{"id":12506,"date":"2024-09-02T16:41:40","date_gmt":"2024-09-02T08:41:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/?p=12506"},"modified":"2024-09-02T16:48:48","modified_gmt":"2024-09-02T08:48:48","slug":"committed-employees-loyal-customers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/committed-employees-loyal-customers\/","title":{"rendered":"Committed employees, loyal customers"},"content":{"rendered":"\u4e2d\u6587\u7248\u672c \/ Chinese version<\/span>\n\n\n\n
The hospitality and tourism industry stands to gain from understanding how employees\u2019 attitudes influence customers\u2019 loyalty, says a study by a team of researchers including a scholar from UTM<\/em><\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A study involving a scholar from UTM has revealed insights into the role of employee commitment in fostering customer loyalty within the hospitality and tourism industry. By implementing strategic training, encouraging customer feedback, and rewarding employees, the sector can enhance employee commitment, which in turn contributes to building a loyal customer base, ultimately driving long-term success, the study suggested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The research was conducted by Dr. Elizabeth Agyeiwaah, currently with The University of Queensland in Australia, Dr. Frederick Dayour from the Simon Diedong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies in Ghana, and UTM\u2019s Dr. Joe Zhou Yong. The study, titled \u201cHow does employee commitment impact customers\u2019 attitudinal loyalty?\u201d, was published in the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their work delved into how committed employees can significantly enhance customers’ \u2018attitudinal loyalty\u2019. The latter refers to willingness to repeatedly buy products or services that customers know and trust; their consistent attitudes resulting in habitual buying behaviour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The research focused on the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. It included a comprehensive survey of 664 customers visiting hotels and tourist attractions in Hong Kong, Macao and Zhuhai. In Hong Kong, data was collected at popular attractions including Hong Kong Disneyland and Lantau\u2019s Big Buddha. In Macao, integrated resorts and heritage attractions were the focus, while in Zhuhai, data collection sites included the Pullman Zhuhai hotel and other tourist attractions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The findings showed that employee commitment \u201cplays a response-predictor-mediator role\u201d in customers\u2019 attitudinal loyalty. Employee commitment was found to influence customer satisfaction and likelihood to show particular behaviour, namely repeat purchase intention of a product or service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEmployee commitment is triggered by not only supporting service climate with good technical quality,\u201d but also and particularly by \u201chow customers respond in their interaction with employees during service delivery,\u201d the team of researchers found. \u201cIn this way, commitment could be gained from employees\u2019 happy feelings derived from quality interaction with the customer of an organisation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The study challenged previous research that argued employee commitment must be solely the responsibility of tourism and hospitality organisations through employee empowerment, managerial support and work facilitation. It \u201cdemonstrates that the customer can play a role in influencing employees\u2019 affective commitment to an organisation through genuine interaction and feedback on the service delivery.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Supporting employee commitment<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The practical implications of these results are significant for hoteliers and destination management organisations, noted the authors. The findings on the \u201csignificant role\u201d of employee commitment on customer satisfaction require that managers \u201cprovide a service climate that trains employees to be helpful to customers,\u201d said the researchers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Managements should create a supportive service climate that trains employees to respond effectively to customer needs. Employees should also be able to provide accurate information on when a particular service is to be performed, and demonstrate a positive attitude to their organisation during the service-delivery process for customers. \u201cBy focusing on these themes in employee training, employee affective commitment could be enhanced, to improve customer satisfaction,\u201d the researchers suggested.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, given that employee commitment could be derived from personal interaction with customers, hoteliers and destination management organisations should encourage customers to \u201cbe responsive\u201d to employees and \u201coffer constructive feedback\u201d on service delivery, said the researchers. \u201cPromotional campaigns could be used to sensitise customers on some polite feedback and employee appreciation during service interaction with employees.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moreover, the findings confirmed that \u201ccommitted employees are satisfied and such satisfaction is transferred to the customer\u201d. This, according to the researchers, implies that customer satisfaction \u201cis rooted in the satisfaction\u201d of the service providers, and their dissatisfaction \u201ccan be transferred to the customer.\u201d Hence, managers were urged to focus on the employees, by providing a supportive work climate and managerial support that create an emotional bond and affective feeling toward the organisation and its customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last but not least, to motivate employees, management should consider implementing incentives such as pay raises, bonuses, paid time off, and employee recognition awards. Reducing job security threats could also contribute to higher levels of employee commitment, it was argued.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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MORE INFO<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n

<\/div>
The researchers<\/div>\n

Dr. Elizabeth Agyeiwaah is currently a Lecturer in tourism at the School of Business at The University of Queensland in Australia. She holds a PhD in Tourism Management from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. At the time of the study, she was employed as an Assistant Professor at the Macau University of Science and Technology.<\/p>\n

Dr. Frederick Dayour is the Director of Research, Innovation, and Consultancy at the Simon Diedong Dombo University of Business and Integrated Development Studies in Ghana. He has a PhD in tourism and hospitality from the University of Surrey in the United Kingdom. He is also a Senior Research Fellow at the School of Tourism and Hospitality at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa.<\/p>\n

Dr. Joe Zhou Yong is an Assistant Professor at UTM. He holds a PhD in Tourism Management from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. His research interests include tourism impact analysis, MICE (meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions) and event management, destination development, and tourist behaviour analysis.<\/p>\n<\/div>

The paper<\/div>\n

Elizabeth Agyeiwaah, Frederick Dayour and (Joe) Yong Zhou: \u201cHow does employee commitment impact customers’ attitudinal loyalty?\u201d, Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights, Volume 5, Issue 2, pages 350-376, 2022.
https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1108\/JHTI-09-2020-0169<\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n

Editor: Research Corner | A partnership between Macau Business and UTM<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The hospitality and tourism industry stands to gain from understanding how employees\u2019 attitudes influence customers\u2019 loyalty, says a study by a team of researchers including a scholar from UTM A […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":12508,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54,136],"tags":[3229,3230,745,2863,185,1841,3232,400,2861,560,402,2859,3231],"class_list":["post-12506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-knowledge","category-main_headline","tag-customers-loyalty","tag-employee-commitment","tag-greater-bay-area","tag-guangdong-hong-kong-macao-greater-bay-area-2","tag-hospitality","tag-joe-zhou","tag-journal-of-hospitality-and-tourism-insights","tag-macao","tag-macao-university-of-tourism","tag-research","tag-tourism","tag-utm","tag-zhou-yong"],"views":563,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12506"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12506\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12513,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12506\/revisions\/12513"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.utm.edu.mo\/NewsPortal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}