The self-distancing perspective of daily customer mistreatment and employee service behaviors

Abstract

Recent research has explored employees' functional and dysfunctional reactions to customer mistreatment, acknowledging the diverse impacts it can have. Drawing on self-distancing theory, this study offers a novel investigation into hospitality employees’ varied reactions to daily customer mistreatment and identifies the boundary conditions that influence these responses. Using an experience sampling method research design, we conducted a ten-day daily diary survey of 82 hotel employees. Our results reveal that when hospitality employees adopt a self-distanced perspective following daily customer mistreatment, they are more likely to engage in problem-solving pondering during the evening, which leads to enhanced next-day proactive customer service performance. In contrast, when they adopt a self-immersed perspective, they tend to engage in affective rumination during the evening, which increases next-day service sabotage. Additionally, daily coworker reframing strengthens the relationship between daily customer mistreatment and problem-solving pondering during the evening and enhances the mediating role of problem-solving pondering during the evening between daily customer mistreatment and next-day proactive customer service performance. Conversely, daily venting with coworkers reinforces the connection between daily customer mistreatment and affective rumination during the evening, and intensifies the mediating effect of affective rumination during the evening between daily customer mistreatment and next-day service sabotage.