The Effects of Customer Incivility on High-Contact Service Employees and Organizational Behaviors: A Framework and Analysis of Propositions

Abstract

The research objective of this paper is to study a broad context of emotional exhaustion and its importance to hospitality management. This knowledge would provide a better understanding of the factors that contribute to customer incivility, emotional exhaustion, job satisfaction, employees’ perceived performance, and turnover intentions among high-contact service employees. Seven hypotheses are proposed to test the relationships between customer incivility and its determinants which are emotional exhaustion, job satisfaction, employees’ perceived performance, and turnover intentions. This paper fills a gap in knowledge on the role of emotional exhaustion among high-contact service employees that has an impact on job satisfaction, employee’s perceived performance, and turnover intentions. With the proposed conceptual framework, the author aims to clarify the effects of customer incivility on high-contact service employees and organizational behaviors which leads to the protection of employee morale and the pro-action of the management team to deal with the situations. The limitation is that the study should be extended beyond the conceptual stage and conduct the empirical research across the high-contact service employees in different countries, different industrial setting, and to explore the role of cultural differences on emotional exhaustion. The managerial implications would extend to improving the recruitment and evaluating the effectiveness of development programs such as a developing and retaining talent that drive the organization for success.