Customer incivility constitutes a significant area in human resources management, organizational behavior, and marketing literature. A plethora of studies suggests that customer incivility is widespread among service organizations and renders the workplace atmosphere harmful and detrimental to employees’ psychological and physical well-being due to the abusive environment surrounding them. Although these studies are significant and provide important information about incivility and its devastating impact on frontline employees during service encounters, there is still minimal focus on critically understanding customer incivility within the restaurant industry, specifically during service relationships. In the scant available research in the sector, scholars predominantly see front liners as the victims of the customers. Based on a qualitative study comprising an ethnographic methodology, data is gathered by participant observation, informal interviews, content analysis, virtual ethnography, and also from 12 interviewees (11 male and one female service employee) working at a Lebanese “authentic” restaurant, named here Be-Beirut, located in Northwest London. This study argues that customers in this case study are characterized as frequent customers; thus, incivility takes a different form than in already studied restaurants.

错误:搜索内容不能为空,请输入英文关键词
错误:关键词超出字数限制,请精简
高级检索

Managing and Coping with Customer Incivility: Insights into Service Professionals

  • Nolla Haidar,
  • Marcus Goncalves,
  • Elif Celik

摘要

Customer incivility constitutes a significant area in human resources management, organizational behavior, and marketing literature. A plethora of studies suggests that customer incivility is widespread among service organizations and renders the workplace atmosphere harmful and detrimental to employees’ psychological and physical well-being due to the abusive environment surrounding them. Although these studies are significant and provide important information about incivility and its devastating impact on frontline employees during service encounters, there is still minimal focus on critically understanding customer incivility within the restaurant industry, specifically during service relationships. In the scant available research in the sector, scholars predominantly see front liners as the victims of the customers. Based on a qualitative study comprising an ethnographic methodology, data is gathered by participant observation, informal interviews, content analysis, virtual ethnography, and also from 12 interviewees (11 male and one female service employee) working at a Lebanese “authentic” restaurant, named here Be-Beirut, located in Northwest London. This study argues that customers in this case study are characterized as frequent customers; thus, incivility takes a different form than in already studied restaurants.