IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/joreco/v63y2021ics0969698921002897.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

I don't want to be a rule enforcer during the COVID-19 pandemic: Frontline employees' plight

Author

Listed:
  • Northington, William Magnus
  • Gillison, Stephanie T.
  • Beatty, Sharon E.
  • Vivek, Shiri

Abstract

This research explores the pandemic-related experiences of frontline employees (FLEs) relative to customer rule-enforcement interactions within retail and service industries. Using a survey, incorporating closed-ended and CIT questions, we investigated, from the FLEs' perspectives, the occupational stress of rule-enforcement, company expectations of FLEs regarding rule enforcement, and the emotional impact of customer interactions on FLEs. Results indicate that several customer misbehaviors, such as not following rules and being rude, produce significant occupational stress. Further, based on our CIT assessments, many of the FLEs’ recounted rule-enforcement incidents involved negative customer reactions, translating to heightened negativity for FLEs due to emotional contagion.

Suggested Citation

  • Northington, William Magnus & Gillison, Stephanie T. & Beatty, Sharon E. & Vivek, Shiri, 2021. "I don't want to be a rule enforcer during the COVID-19 pandemic: Frontline employees' plight," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:joreco:v:63:y:2021:i:c:s0969698921002897
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jretconser.2021.102723
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0969698921002897
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jretconser.2021.102723?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Walsh, Gianfranco, 2011. "Unfriendly customers as a social stressor - An indirect antecedent of service employees' quitting intention," European Management Journal, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 67-78, February.
    2. Barnes, Donald C. & Ponder, Nicole & Hopkins, Christopher D., 2015. "The impact of perceived customer delight on the frontline employee," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 433-441.
    3. Reynolds, Kate L. & Harris, Lloyd C., 2009. "Dysfunctional Customer Behavior Severity: An Empirical Examination," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 85(3), pages 321-335.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Surachartkumtonkun, Jiraporn & Ngo, Liem Viet & Shao, Wei, 2023. "The crisis cloud's silver linings: The effects of hope and gratitude on employee burnout and engagement," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    2. Serravalle, Francesca & Pantano, Eleonora, 2023. "Mastering care management strategies to improve retailing: Mechanisms, capabilities, impacts and emerging opportunities," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    3. Castaldo, Sandro & Ciacci, Andrea & Penco, Lara, 2023. "Perceived corporate social responsibility and job satisfaction in grocery retail: A comparison between low- and high-productivity stores," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    4. Cecilia Ramos-Estrada & María Teresa de la Garza Carranza & Jorge Armando López-Lemus & Quetzalli Atlatenco-Ibarra & Edgar René Vázquez-González, 2021. "Organizational Strategies and Their Impact on Employee Commitment during the Health Emergency," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(23), pages 1-14, November.
    5. Raggiotto, Francesco & Compagno, Cristiana & Scarpi, Daniele, 2023. "Care management to improve retail customers' and employees’ satisfaction," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    6. Ifie, Kemefasu & Mousavi, Sahar & Xie, Junyi, 2023. "Enforcement of service rules by frontline employees: A conceptual model and research propositions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    7. Gaan, Niharika & Shin, Yuhyung, 2023. "Supervisor incivility and frontline employees’ performance amid the COVID-19 pandemic: A multilevel moderated mediation analysis," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    8. Mortimer, Gary & Andrade, María Lucila Osorio & Fazal-e-Hasan, Syed Muhammad, 2024. "From traditional to transformed: Examining the pre- and post-COVID consumers’ shopping mall experiences," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    9. Rodríguez-Priego, Nuria & Porcu, Lucia & Prados Peña, María Belén & Crespo Almendros, Esmeralda, 2023. "Perceived customer care and privacy protection behavior: The mediating role of trust in self-disclosure," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    10. Priporas, Constantinos Vasilios & Vellore Nagarajan, Durga & Kamenidou, Irene (Eirini), 2023. "A technology-people-integrated toolkit for retail care management during a crisis," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Minjeong Kang & Taeshik Gong, 2019. "Dysfunctional customer behavior: conceptualization and empirical validation," Service Business, Springer;Pan-Pacific Business Association, vol. 13(4), pages 625-646, December.
    2. Lages, Cristiana R. & Perez-Vega, Rodrigo & Kadić-Maglajlić, Selma & Borghei-Razavi, Niloofar, 2023. "A systematic review and bibliometric analysis of the dark side of customer behavior: An integrative customer incivility framework," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    3. Arne K. Albrecht & Gianfranco Walsh & Simon Brach & Dwayne D. Gremler & Erica Herpen, 2017. "The influence of service employees and other customers on customer unfriendliness: a social norms perspective," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 45(6), pages 827-847, November.
    4. Allen, Jaime & Muñoz, Juan Carlos & Ortúzar, Juan de Dios, 2019. "On evasion behaviour in public transport: Dissatisfaction or contagion?," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 626-651.
    5. Tine Bock & Patrick Kenhove, 2010. "Consumer Ethics: The Role of Self-Regulatory Focus," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 97(2), pages 241-255, December.
    6. Shuang Ma & Huimin Gu & Daniel P. Hampson & Yonggui Wang, 2020. "Enhancing Customer Civility in the Peer-to-Peer Economy: Empirical Evidence from the Hospitality Sector," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 167(1), pages 77-95, November.
    7. Dorsey, Joshua D. & Ashley, Christy & Oliver, Jason D., 2016. "Triggers and outcomes of customer-to-customer aisle rage," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 67-77.
    8. Valentina Sommovigo & Ilaria Setti & Piergiorgio Argentero, 2019. "The Role of Service Providers’ Resilience in Buffering the Negative Impact of Customer Incivility on Service Recovery Performance," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(1), pages 1-22, January.
    9. Chux Gervase Iwu & Abdullah Promise Opute & Olayemi Abdullateef Aliyu & Chukuakadibia Eresia-Eke & Tichaona Buzy Musikavanhu & Afeez Olalekan Jaiyeola, 2021. "A Structural Equation Modelling Evaluation of Antecedents and Interconnections of Call Centre Agents’ Intention to Quit," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-21, April.
    10. Barbara Duffek & Andreas B. Eisingerich & Omar Merlo, 2023. "Why so toxic? A framework for exploring customer toxicity," AMS Review, Springer;Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 13(1), pages 122-143, June.
    11. Błoński Krzysztof, 2022. "Dysfunctional Customer Behaviour — Bibliometric Analysis," Marketing of Scientific and Research Organizations, Sciendo, vol. 45(3), pages 1-16, October.
    12. Marília Lara Marcondes Machado de Oliveira & Andres Rodriguez Veloso, 2015. "Dysfunctional Consumer Behavior: Proposition of a Measurement Scale," Brazilian Business Review, Fucape Business School, vol. 0(2), pages 24-49, August.
    13. Delbosc, Alexa & Currie, Graham, 2016. "Cluster analysis of fare evasion behaviours in Melbourne, Australia," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 29-36.
    14. Ina Garnefeld & Andreas Eggert & Markus Husemann-Kopetzky & Eva Böhm, 2019. "Exploring the link between payment schemes and customer fraud: a mental accounting perspective," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 47(4), pages 595-616, July.
    15. Surachartkumtonkun, Jiraporn & Patterson, Paul G. & McColl-Kennedy, Janet R., 2013. "Customer Rage Back-Story: Linking Needs-Based Cognitive Appraisal to Service Failure Type," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 72-87.
    16. Seger-Guttmann, Tali & Vilnai-Yavetz, Iris & Wang, Chen-Ya & Petruzzellis, Luca, 2018. "Illegitimate returns as a trigger for customers’ ethical dissonance," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 120-131.
    17. Debenedetti, Alain & Chaney, Damien, 2024. "From feeling like home to being at home: The negative outcomes of attachment to commercial places," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    18. Johnson, Jeff S., 2023. "How business-to-business salespeople deal with buying center dissenters," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 40(3), pages 590-608.
    19. Christ-Brendemühl, Sonja & Schaarschmidt, Mario, 2020. "The impact of service employees’ technostress on customer satisfaction and delight: A dyadic analysis," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 378-388.
    20. Huang, Yu-Shan (Sandy) & Dootson, Paula, 2022. "Chatbots and service failure: When does it lead to customer aggression," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:joreco:v:63:y:2021:i:c:s0969698921002897. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-retailing-and-consumer-services .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.