Organizacija, Volume 47 Special Theme: Application of Quality Management Number 3, August 2014 DOI: 10.2478/orga-2014-0015 Managing Customer Participation and Customer Interactions in Service Delivery: the Case of Museums and Educational Services Marlene Amorim, Maria Joao Rosa, Sandra Santos University of Aveiro, Department of Economics, Management and Industrial Engineering, Aveiro, Portugal, mamorim@ua.pt (corresponding author), m.joao@ua.pt, sipsantos@ua.pt Background and Purpose - In this study we investigate determinants of customers' quality perceptions in service processes which involve customer participation and customer to customer interaction (CCI). Building on existing multidimensional approaches to service quality we explore relevant quality aspects for related to the performance customer participation and CCI. Design/Methodology/Approach - The study builds on focus groups conduct with employees and customers of a leading provider of educational and science services, which offered a portfolio of service activities requiring very diverse levels of customer participation and CCI, to characterize service quality dimensions. Results - The study distinguishes three dimensions of service delivery quality: a dimension related to the providers' direct performance; a second dimension relative to the performance of customers' own participation in service activities, and a third dimension relative to the interaction with other customers. The work extends service quality literature by identifying new dimensions which affect service quality in service settings with active customer involvement. Conclusion - Service providers have been developing very diverse delivery processes, frequently inviting customers to have active roles in service production. Often, customers also interact with other costumers in service delivery. The paper provides a contribution to foster the debate about service quality frameworks, and aims to inform the design and the management of services where customer participation and CCI have a key role. Keywords: service quality, customer participation, customer-to customer interaction 1 Introduction Customers assess the quality of a service by evaluating various outputs in a delivery process. Johnston and Clark (2005) distinguished a direct result (the core output of a service, such as a meal in a restaurant) and an experience outcome (the way the customer is dealt in the delivery). Other authors, such as Roth and Menor (2003) identified dimensions of explicit and implicit service outputs. Research results also evidenced that when service results are difficult to assess (e.g. because of their intangibility, such as in education services), customers often rely on service process clues for inferring about service quality (Rosenbaum and Massiah, 2011; Baker and Lamb, 1994). Extant quality models capture such multidimensional nature of service outputs (Martínez and Martínez, 2010). Seminal conceptualizations include the work of Gronroos (1993), which distinguishes dimensions of technical and functional quality, and SERVQUAL (Parasuraman et al. 1991,1988) which identified five quality dimensions: tan- Received: September 6th, 2013; revised: 19th July 2014; accepted; July 29th, 2014 166 Organizacija, Volume 47 Special Theme: Application of Quality Management Number 3, August 2014 gibility, responsiveness, assurance, reliability and empathy. These models have been successfully applied across the diverse universe of service industries (Ladhari, 2009). They seem, however, less fit to describe service quality for delivery processes which have distinct operational characteristics. Quality models typically address service processes with substantial volume of customer-employee interactions and customer contact with tangible elements (e.g. service facilities). Yet, service providers have been developing very diverse delivery processes, frequently inviting customers to have active roles in service production (e.g. adopting selfservice technologies), and therefore affecting service quality (Payne et al., 2008). Often, as well, customers interact with other costumers in service delivery (e.g. customers frequently provide instructions and assistance to each other in service settings). Both customer participation and customer-to-customer interaction (CCI) can have substantial impacts for service results (Frei, 2006; Nichols, 2005, 2010) and consequently for customers' quality perceptions (Bendapudi and Leone, 2003). Nevertheless these aspects are not explicitly integrated in the prevalent quality frameworks, which are used to support service research and management (Kelley et al., 1992). We need to expand service quality frameworks, in order to meet the diverse service delivery processes offered by providers. In particular, we need to look at service processes involving distinct degrees of customer participation and CCI, to understand its influence for service results and customers' quality perceptions. Our work aims to provide a contribution to this field. We are conducted a case study with a leading provider of educational, and science, events, targeted to both adult and children audiences. The organization conducts service activities requiring very diverse levels of customer participation and CCI, therefore providing a rich portfolio of service delivery processes for our study. The primary goal of the study was to investigate how the operational characteristics of the service delivery (e.g. customer participation and CCI) contribute to inform customers' quality assessments. The study sets out to identify service quality dimensions associated to the characteristics of providers and customers which influence service outputs and quality. The paper is structured as follows. We first provide the conceptual background of our study, reviewing the conceptualization of quality service literature, notably the multidimensional nature of the service quality construct. We also provide a review of the characterization and implications of customer participation and CCI in services. In the methodology section we describe the objectives of the study and the data collection and data analysis methods. Finally we provide a discussion of the results of the work, and we draw some managerial implications and directions for future research. 2 Conceptual background 2.1 Service Quality The outputs of a service process are considerably more difficult to specify and evaluate than those of pure manufacturing processes (Goldstein et al., 2002). The results obtained in many services can involve intangible components, which can be difficult to specify and assess (Lovelock and Wirtz, 2001; Gronroos and Ojasalo, 2004). Moreover, as customers participate in the service process, they evaluate both the final outcome of service delivery and how the service was delivered and how good their personal experience was (Mohr and Bitner, 1995, Gronroos and Ojasalo, 2004). Service process experiences can be positive when customers enjoy some of the process participation itself, for example, because of fun elements and socialization aspects related to the interaction with other customer or employees (Burke, 2002). But it may also be perceived negatively because it will involve some personal time and effort to reach or contact the service facilities and for completing the service delivery. In many cases, the process experience can dominate the overall value perception of the customer and be even more important for the customer than the service direct results (Gronroos, 1998). The definition of specific performance measures to evaluate the quality of the service delivery in each of these value dimensions is complex. The SERVQUAL model by Parasuraman et al. (1988) is probably the most widely accepted model to develop adequate measures of service quality. The model defines 5 dimensions to measure service quality: tangible elements, reliability (performing the service accurately and consistently), responsiveness (providing the service fast), assurance (delivering the service in a competent and credible manner) and empathy (offer care, courtesy and individualized attention). Other authors developed similar approaches adding new dimensions to address specificities of particular service contexts. For example, Parasuraman et al. (2005) developed ES-QUAL and E-RecS-QUAL for the specific case of electronic retail services quality and the quality of service recovery, introducing dimensions such as efficiency, fulfillment, system availability or privacy, to address specifi service attributes related to customer-technology interactions. Similar efforts can be found in the literature about retail services, with the retail service quality scale (RSQS) consisting of five dimensions: physical aspects, reliability, personal interaction, problem solving and policy Dabholkar et al. (1996). The RSQS measurement scale includes some general service quality items, inspired in SERVQUAL, as well as items related to specific aspects of retail services such as, the layout of the store its adequacy to customers' browsing and picking of products (in the physical aspects dimension), or the quality of the merchandise (in the policy dimension). Whereas customer participation and CCI have been acknowledged as 167 Organizacija, Volume 47 Special Theme: Application of Quality Management Number 3, August 2014 an important feature in many service settings, extant service measurement scale, don't include specific items or dimensions related to the performance of the customer actions or the interaction with others. The purpose of this study is to provide a contribution to this body of knowledge. 2.2 Customer participation Customer participation has been acknowledged as a key distinguishing feature of service process (Sampson, 2000). Customers provide very diverse inputs for service production, notably the presence of the customer himself (as it in the case of healthcare or personal services); some material or immaterial customer possessions (personal objects to be transported, cleaned, repaired); and frequently, customer information (Lovelock and Gummesson, 2004; Sampson and Froehle, 2006). Consequently, service processes typically involve a great deal of interaction between the customers and the service employees, as well as the commitment of personal time and effort to engage in the service delivery (Mills and Margulies, 1980, Chase, 1981, Mills et al., 1983). Customers have been progressively encouraged to perform more active roles in service production. Some authors have suggested long ago that companies can use customers to replace the employees in some operations as a source of productivity gains (Mills and Morris, 1986). More recently, the concept of co-production has been extended to consider customer contributions in more general instances. In the strategic management literature, this is often referred to as "value co-creation" (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004). Building on previous work, Sampson (2007) defined seven possible types of generic roles a customer can perform in services: supplier, labor, design engineer, product, inventory, quality assurance, and competitor. Increasing the extent of customer participation in services, however, does not come without a cost. The quality of the resulting service becomes, at least partially, dependent on the quality of the collaboration between the customer and the provider (Heinonen et al. 2013; Cheung and To, 2011). As Frei (2006) noted, customers can introduce substantial variability in service process operations and outputs, due, for example to their lack of capabilities to perform the service delivery operations required from them, or just because they don't have enough motivation of incentive to do so. As such, in services involving substantial customer participation, diverse types of customer failures, and low performance situations can occur (Ford and Dickson, 2012). For service providers customer participation creates the need to design service processes in a robust way, to incorporate customer contributions in a seamless way which doesn't affect efficiency and customer value. Examples of these efforts include the creation of clear customer instruction and scripts to guide customer roles and actions in service delivery (Tax et al. 2006). Moreover, customer failure, or misbehavior will affect not only the quality of his own outputs, but also the results and the experience provided to other customer sharing the same service settings (e.g. smoking in the non-smoking area of a restaurant, talking in an overly loud voice late at night in a hotel hallway, talking on cell phones during a movie, etc.) (Huang et. al 2010). Customer participation has effects for customer service quality perceptions, particularly in the case of service failures, or when delivery fall below certain expected level. For example, in service settings which ask from customers a high degree of autonomy in the conduction of the tasks in order to obtain a service output, it has been observed that customers can show a bias in attributing the responsibilities to the company and the employees (Yen et al. 2004). In service settings with intense customer participation (e.g. retail, education, etc.), the service system evolves towards a production system where employees and customer tasks and instructions are linked and visible for these two actors. Customers will therefore also assess how well the service processes is design to accommodate their participation. As such, in such settings, service quality measure should reflect these aspects, and customer perceptions regarding their capabilities to perform as well as elements related to the sevrcie process operations (e.g. layout, information, etc.) 2.3 Customer-to-customer interaction CCI is a broad concept used to refer to an ample range of interactions that take place between customers during service delivery. In retail settings, for example, customers often engage in conversations with each other to exchange information which facilitates the service process - e.g. asking for help in locating an item in the store, asking for advice or opinions about the suitability of an item for a specific purpose or occasion, etc. - (Harris et. al, 1997). Although CCI is present in a wide variety of service industries, it has been mostly addressed in settings such as retail (see for example Parker and Ward, 2000; Baron et. al, 1996) and travel and leisure services (von Lehn, 2006; Harris and Baron, 2004; Martin, 1997). The literature documents well the diversity of forms that CCI can assume. McGrath and Otnes (1995) proposed a classification to capture the diverse social and informational exchanges that take place between unacquainted retail customers. Their work distinguished situations in which customers engage in explicit interactions - labeled as overt customer influences - from other instances in which, although customers exert influence over each other's behavior, some of them can be oblivious or even unaware of such interactions - labeled as covert customer influences. Their work documented situations in which customers respond to others facing a problem or a service difficulty (overt influences when customers act as proactive help-seekers, as well as covert influences observed in behaviors of followers and observers); it described also instances when customers presume to have a value or experience to contribute to another 168 Organizacija, Volume 47 Special Theme: Application of Quality Management Number 3, August 2014 (overt influences: reactive helpers; as well as covert: judges, accused, spoilers), and also cases where customers provoke some sensory stimulation that has the effect of catching others' attention (covert influences: admirers, complainers) and finally settings in which customers compete for limited resources (overt influences: competitors). Several other authors also contributed to the characterization of the differentiated possible customer roles in CCI, for example by: highlighting the need to distinguish proactive from reactive interaction (e.g. proactive vs. reactive helpers in Parker and Ward (2000)); identifying situations in which CCI results from customer incidents (e.g. Grove and Fisk (1997) distinguished protocol incidents, such as physical and verbal incidents in line, from sociability incidents such as ambiance incidents ) and addressing also dysfunctional customer behavior (e.g. Harris and Reynolds (2004) proposed eight categories of misbehavior - property abusers, oral abusers, vindictive customers, etc.). Customers' collaboration and socialization is very common in service encounters which take place in the presence of other customers (e.g. public transport, retail, etc.), and can be particularly stimulated when customers have to share time (e.g. wait for the service) or any service resources or utensils (e.g. using self-service technologies). Moreover, CCI is neither restricted to on-site customer interactions, or to the service encounter. Customers often seek for other customers inputs before, or after, a service encounter using a technology interface such as the internet (e.g. a priori searching for customers' opinions' and ratings about a service, or any other word-of-mouth behavior), (Georgi and Mink, 2013; Nicholls, 2005; Harris et. al, 2000). In some services CCI is not restricted to short interactions between strangers such as the ones described above, but rather, it is one of the main sources of value creation. Examples include tourism and leisure services, such as adventure holidays, for which CCI is an integral element of the intended service experience, and is often planned in advance. The importance and the slightly distinct role of CCI in such services have been acknowledged by being specifically labeled as "CCI-driven services" (Nichols, 2007). The need for further investigation of CCI-driven services has been acknowledged by seminal authors in the field (e.g. Nicholls, 2010), and is further justified by the widespread presence, and importance, of CCI-driven services in our economies - CCI-driven services can be found in a wide variety of industries, such as tourism, education or leisure. Education services, like the ones addressed in this study, have characteristics of "CCI-driven services", as they are designed be provided to groups of customers and often require their participation and collaboration in the process. As such, the measurement of quality in such settings should contemplate items related to the perceived quality of attributes related to the specification and the management of customer groups and their interactions. In this study we will look specifically into these aspects, in order to understand if customers are aware of it being part of service design and specification decisions, for which the service provider is responsible and accountable. 3 Methodology 3.1 Data collection The study builds on a preliminary review of the literature about service quality, customer participation and CCI to learn about the extant service quality models, as well as to identify attributes related to customer participation and interaction which could affect service outputs. The purpose was to specify a set of priory categories of service quality attributes to guide the conduction of focus groups interviews, and the subsequent data analysis, following Miiles and Huberman (1994). Building on the literature review we distinguished three broad dimensions of service delivery performance which can have a determinant impact for service process and service outcomes. A first dimension was related to the direct performance of the service provider, i.e. the resources directly managed and controlled by the company (e.g. service facilities, personnel, etc.). A second dimension was linked to the performance of the customer in his actions and participation in service activities. A third dimension was Table 1: Service process dimensions influencing service quality Service Process Characteristics Provider Service Quality Dimensions Key References Tangibility Responsiveness Assurance Reliability Empathy Parasuraman et al., 1988, 1991 Public Time Space Behaviour Assistance Nicholls, 2005 Personal Arrivals Requests Capabilities Motivation Preferences Frei, F., 2006 169 Organizacija, Volume 47 Special Theme: Application of Quality Management Number 3, August 2014 considered to contemplate the performance of other customers, and their action an interaction during service delivery (See Table 1). The proposed three levels of service process dimensions were adopted to analyze the portfolio of educational services offered by the organization addressed in the study - provider of educational, and science, events - in order to characterize service portfolio according to two criteria: the intensity of customer participation required; the number of customers involved in a service event. This classification led to the four process archetypes illustrated in Figure I. Most of the services offered required substantial customer participation because the education and science labs involved a great deal of experimentation and interaction with the provider employees to analyze and comment the observed experiences or exhibition of scientific aspects (e.g. learning the chemistry involved in producing butter or bread, etc.). The provider offered diverse group activities, for example for school audiences which were monitored by professors and employees of the provider who were responsible for conducting the activities, and assuring the involvement and the engagement of all participants in the experiments. Individual experiences were also provided, where the customers interacted autonomously with the materials and technologies exhibited in the service space. A few services, requiring more modes customers' participation were also offered, such as small exhibitions, and movies and talks with invited guests from the partner university. The provider has a close collaboration with a partner university, located in the same town. Most of the staff involved in the design and conduction of the services (e.g. laboratories for kids, experiment with food and nature, etc,) were current or former researchers from the university. The next step in the study involved the conduction of 7 focus groups, involving about 12 participants each, including users of the services (i.e. mostly groups of visiting students and professors) and employee, i.e. the monitors involved in the provision of services, for the service categories of Active/Groups and Passive/Groups. The group interviews follow a semi-structured protocol, including a set of guiding questions regarding the service experience, and the preparation undergone by customers and employees before a service experience. The purpose was to explore service delivery aspects found by each of these actors as relevant for the successful service experience. The interviews are recorded and subsequently transcribed for data analysis and coding. 3.2 Data analysis Data analysis involved the identification of relevant quality attributes related to the three service dimensions specified ex-ante, from the exploration of the transcribed interviews. Relevant aspects were summarized into in an adequate display, an analysis strategy recommended by Miles and Huberman (1994). We built separate matrices for summarizing the service quality aspects mentioned by employees, and by professors and student customers, in an effort to categorize then under one of the three dimensions: provider's direct performance, customer performance, and CCI performance. We began by building a comprehensive list of quality attributes that were classified into those broader conceptual categories. This resulted in a comprehensive list of aspects supported by the literature and a few new aspects which were not found in the literature review x> o > C Groups i t- 0) > "55 ■o cu o > cu cn