1 Managing emotional labour consequences during aggressive customers' interactions

301 Pages·2016·2.01 MB·English

Managing emotional labour consequences during aggressive customers’ interactions:
A study of the Cyprus hospitality industry

Aspasia Simillidou

A thesis submitted to the University of Gloucestershire (UK)
in accordance with the requirements of the degree of
PhD in Business Management
in the Faculty of
Business and Management

May 2016

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ABSTRACT
This doctoral investigation explores the area of emotional labour in relation to aggressive
customers’ behaviours. In more detail, it is focussing on the way employees engage in
emotional labour, which can be done either by surface acting or deep acting, when they are
interacting with aggressive customers and the consequences that may arise due to this
method. The thematic and narrative literature review conducted by the researcher on the
initial stages of this thesis provided the basis and foundations of the creation of the initial
conceptual framework on managing the negative consequences of surface acting when
interacting with aggressive customers and achieving the desired deep acting during those
interactions.
The researcher follows the constructivist / interpretivist philosophical approach in her
study, and adopts the methodological triangulation for conducting her primary research by
using a combination of two qualitative methods, semi-structured interviews and focus
groups. The semi-structured interviews were contacted first, and the focus groups, as an
additional method, had the purpose of either validating the results or adding to them
accordingly.
This study revealed that employees are only engaging in surface acting when they are
interacting with aggressive customers. This results in a number of negative consequences.
The current research has focussed on how to overcome those negative consequences. It
further explored the ways that would engage employees in deep acting during those
challenging interactions with aggressive customers and the positive effects. The results
were presented in the empirically validated conceptual framework that has been created.
The findings of this doctoral investigation have contributed both in theory as well as
practice. The theoretical contributions include innovative additions to the existing
theoretical gaps in the area of emotional labour in terms of how to overcome the negative
consequences of surface acting and enhance the use of deep acting during interactions with
aggressive customers. Further on, there are also contributions in the literature of the
hospitality industry that has been under-researched in regards to this area. In addition, this
research is adding to the existing knowledge of how to handle aggressive customers since
it is including important findings on how to handle employees’ emotions so that aggressive
customers are being treated more effectively. This also benefits the theory of marketing by
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offering the opportunity for further researchers to use the current empirically tested
theoretical framework in order to test the relationship between engaging in deep acting and
eliminating customer dissatisfaction.
In terms of practical contributions, this research is adding knowledge to the hospitality
industry employees, the management and the industry as a whole. While utilising this
framework, both management and employees will be able to offer more genuine emotions
to their aggressive customers and therefore be able to achieve the best possible results for
the organisations they are working for.

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DECLARATION
I declare that the work in this thesis was carried out in accordance with the regulations of
the University of Gloucestershire and is original. The aspects that reflect literature findings
are being indicated by specific reference in the text. No part of the thesis has been submitted
as part of any other academic award. The thesis has not been presented to any other education
institution in the United Kingdom or overseas. Any views expressed in the thesis are those
of the author and in no way represent those of the University.

Signed …Aspasia Simillidou……..

Date …21/5/2016……….

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Table of Contents
Pages No.
Abstract 2
Declaration 4
Table of Contents 5
List of Tables 8
List of Figures 9
List of Appendices 10
Abbreviations 11
Dedication 12
Acknowledgements 13

Chapter 1 Introduction........................................................................................... 14
1. Introduction 14
2. Background & Problem Identification 14
3. Initial Research Questions 19
4. Aim of Research 19
5. Research Objectives 19
6. Choosing a suitable empirical concept 20
6.1 Cyprus Hospitality Industry 21
7. The role of the researcher in the industry 23
8. Contribution to theory and practice 24
9. Structure of the thesis 25
10. Conclusion 29

Chapter 2 Literature Review and Initial Conceptual Development ………….. 30
1. Introduction 30
2. Introduction to the topic 30
3. Literature Gaps and Inconsistencies 32
4. The theory of emotional labour 35
4.1 Deep acting method 37
4.2 Surface acting method 39
5. Emotions in Organisations 42
6. Explaining Aggressive Customers’ behaviours 45
6.1 Customer-employee interactions 45
6.2 Types of misbehaving customers 47
7. Engaging in emotional labour when interacting with aggressive customers 49
7.1 Contagious emotions 51
7.2 Affective Events theory 53
8. The Negative consequences of engaging in emotional labour
when interacting with aggressive customers 55
8.1 Decreased sense of well-being 56
8.2 Emotional Dissonance 58
8.3 Increase in psycho-physiological stress 59
8.4 Emotional exhaustion 62
8.5 Burnout as the extreme negative effect 63
8.6 Depersonalisation 65
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8.7 Increase in absenteeism 66
8.8 Decrease in job satisfaction 68
8.9 Work-life conflict 69
8.10 Effects on service performance 71
9. Buffering out the negative effects of surface acting
during aggressive customers’ interactions 72
9.1 Behavioural Disengagement 73
9.2 Venting negative emotions 74
9.3 Job autonomy and self-monitoring 75
9.4 The role of organisational / group and family emotional support 77
9.4.1 Perceived Organisational Support 78
9.4.2 Family support 79
9.5 The role of stress appraisal 80
9.6 The role of positive, negative affectivity and self-efficacy 81
9.7 Initial and on-going training of employees 85
9.8 An increased use of deep acting 87
10. Initial theoretical framework 91
11. Conclusion 96
Chapter 3 Research Methodology ……………………………………………… 97
1. Introduction 97
2. Philosophical positioning 97
2.1 Ontology & Epistemology 98
2.2 Research Paradigm: Explaining the various paradigms 98
2.2.1 Application of constructivism / Interpretivism 101
3. Research Strategy – Application of the Inductive Approach 104
4. Research Purpose 109
5. Qualitative Method 110
5.1 Qualitative techniques 115
5.1.1 The triangulation method 116
5.1.2 Semi-structured interviews and focus groups 118
5.1.3 Justification and Evaluation 122
6. Time Horizon 128
7. Selection of key informants / Sampling 129
7.1 Choosing the sampling technique 129
7.2 Sample size 131
8. Conducting the interviews and focus groups 133
8.1 Conducting the interviews 133
8.2 Conducting the focus groups 137
8.3 Pilot testing 141
8.3.1 Pilot testing for interviews 141
8.3.2 Pilot testing for focus groups 142
9. Data Quality 144
9.1 Credibility 145
9.2 Validity 146
9.3 Reliability 148
10. Ethical considerations 148
11. Analysis and Presentation of Data 150
11.1 Nvivo software 151
11.2 Template Analysis 151
11.3 Analysis of interviews 155
11.4 Analysis of focus groups 157
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11.5 Constant comparison 158
11.6 Framework design 158
12. Conclusion 158
Chapter 4 Data Analysis and Discussion ……………………………………….. 159
1. Introduction 159
2. Data Analysis and Discussion 159
2.1 Emotional Labour and Interaction with aggressive customers 160
2.1.1 Discussion 167
2.2 Theme 2: The negative consequences of surface acting when interacting
with aggressive customers 169
2.2.1 Discussion 188
2.3 Theme 3: Buffering out the negative consequences of Surface Acting
when interacting with aggressive customers 191
2.3.1 Discussion 210
2.4 Theme 4: Increased engagement in deep acting during interactions
with aggressive customers 214
2.4.1 Theme 5: Positive consequences of engaging in deep acting
during interactions with aggressive customers 226
2.4.2 Discussion 233
3. Conclusion 235
Chapter 5 Research Conclusions ………………………………………………... 237
1. Introduction 237
2. Summary of findings 237
2.1 Employees engagement in Emotional Labour during interactions
with aggressive customers 238
2.2 The negative consequences occurring when engaging in surface acting
during interactions with aggressive customers 239
2.3 Buffering out the negative consequences of Surface Acting
when interacting with aggressive customers 240
2.4 Ways of increasing engaging in deep acting during interactions
with aggressive customers and the possible positive effects that
would occur due to that 242
3. Final conceptual framework 244
4. Contribution to theory 248
5. Contribution to practice 251
6. Limitations 255
7. Suggestions for further research 257
8. Conclusion 260
References ………………………………………………………………………… 261
Appendices ………………………………………………………………………... 294

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List of Tables
Pages No.
Table 3.1: Interview Questions in relation to RQs and ROs 135
Table 3.2: Focus Groups Questions in relation to RQs and ROs 139
Table 3.3: Initial Template including the themes and sub-themes
identified a priori from the literature and the initial pilot analysis 153
Table 3.4: Final Template including the themes and sub-themes &
how they correspond to the RQs and ROs 154

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List of Figures
Pages No.
Figure 2.1: Initial theoretical framework created for this thesis 95
Figure 5.1: Surface Acting negative consequences 240
Figure 5.2: Managing the surface acting negative consequences
during interactions with aggressive customers 242
Figure 5.3: Engaging in deep acting during interactions
with aggressive customers 243
Figure 5.4: Positive outcomes of engaging in deep acting
during interactions with aggressive customers 244
Figure 5.5: Final conceptual framework 245

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List of Appendices
Pages No.
Appendix A: Interviewees’ characteristics 294
Appendix B: Focus Group 1: Respondents’ characteristics 296
Appendix C: Focus Group 2: Respondents’ characteristics 297
Appendix D: Focus Group 3: Respondents’ characteristics 298
Appendix E: Focus Group 4: Respondents’ characteristics 299
Appendix F: Letter of Consent 300

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