paradoxical satisfaction increase after a service failure.

Recovery voice and satisfaction after service failure: an experimental investigation of mediating and moderating factors

Past research studies on service failures and recovery have conceptualized “voice” in terms of customers having an opportunity to air complaints after failures occur. In contrast, the authors introduce the concept of recovery voice , which entails a service provider asking a customer (after a failure has occurred) what the firm can do to rectify the problem. In a scenario-based experiment carried out in an airline setting and in a hotel setting with 216 and 208 participants, respectively, it was found that customers perceived greater procedural justice when offered recovery voice, which resulted in higher overall postfailure satisfaction. It was shown that perceived procedural justice mediated the effect of recovery voice on overall satisfaction. Furthermore, recovery voice had a greater impact on perceived procedural justice for established customers with long transaction histories than for new ones with short transaction histories. Managerial and research implications based on these findings are also presented.

Understanding Customer Delight An Application of Travel Blog Analysis

Distinct from satisfaction, delight occurs when a customer receives a positive surprise beyond his or her expectations. Because of strong correlations with repurchase intention and positive word of mouth, customer delight is a quintessentially germane topic of inquiry. This study illustrates that determinants of customer delight in tourism venues can be identified through travel blog analysis. Using the hotel sector as the context, this research text-mines and content-analyzes 743 pertinent travel blogs that contain the phrase “pleasant surprise,” “delightful surprise,” excellent surprise,” or “positive surprise” and finds that the most frequent cause of guest delight in the hotel sector appears to be customer service, followed by cleanliness. In addition, this study also finds that triggers of delight are statistically different for domestic versus international travel and for travelers to more-developed versus less-developed countries. Based on the study’s findings, the article concludes with a presentation of managerial and research implications.

A holistic approach to expatriate success.

Purpose – The paper seeks to illustrate that a holistic selection, training, and organizational support approach encompassing variables such as the expatriates family status, emotional intelligence, dietary and exercise habits, and his/her learning orientation is needed to enhance the odds of the expatriates success.Design/methodology/approach – The argument brought forth in this article is the product of a literature review drawing upon multiple streams of current research.Findings – The holistic approach to expatriate selection, training, and organizational support detailed in this paper should be employed by multi‐national hotel corporations.Practical implications – This information should benefit hoteliers since the industry is currently experiencing a high rate of expatriate failure.Originality/value – No research to date has addressed the issue of expatriate failure from this holistic viewpoint.

Service failure recovery in China

In the hotel industry, exceptional service failure recovery is a key determinant of customer satisfaction and loyalty. Western‐based hotel corporations should adapt their failure recovery training programs for their properties in China. Adjustments are necessary because of differences in cognitive processing. Modifications are also required due to various Chinese cultural characteristics.

Understanding and Reducing Work-Family Conflict in the Hospitality Industry

Due the nature of the industry, hospitality workers often face work-family conflict (WFC) issues. If not managed properly, WFC can produce many detrimental consequences, including decreased employee performance, job dissatisfaction, lateness, absenteeism, and high turnover. This article synthesizes pertinent WFC literature and explicates a series of measures for reducing WFC in hospitality firms. Future research directions are also identified.

Gender differences on job satisfaction of the five-star hotel employees: the case of the Turkish hotel industry.

Purpose – The purpose of this research is to examine gender differences while controlling for select variables on job satisfaction using data collected from employees in the hospitality industry.Design/methodology/approach – The study was conducted on 397 employees (234 males and 163 females) in five‐star hotels in Ankara, Turkey.Findings – The level of job satisfaction is determined by four factors: “management conditions”, “personal fulfillment”, “using ability in the job”, and “job conditions”. The study results show that significant gender differences exist with regard to the “using ability in the job” dimension of job satisfaction. After controlling such variables as age, marital status, monthly income level, education, type of department, position held, length of time in the organization, length of time in the tourism sector, and frequency of job change, most gender differences remained significant.Research limitations/implications – The use of hotel employees solely representing five‐star hotels ma...

Factors Affecting Customer Satisfaction in Responses to Negative Online Hotel Reviews The Impact of Empathy, Paraphrasing, and Speed

An analysis of three types of responses to negative hotel reviews finds that the response generally should follow the same principles as answering a customer complaint in person. Based on a series of hypothetical responses to a negative review, this study finds that inserting an empathy statement in response to the negative review improved the ratings of the response among a sample of university students. Likewise, this group of 176 potential customers rated the response more favorably when the response included a paraphrase of the complaint, thus making the response more personal and less generic. Interestingly, contrary to popular belief, our results indicate that the speed with which the hotel responds to an online complaint did not influence the survey participants’ rating of the response. The theoretical implications of these findings are that the online response should include same theoretical anchorings based on interactional justice and active listening that apply to face-to-face customer complaints. The major difference between an in-person complaint and an online review is that, in the review, the guest is not on premises waiting for a response, which changes the importance of the timing of a response and alters the perception of procedural justice, which supports the idea of a prompt response. This study further implies that hotel managers should include empathy or paraphrasing statements in their responses to online reviews.

The Psychological Effects of Foreign-Language Restaurant Signs on Potential Diners

Some ethnic restaurants display exterior signage written only in their native tongues. Therefore, this research examines the psychological effects of foreign-language signs on potential diners. More specifically, psychological influences of restaurant signs’ language are explored in the following three laboratory experiments: Study 1, a Mexican restaurant sign manipulation (Spanish vs. English script) on a non-Hispanic sample; Study 2, a Korean restaurant sign manipulation (Korean vs. English script) on a non-Asian sample; and Study 3, a Korean restaurant sign manipulation (Korean vs. English script) on a Korean-American sample. In each of these three experiments, the authors found that a restaurant sign’s language has statistically significant effects on potential diner’s perceptions of the restaurant’s brand personality. On the other hand, a sign’s language does not appear to influence perceptions of anticipated food authenticity or perceptions of the restaurant’s target marketing efforts. Based on these research findings, the article concludes with a presentation of managerial and research implications.

Understanding the use of celebrity endorsers for hospitality firms

Promotional clutter makes it extremely difficult for hospitality firms to capture the attention of prospective buyers with sales messages. One way firms attempt to penetrate clutter is by utilizing an effective celebrity endorser. When the proper celebrity endorser is selected to represent a firm, sales and brand image can be significantly bolstered. Conversely, selecting an inappropriate celebrity endorser severely reduces sales and brand reputation. This research study collected data from a convenience sample of 213 adults in the USA and found that trustworthiness, expertise, and genuine support are important characteristics for an effective celebrity endorser to possess. Further, the findings confirm that a match between the celebritys and companys image and values and the celebrity being perceived by the buyer as part of his/her reference group are also statistically significant characteristics of an effective endorser.