Customers as “partial” employees of organizations: good or bad?

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this study is to address the following research questions: How do customer input and service provider (in this study, the terms firm and service provider are used interchangeably) input coproduce customer experience and response? Do different components of customer input influence customer experience differently? Design/methodology/approach Structural equation modeling (SEM) was adopted to conduct tests of the measurement model and the main hypotheses represented in Figure 1. LISREL 8.80 (Jöreskog and Sörbom, 1993) was applied for data analysis in the current study. A survey instrument was designed and used to gather data for use in this study. Data were collected using an online survey administration tool (www.qualtrics.com). Findings The results indicate that two dimensions of customer participation – information resource and codeveloper activities – demonstrate distinct impacts on customers’ responses. Specifically, customer participation (information resource) is negatively related to customer shopping values and satisfaction. However, another dimension of customer participation (codeveloper activities) is positively related to the same outcomes. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is among the first to integrate customer participation and customer orientation to understand the phenomenon of customer co-creation. The study applies for a two-dimensional customer input construct and empirically tests their impacts on customer experience. Both utilitarian value and hedonic value are included in the research framework to assess customer value experience.

Is customer participation always good in service recovery? The moderating role of customers' positive psychological capital

“…In addition, utilitarian value is found to be a crucial determinant of customer satisfaction (Lee and Kim, 2018). In the context of co-creation, Zhuang et al (2019) conclude that customers' perceived utilitarian value positively influences their satisfaction. Similarly, Ryu et al (2010) evidence that both hedonic and utilitarian values positively affect customer satisfaction.…”

Scan it, buy it, pay it – customers' psychological contracts as partial employees in retail

“…, 2006). Recent literature on partial employees has notably focused on the outcomes of their involvement in the service in terms of satisfaction (Zhuang et al. , 2019) and on their relationship with service employees (Choi and Lawry, 2020).…”

“…The concept of "partial employee" emerges in organization studies in the 1980s by authors such as Bowen (1986), Mills et al (1983) and Mills and Morris (1986), but finds its roots in the 1930s through Barnard (1938Barnard ( , 1948 whose work invites organizations to manage customers' contributions as a source of human resource (Novicevic et al, 2006). Recent literature on partial employees has notably focused on the outcomes of their involvement in the service in terms of satisfaction (Zhuang et al, 2019) and on their relationship with service employees (Choi and Lawry, 2020). Much of the research has focused on SST, where customer involvement is particularly high (Audrin et al, 2021;Hilton et al, 2013;Turner and Shockley, 2014).…”