Institut für Marketing & Management

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Artificial intelligence and robots in services : theory and management of (future) human–robot service interactions
(2023) Blaurock, Marah Karin; Büttgen, Marion
During the past decade, service robots have increasingly been deployed in a wide variety of services, where they co-produce service outcomes with and for the benefit of internal or external customers within human–robot service interactions (HRSI). Although the introduction of different service robot types into the marketplace promises efficiency gains, it changes premises of service encounter theory and practice fundamentally. Moreover, introducing service robots without considering external or internal customers’ needs can lead to negative service outcomes. This thesis aims to generate knowledge on how the introduction of different service robot types (i.e., embodied and digital service robots) in internal and external service encounters changes fundamental premises of service encounter theory and impacts HRSI outcomes. In doing so, it leverages different scientific methods and focuses on external service encounters with digital and embodied service robots, as well as internal service encounters with digital service robots. Chapter 2 aims to advance service encounter theory in the context of HRSI in external service encounters by conceptually developing a service encounter theory evaluation scheme to assess a theory’s fit to explain HRSI-related phenomena. The scheme includes individual and contextual factors that bound theoretical premises and, hence, supports scholars in assessing standing service encounter theories. The chapter also puts forth an exemplary assessment of role theory and provides detailed avenues for future research. Chapter 3 aims to synthesize the great wealth of knowledge on HRSI related to external service encounters with embodied service robots. By conducting a comprehensive systematic literature review, the chapter identifies 199 empirical research articles across scientific fields that can inform service research on how to successfully introduce service robots into the organizational frontline. To organize the plethora of research findings, this chapter develops a new structuring framework (D3: design, delegate, deploy). It utilizes this framework to provide a comprehensive overview of the empirical HRSI literature, delineates practical implications, and identifies gaps in literature to identify promising future research avenues. Chapter 4 also addresses HRSI in external service encounters but focuses specifically on the transformative potential of embodied service robots to enhance vulnerable consumers’ (i.e., children and older adults) well-being in social isolation. To identify how different robots can enhance well-being, this chapter follows a conceptual approach and integrates findings from service research, social robotics, social psychology, and medicine. The chapter develops a typology of robotic transformative service (i.e., entertainer, social enabler, mentor, and friend) as a function of consumers state of social isolation, well-being focus, and robot capabilities and a future research agenda for robotic transformative service research (RTSR). This work guides service consumers and providers, as well as robot developers, in identifying and developing the most appropriate robot type for advancing the well-being of vulnerable consumers in social isolation. Finally, Chapter 5 focuses on HRSI research in the context of interactions with digital service robots in internal service encounters. Based on a comprehensive literature review paired with a qualitative study, it conceptionally develops a new concept of a collaborative, digital service robot: a collaborative intelligence system (i.e., CI system) that co-produces service with employees. Drawing from service encounter needs theory, the chapter also empirically tests the effect of CI systems on employee need fulfillment (i.e., need for control, cognition, self-efficacy, and justice) and, in turn, on responsibility taking in two scenario-based experiments. The results uncover divergent mechanisms of how the fulfillment of service encounter needs drives the effect of CI systems on outcome responsibility for different employee groups. Service scholars and managers benefit from a blueprint for designing collaborative digital service robots and an understanding of their effects on employee outcomes in service co-production. In summary, this thesis contributes to literature by providing new insights into different types of HRSI by consolidating HRSI knowledge, developing and advancing HRSI concepts and theory, and empirically investigating HRSI-related phenomena. The new insights put forth in this thesis are discussed and implications for service theory and practice are delineated.
Managing Share Economy : positive und negative Auswirkungen bei der Einführung von Access-Based Services
(2019) Lehr, Adrian Marinus; Büttgen, Marion
In the last few years, services that allow consumers to use goods for short time periods have gained considerable relevance (Baumeister et al. 2015; Bert et al. 2016). This phenomenon is known as sharing or share economy (Wallenstein 2016) and follows the principles of borrowing, renting, bartering and sharing, and focuses in particular on collaborative consumption (Botsman and Rogers 2010). This dissertation project is focused on access-based consumption or access-based services (Schaefers et al. 2016). These services are defined as "market-mediated transactions that provide customers with temporally limited access to goods in return for an access fee, while the legal ownership remains with the service provider". A common practical example is car sharing. Starting from the main drivers of this trend towards non-ownership-oriented forms of consumption, this dissertation addresses the positive and negative effects for companies that want to move into this sector. Based on a systematic literature review, the thesis identifies several important research gaps in this emerging field. This dissertation project makes several important contributions to the research to close these gaps. The thesis examines three central research questions. A first research question addresses the impact of the development towards service-oriented business models of the so-called access-based services for manufacturing companies. This work shows in detail which customer-side effects arise from the use of access-based services with regard to the product or brand used. The role that access-based services can play in the adoption and diffusion of new products is also highlighted. Furthermore to these positive effects, this dissertation project also addresses the issue that in many cases the introduction of access-based services does not lead to the intended commercial success. Thus, this research examines the question which features and characteristics an access service must have in order to be accepted by the customer. This also shows that these offers result in a cost-intensive operation. The third question of this dissertation is dedicated to the issue that companies try to establish themselves in this new market through a communicative positioning of less innovative, more classical rental concepts as sharing offers. For this purpose, the concept of sharewashing on the basis of established greenwashing is introduced within this dissertation project. Thus, one of the objectives of the thesis is to examine the effects of such a misleading approach. The results show that such sharewashing leads to a loss of customer acceptance. Thus, this work also contributes to the research stream of marketing ethics. In summary, the present work addresses different, but interdependent questions in the field of access-based services. To answer the questions, several theoretical concepts (information integration theory, attribution theory, adoption theory) and research streams (innovation, trial, consumer skepticism) were referred to, which were also extended within this work. A longitudinal field study, a field study including company data, a qualitative study, a factorial survey design and two experiments were applied. This dissertation thus makes comprehensive contributions by demonstrating how and under what conditions corporate behavior within the access-based services market can lead to positive, but also possible negative effects for companies.
Negative affective states in customers’ service experience : investigating antecedents and mitigations
(2019) Haager, Stephanie; Büttgen, Marion
Previous research has provided various insights into the potential benefits and competitive advantages of customer participation (Bendapudi and Leone 2003). For instance, customer participation can lower production costs and improve productivity (Lovelock and Young 1979; Mills and Morris 1986), service quality, customer satisfaction (Bendapudi and Leone 2003; Chan et al. 2010; Dong et al. 2015), and opportunities for promotion (Bettencourt 1997). Hence, many companies create a new customer experience by making the customer a co-creator of value (Ramaswamy and Gouillart 2010). However, observing people trying to print their own luggage tags and checking in at an airport or assembling IKEA furniture reveals emotions that are not always positive. Customers appear to be overtaxed, irritated, unhappy, and distressed. This phenomenon is especially relevant for services that are crucial for customers and that cause them to feel some kind of pressure (e.g., time), that are hard to understand, or are in any way upsetting. For instance, in one of their studies, Berry et al. (2015) found that patients in hospitals experienced such stress due to the service process and newspapers often also report on the problem of customers feeling helpless at banks (Adamu 2015). Attributable to the growing number of tasks that customers have to fulfill, yet, they are not driven by failures in the process but by stressors within the service process. Such stressors could arise from industry-specific knowledge that customers often do not have (e.g., financial expertise), the high relevance of the service to a customer’s life (e.g., medical services), or high time pressure (e.g., the need to catch a flight). However, organizations might not be aware of such stressors, and research about negative emotions, particularly stress due to physical and mental overload and strain in customer participation, is lacking. Service organizations, however, might benefit from such research, as managers must be aware of potential stressors and the possibility that customers could become stressed due to the characteristics of the service itself. Greater knowledge in this area would enable managers to respond to customer stress appropriately, e.g., by altering the service design or process and by training their employees to intervene when necessary. This thesis seeks to fill in this gap within two empirical studies (chapter 2 and 3). As a means of investigating negative customer emotions in services with flawless delivery, customer participation stress (CPS) is introduced as a new construct to service marketing research. The definition of CPS builds on established definitions of stress from general and organizational psychology and links them to the behavioral aspects of customer participation. While CPS is a negative emotion that occurs within the service process, some services are affected by negative emotions that have already emerged before the actual service encounter and/or are the initial reason the customer has come to the service provider. These services, such as medical or funeral services, can be summarized as negative services (Dasu and Rao 1999; Morgan and Rao 2006). It might be a challenge for service organizations to actively engage customers in such services, yet their professional reputations are vital to their ability to remain in business; methods of how such service providers may increase customer engagement are outlined in chapter 3. While previous studies have presented valuable insights into positive emotions in the customer experience, negative emotions due to service failure, and the service process of negative services, research to date has not covered knowledge about negative customer emotions in flawless customer experiences with a focus on jointly created value of employee and customer and a comprehensive definition and boundaries of negative services. This thesis seeks to fill in these gaps with three distinct but related studies, two quantitative and one conceptual; answering to the following research questions: 1. Which demands and resources of the participation process cause CPS and how does CPS influence customer participation behavior? 2. What are the consequences of CPS and how do they influence customers’ evaluation of a service? 3. How can the characteristics of the participation process and customers’ predispositions mitigate unwanted psycho-physical and behavioral outcomes of CPS? 4. What characterizes negative services and how can providers of such service be more successful by engaging customers?
Personality traits and career success : a multilayered approach
(2022) Höflinger, Vivien Francesca; Büttgen, Marion
For years now career success emerged as one of the focal points in managerial psychology research. It still remains a key topic in contemporary literature. Personality has been identified as an essential predictor of work and career success. In examining associations between personality traits and professional outcomes, the Big Five represents the prevalent theoretical basis. This widely recognized framework stands primarily for bright and affirmative personality attributes. In more recent times, the rather negative side of the personality range received increasing scientific attention, not least triggered by severe scandals in the business world. Especially the Dark Triad personality construct consisting of Machiavellianism, psychopathy and narcissism has attracted growing academic consideration. Surprisingly these rather undesirable personality characteristics do not only promote counterproductive outcomes. Consequently, the two topics of bright as well as dark personality traits and career success constitute the scope of the thesis. To split the topic up and to explore it as sophisticated as possible, a comprehensive scientific approach is required. Supported by a multilayered methodological procedure, the interplay of personality and career success was investigated on heterogeneous criteria: (1) multifaceted bandwidth of personality, (2) diversity of career success indicators, (3) varied decision-making levels, and (4) new work environment. In summary, this dissertation answers the following research questions in three interrelated essays: 1. How successful are both light and dark personalities in terms of objective success criteria? 2. Does a GFP-E specific for executives exist and how is it related to the Dark Triad, success and satisfaction measures? 3. Do paradox personalities, in particular narcissism and humility, succeed in new work environments? The first paper represents the basis for gain in knowledge. It takes a broad attempt by addressing both the bright and dark personality traits of the Big Five and the Dark Triad. Accordingly, the influence of these expansive personality attributes and the selected objective career success indicators budget responsibility and personnel decision-making authority were examined. Empirically, a dual approach with a German sample combining an AI-based automated speech analysis tool with self-reported survey data was chosen. The results indicate a positive relationship between psychopathy and personnel decision-making authority, as well as between narcissism and emotional stability to budget responsibility. In the second article, the interest shifts entirely to the top-management. Here, a narrower personality approach was considered. For this purpose, self-reported survey data from German top-managers were collected. The study demonstrates that a superordinate singular factor (General Factor of Personality, GFP) specifically for executives (GFP-E) exists that is characterized by high agreeableness, extraversion, conscientiousness and openness to experience as well as low neuroticism. Furthermore, the relationship of the GFP-E to the Dark Triad and to success and satisfaction indicators were examined. Positive correlations to these criteria as well as to narcissism were evident. In contrast, negative connections to Machiavellianism and psychopathy were apparent, indicating the existence of a Dark Dyad. Finally, the third essay highlights the impact of paradox personalities on career success, namely the combination of narcissism and humility. In order to reflect the current transformation in the business world, new work settings are integrated in this study as well. Methodologically, a dyadic approach relating self-reported and other-reported survey data of US-professionals was selected. Further, to represent career success in its entirety, especially in new work environments, four measures of objective career success as well as a multidimensional subjective career success scale were included. The interaction between narcissism and humility indicated negative effects on leadership position, project responsibility and salary. However, when the working environment is included, the humble narcissist is materially successful in the new world of work. In total these findings contribute to existing knowledge of both bright and dark personality by showing that psychopaths and especially narcissists can be quite successful in their professional life. Emotional stability and conscientiousness proved to be the relevant predictors in a professional setting. Supplementary to the important content-related insights, this thesis further contributes to an increasing body of research incorporating language and personality. It encompasses as one of the first studies that introduces elements of artificial intelligence to the research streams of personality and success by using an automated psycholinguistic analysis technology. This dissertation further contributes to the literature on paradoxes in the workplace by enhancing previous leadership approaches. While positive effects of paradoxical personalities have already been found at the top management level it was demonstrated that this phenomenon couldn’t be converted to the general career success perspective. Further, by expending the research focus to new modes of working it could be shown that the working environment in today’s organizations proves to be an essential contextual factor impacting an employee’s career.
The human side of digital transformation : understanding the changing role of employees and leaders
(2021) Krehl, Eva-Helen; Büttgen, Marion
In the last few years, digital transformation forced organizations to integrate digital technology into different business areas. While many companies undergoing a digital transformation focus on the technology-side, the more successful approach to tackle digital transformation is focusing on the people who make things work (Berlin, 2018; Kane, 2019). Digital transformation has tremendously changed the way people live and work (Larson & DeChurch, 2020). Employees are augmented or substituted by technology (Breidbach & Maglio, 2016; Breidbach et al., 2018; Huang & Rust, 2018) and hence, employee roles are changing, and new skills are required (Bowen, 2016). Moreover, leader roles are changing in the light of digital transformation (Larson & DeChurch, 2020; Schallmo et al., 2017). They find themselves confronted with challenging and complex situations, such as introducing a new agile mindset (Kane, 2019). In addition to the outlined challenges for employees and leaders, digital transformation was accelerated in 2020 by the COVID-19 pandemic. Employees and leaders were required to work from home to follow social distancing restrictions (Brynjolfsson et al., 2020). Suddenly, new daily routines such as the intense use of digital tools while working from home were established (Criscuolo et al., 2020). In their roles as pioneers, motivators, and mentors, leaders have a particularly decisive function during the pandemic (Bartsch et al., 2020). In sum, the challenges of digital transformation and the COVID-19 pandemic can be described as a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous environment, also referred to as VUCA world (Bennett & Lemoine, 2014). It is important to understand the required roles and skill set for employees and leaders acting in a VUCA world, to be able to improve skills by training or learning on the job (Peterson et al., 2001). However, existing research regarding the human side of digital transformation accelerated by a global pandemic and the changing roles of employees and leaders is stretched to their limits. Thus, this dissertation focusses on employees and leaders as key factors for a successful digital transformation (Kane, 2019), by answering the following research questions: (1) How do digital transformation and new technologies transform service employee and leadership roles? (2) What specific skills are required for service employees in technology-based service encounters? (3) What are appropriate leadership behaviors in the context of digital transformation? (4) Which leadership practices do leaders perform from home during the COVID-19 pandemic? (5) How can leaders be effective working remotely with the aid of digital tools during the COVID-19 pandemic? By answering the research questions, this thesis advances research on the human side of digital transformation in four important points. First, this research extends our understanding on the human side of digital transformation by focusing on the changing roles, skills and practices of employees and leaders in the light of a (crisis-induced) digital transformation. Second, this thesis contributes to our understanding of how technology is changing employees’ roles in the service encounter. Specifically, this thesis explores which particular skills service employees need to perform in the technology-based service encounter. Hence, a skill-based framework for frontline service employees is presented. Third, this thesis contributes to leadership research by providing a deeper understanding of leadership challenges resulting from digital transformation. Moreover, this thesis presents insights into digital leadership roles appropriate to the leadership challenges associated with digital transformation, including a measurement scale for the identified leadership roles. Fourth, this thesis contributes to existing virtual and crisis leadership literature. Existing findings are supplemented by demonstrating the suitability of video conferences to make up for face-to-face communication when leading from home. In addition, this thesis reveals several drivers and barriers with positive and negative impacts on leadership effectiveness when coping with crisis-specific challenges. Following an introduction (chapter 1), this thesis is divided into three main chapters with a concluding overarching discussion (chapter 5). Chapter 2 examines employee roles and skills in technology-based service encounters, Chapter 3 includes the conceptualization of a Digital Transformation Leadership Framework, and Chapter 4 explores the daily experience of leaders aiming to lead effectively while using digital tools and working remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic. Since the global pandemic has pushed organizations to change current practices and embrace digital solutions while creating hybrid collaboration models, this research might encourage further research on the human side of digital transformation.
The influence of Corporate Brand Experience on employees´ corporate brand pride, brand-related and service-related behaviour
(2023) Abed, Fabian; Büttgen, Marion
In the past years corporation and brands increase their efforts to influence employees´ attitudes and behaviour using internal branding activities. In doing so, corporation and brands try to enhance organizational or brand commitment and related positive behaviour of its personnel. Here, corporate brand pride seems particular interesting as this construct receives increasing attention in theory and practice. On the one hand, corporate brands such as Facebook or Ritz-Carlton have already identified pride as a central element in their strategy regarding employee engagement and outstanding customer service (Kraemer et al., 2020). On the other hand, research regarding pride is scarce. As pride implies a strong bond between the employee and the corporation or brand, strong effects on employee behaviour can be assumed. For this reason, it seems interesting to further investigate this construct. Here, the question arises how employees´ corporate brand pride can be fostered. In answering this question this work uses an internal branding approach, investigating how direct and indirect corporate brand experience affect corporate brand pride, brand-related and service-oriented behaviour of personnel. The latter experience represents a non-product related corporate brand experience, for example via internal communications. As corporate brands face nowadays increasing media coverage, this thesis further investigate effects of perceived negative on corporate brand pride and brand-oriented behaviour. In doing so, this work show how corporation can mitigate unfavourable effects of negative corporate brand publicity. The central part of this behaviouristic thesis represents three quantitative cross-sectional studies which have been analysed using structural equation modelling. In doing so, manifest and latent relationships are analysed. The data used in the studies stem mostly from various online survey, which have been conducted in Germany´s largest Business-Network (XING). The results of this thesis reveal, that corporate brand pride of employees can be fostered through indirect corporate brand experience. Indirect corporate brand experience through internal communications also provides an effective way to mitigate the perception of negative corporate brand publicity and their subsequent adverse effects on corporate brand pride. Moreover, the thesis reveal that the dissemination of brand knowledge, as a central part of internal branding, positively affect pride of employees, too. In addition, results provide evidence that employee pride represent a strong attitudinal motivator, which in turn influence brand- and service-oriented behaviour of personnel. At the end, the thesis highlights implications for theory and practice as well as limitations. The findings of this thesis provide important theoretical and practical implications, in particular for marketing manager and human resources manager.

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