Achieving favourable customer outcomes through employee deviance

Abstract

This study advances current knowledge by examining how employee deviance and customer participation during a single employee-customer exchange generate favourable customer responses. This work bridges the employee deviance stream with the service encounter literature and illustrates the importance of equity theory in deviant service exchanges between customers and employees. Moreover, results add to the ongoing debate on service nepotism by canvassing the consequences from the customer's active participation in deviant exchanges which appears to enhance customer perceptions of the exchange. A 3x2 betweensubjects experimental design was adopted which manipulates three types of pro-customer deviance along with customer's participation (or not) to the exchange. The dependent variables capture three types of perceived customer justice (cognitive outcomes) and customer's affective state (affective outcome). Findings illustrate that customers approve employees' deviance for their own benefit while also indicate favourable outcomes from deviant exchanges with employees such as higher perceived justice and a more positive affective state. The article concludes with a discussion of the theoretical and managerial implications, limitations and research directions that emerge from this study.

Customer-Oriented Constructive Deviance as a Reaction to Organizational Injustice Toward Customers

“…Similarly, Leo and Russell-Bennett (2012) propose that employees tend to serve customers in a manner that is contrary to organizational procedures and policies because employees expect to exceed customers' expectations and achieve customer delight. In particular, they argue that employees arbitrarily modify service offerings to cater to customers' needs (e.g., providing unofficial discounts) and devote organizational resources beyond their role requirements to support customers without conforming to organizational norms (e.g., spending excessive time listening to customers; Boukis, 2016). In addition, Ghosh and Shum (2019) claim that employees deviate from established processes and routines (e.g., waiving service charge and providing extra service) to respond promptly to unexpected events, which, in turn, improves customer satisfaction.…”

Deviance, deviant behaviour and hospitality management: Sources, forms and drivers

“…In the public health and sociological literature, 'positive deviance' refers to the adoption of uncommon practice that may lead to beneficial outcomes, for example the ability to solve problems in innovative ways, which subsequently confers advantages to individuals or groups over others (cf. Boukis, 2016;Marsh et al, 2004;Pascale et al, 2010;Spreitzer & Sonenshein, 2004). Second, deviance is not a straightforward status or label.…”

“…However, it may also consider the socio-material contexts within hospitality settings that facilitate or drive innovative forms of deviance, either because they respond to flawed or incomplete organisational and consumer practices, or because the socio-material environment acts as an incubator, promoting innovative norm-breaking (cf. Baradarani & Kilic, 2017;Boukis, 2016;Ukko, Saunila, Parjanen, Rantala, Salminen, Pekkola, & Mäkimattila, 2016).…”

“…Hospitality is often associated with the notion of deviance and deviants: venues and resorts are frequently seen as sites for hedonistic, transgressive and criminal behaviour (Andrews, 2009;Botterill & Jones, 2010;Botterill, Pointing, Hayes-Jonkers, Clough, Jones, & Rodriguez, 2013;Botterill, Seixas, & Hoeffel, 2014;Chapman & Light, 2016); employers and operators in the sector are regularly portrayed as engaging in unethical practices (Baum, 2015;Harris, 2012;Terry, 2009); hospitality organisations and occupations are characterised as spaces of violence, harassment and bullying (Ariza-Montes, Arjona-Fuentes, Law, & Han, 2017;Meloury & Signal, 2014;Ram, 2018); and the sector itself is often treated as a marginalised profession attracting deviants and misfits (Baum, Kralj, Robinson, & Solnet, 2016;Orwell, 1989;Robinson, 2008;Wood, 1997). The topic of deviance continues to emerge in research on hospitality management (Pizam, 2012(Pizam, , 2015(Pizam, , 2016aTorres, van Niekerk, & Orlowski, 2017;Tresidder, & Martin, 2018) and in cognate fields of tourism (Li, & Chen, 2017;Tham & Wang, 2017) and services management (Bedi & Schat, 2017;Boukis, 2016). However, existing work concerned with deviance and hospitality tends to be discrete empirical studies focusing on specific issues such as consequences and coping behaviours (cf.…”

Strategic Brand Model Proposal for Patient Satisfaction and Private Healthcare Preferences

“…Until recently, the issue of quality in health services had been regarded as a professional and technical issue, but today, patient expectations and opinions and patient satisfaction have become decisive factors when assessing quality. In the traditional patient care, the service was provided based on the perspective of those providing it; however today the focus is on care generated from the perspective of the customer (Esatoglu, 1997, Bouk s, 2016.…”