Many papers have focused on service operation management (SOM), particularly in the field of a ‘service encounter’. This study considers its meaning and analyses the model for the evaluation of service encounter. The methodology is launched by reviewing literature on SOM. With regard to the meaning of a service encounter, it is concluded that the best approach to denote its definitions is to balance client, staff, and technology aspects.
Also, the components of service encounter are needed to progress together harmonically in order to meet customer satisfaction. In addition, this study suggests that SWOT analysis could be an appropriate technique for analysing the service encounter. This study would be of particular interest to the service encounter and could help analyse its position. ?The growth of service industries has increased dramatically over the last six decades.
Many research papers, books, and journals have been published on the service segment. To improve service quality and meet customer’s expectation, Service Operations Management (SOM) has become an interesting issue in modern society (Haksever et al. , 2000). Machuca et al.
(2008) also suggests that the service sector is indeed important and relates to the development of economy.With regard to service industries, there are many systems including marketing, operations, or human resources system; however, the area of these systems where consumers participate mostly is a ‘service encounter’. In addition, the tools or techniques for analysing a service encounter are also received little attention in terms of research. Therefore, the study aims to provide a model for evaluating a service encounter. The methodology is launched by reviewing the literature on SOM, especially in range of service encounter in order to achieve the aim successfully.After the service encounter is completely understood, some SOM’s techniques are reviewed.
The research project is ended with general discussions.? 1. Understanding a Service Encounter 1. 1 Definitions a service encounter It is widely agreed that a ‘service encounter’ could be embedded in two perspectives: customer and service provider (Haksever et al. , 2000). Likewise, Normann (1984) states that an interaction between service provider and client affecting service quality in the customer’s mind is the service encounter, which has been called a ‘moment of truth’.
Similarly, Gil et al. (2008) describes it as a ‘sort of snapshot’ of customer when they participate in a service encounter. Not only does the term of service encounter focus on the perspective of customer, but it is also considered in the view of service worker. It is noted that the feelings of service employee influences customer satisfaction (Soderlund and Rosengren, 2010). Jayawardhena et al.
(2007) also statistically prove that the quality of service encounter is positively regarded service quality evaluations of the workers.In addition, Soderlund and Rosengren (2010) conclude that service firms should encourage a positive display of the workers in order to meet the customer expectation; for instance, some companies established a smile strategy to satisfy their clients, and to build a good relationship at the service encounter. Nonetheless, Fitzsimmons and Fitzsimmons (2008) argue that another viewpoint of a service encounter is technology, which can provide the information when a client or clerk needs. It could be indicated that technology has connected to our daily lives; for example, people use the internet to change or to transfer their data online.It is shown that technology can assist in providing the information and affect the objectives in the service encounter.
However, some service encounters have no information technology such as mini-shop, small clinic, or private tutor, which can be called a technology-free service encounter. In conclusion, it is likely that a service encounter could be occurred at any place and any time when the interaction between consumer and services provider is established (Haksever et al. , 2000). It could be summarised that the definitions of a service encounter are probably has three different points of view.The customer and service provider aspects are generally known by researchers, while the perspective of technology is unlikely that in some service encounters there may be no information system. 1.
2 Elements of a service encounter It may be suggested that the service encounter can be divided into four categories: customer, service provider, delivery system, and physical evidence (Haksever et al. , 2000). Certainly, the consumer is one of the most significant components of the service encounter. It may be anticipated that the study of service encounters has mainly focused on the client sector (Jayawardhena et al. 2007). Haksever et al.
(2000) also suggest that the ultimate goal of a service encounter is to satisfy customers. Not only is the participant one of the most important elements, but the service provider is also one of them. It could be either human or machine (Fitzsimmons and Fitzsimmons, 2008). Haksever et al. (2000) also point out that the most important task of the service provider is to match the customer’s needs.
In addition, the delivery system could be suggested including processes, programmes, and procedures, as well as rules or organisation culture.Also, the mechanism of the service system should be flexible and adaptable enough so that it could respond to the needs of customer (Mill, 1990; Haksever et al. , 2000). The last element could be the physical evidence including all tangible aspects. Clients may observe the physical evidence in order to judge the service quality (Haksever et al. , 2000).
In contrast, the physical evidence would be designed to support the service providers to do their work without any obstructions. This would be let participants pass through the services conveniently. Nevertheless, Miao et al. 2011) argue that the other customers, who do not directly participate in the service system, could not be overlooked in a service encounter. Their behaviours can either dampen or heighten consumer satisfaction. The researchers empirically test that the joint effect of the felt and displayed emotions on encounter satisfaction.
The result demonstrates that the presence of other customers relates to the needs of direct ones. To conclude, it has generally accepted by Haksever et al. (2000) that a service encounter includes consumer, service provider, service systems, and environment.These elements probably affect the customer satisfaction; however, according to the study of Miao et al. (2011), other participants’ behaviours could affect consumer satisfaction.
1. 3 Evaluating of a service encounter It has frequently been argued that the best method to denote service encounter definitions is from the perspectives of consumer, service provider, or technology. According to the study of Jayawardhena et al. (2007), for instance, clients are the most important because customer satisfaction directly relates to the revenue of a company.Similarly, the service employee aspect is probably one of the most significant.
It could be demonstrated that staff are internal customers of every organisation. If any company cannot create morals and positive attitudes towards the firm among their workers, this will affect the atmosphere of the encounter negatively. After these employees have negative displays, it may have an impact on customer’s emotions in worse ways (Soderlund and Rosengren, 2010). Moreover, in the modern world, the internet has connected people for last three decades.
Generally, every organisation needs to launch marketing strategies in order to create opportunities for selling products or services. It could be appeared that technology has become one of the most important factors. In contrast, if the service encounter is defined as one of the three aspects, some points of view will be ignored. Fitzsimmons and Fitzsimmons (2008) argue that the relationship of these aspects is a triangle shape which means each component is related to the others. For example, if the perspectives of service staff and technology are neglected, the definition in terms of client will be found to be incomplete.
Therefore, the proper method of defining the term of service encounter could be to balance all three aspects in order to understand these words as a whole. Not only is the best approach for identifying the definitions of a service encounter a much talked about issue, but its elements are also argued many times. It is convincingly agreed that there are four different components: client, worker, system, and physical evidence (Haksever et al. , 2000). These elements could have an impact on customer satisfaction, which the ultimate goal for every firm is to satisfy their consumers.
For instance, in terms of service employee, according to the study of service provider’s display of emotion, it could be said that emotional displays of service worker could directly affect the satisfaction of client (Soderlund and Rosengren, 2010). In addition, from the perspectives of its system and evidence, they could be designed to meet the consumer expectation. Therefore, it could be concluded that all four elements are related to the service level, which is evaluated by consumer, and it seems that the most important component is customer. Nevertheless, Haksever et al. 2000) unfortunately overlook the other participants. It could be said that the other customers may influence a customer’s experience.
For example, Miao et al. (2011) suggests that service environment could be shared with others, particularly in hospitality service. Their study demonstrates that the presence of other consumers affects the emotion and mind of a focal customer in both ways: positive and negative. It is probably that the other customer is one of the most significant components due to this element can make an impact on the service level.On the other hand, if there is no aware of other participants as an element of a service encounter, the level of customer satisfaction may plummet dramatically. Thus, it could be concluded that other customers is the fifth element of a service encounter.
? 2. Tools and Techniques for Analysing a Service Encounter 2. 1 SWOT analysis and TOWS matrix It appears that the most common technique which is broadly used to identify the position of businesses is SWOT Analysis (Caruana et al. , 2010).Hill and Westbrook (1997), as well as Dyson (2004) and Sevkli et al.
2011), point out that SWOT analysis is a method for assisting the formulation of strategies. It is also used in various types of enterprises (Bernroider, 2002). Thus, it could be anticipated that SWOT analysis is a general technique for evaluating company’s position and building the long-term strategies. The components of SWOT analysis could be divided into four elements: strengths (S), weaknesses (W), opportunities (O) and threats (T). Sevkli et al. (2011) suggest that the first two components are internal factors of a company, while the rest are environmental aspects of the marketplace.
The researchers state that SWOT analysis encompasses a number of different forms of analysis; for example, PESTEL technique is for internal factors, while Porter’s Five Force Model is for external elements. Similarly, TOWS matrix is introduced as a tool for analysing the situation of a company by Weihrich (1982). It could be claimed that TOWS matrix demonstrates the relationship between each element in order to formulate strategies in four aspects: SO, ST, WO, and WT strategy (Lee and Lo, 2003; Sevkli et al. , 2011).
In short, SWOT analysis is a well-known technique for evaluating the position of a firm and developing the long-term strategies. There are two internal components which are strengths and weaknesses, while the others are environmental aspects that are opportunities and threats. Likewise, the TOWS matrix is quite the same idea and elements of SWOT analysis. Each element is matched for contributing to company’s strategies. It could be suggested that “a variation of SWOT analysis is the TOWS matrix” (Dyson, 2004).
Hence, the SWOT analysis and the TOWS matrix seem to be the same technique for evaluating and improving an organisation. 2. 2 Evaluating of SOM’s techniques SWOT analysis and TOWS matrix could be considered to be one of the most useful techniques in order to evaluate the position of a firm and create long-term strategies. It also could be stated that these same techniques are generally implemented in any organisations, which need to analyse their position in the present environment such as the study of Dyson (2004).Not only do enterprises use these tools for evaluating in organisational level, but also these concepts are applied in operational level. For instance, SWOT analysis is used by Arslan and Er (2008) in their research about the application of this technique in operations of the tanker of liquid chemicals.
Nonetheless, Hill and Westbrook (1997) argue that SWOT analysis may be an ineffective approach if it is implemented without any awareness of company’s values. The researchers also claim that this technique survives due to its straightforward and less preparation.Moreover, it is suggested that SWOT method is qualitative analysis, without any quantitative data. Therefore, this method may have some drawbacks in terms of analysing values and variable data.
In conclusion, it is probably that both SWOT analysis and TOWS matrix are appropriate tools because of its various applications; however, they have some disadvantages in the perspectives of evaluating. ? Conclusion A ‘service encounter’ is not only defined in the perspective of customer, but also in service provider and technology aspects, involving a number of studies.This paper reviews its definition and summarises its elements into five-fold. It could be suggested that the meaning of service encounter is an area or interaction of a consumer and service provider. In discussing progress, it was concluded that the term of service encounter could be defined from balancing three aspects: client, staff, and technology.
The components of service encounter including customer, service provider, delivery system, physical evidence, and other consumer, are needed to progress together harmonically in order to meet customer satisfaction.Moreover, this study suggests that SWOT analysis or TOWS matrix, which is generally implemented in any business sectors, could be probably an appropriate analysing tool for a service encounter. Although these approaches have some disadvantages in terms of analysing values and variable data, theirs benefits outweigh drawbacks. The further research could be to evaluate other techniques and implement those tools at a real situation. This study would be of particular interest to the service encounter and could help analyse its position.
