中国接待业情境下顾客授权行为的内涵、成因与后果：赋能与负担

本研究旨在系统地探索我国接待业情境下顾客授权行为概念内涵、形成原因以及对员工的赋能和负担双重作用后果。具体地，本项目主要有以下三方面研究内容：（1）探索顾客授权行为的概念内涵与表现形式，并开发本土化测量量表；（2）基于顾客视角，探讨顾客授权行为的形成原因（基于初步探索，包括但不限于：熟悉水平、选择困难、信任倾向、时间压力等）；（3）基于员工视角，探讨顾客授权行为的赋能和负担双重作用机制。基于调节导向理论，本项目认为员工个体的调节导向（促进 vs. 防御）是决定顾客授权行为发挥赋能作用抑或是负担效应的关键因素：对于促进导向的员工，我们提出“顾客授权行为→增强员工心理安全感→提升服务主动性”的赋能机制；对于防御导向的员工，我们提出“顾客授权行为→增加员工工作压力感→降低服务质量”的负担机制。本项目的积极探索不仅能够在理论上弥补现有研究不足，而且能够在实践上为接待业的企业管理实践提供有益启示。

This project is designed to investigate the content, antecedents and consequences (dual enabling and burdening effects) of customer empowering behaviors in Chinese hospitality industry. Specifically, this project mainly includes the following three aspects. First, based on Chinese hospitality context, we explore the content and manifestations of customer empowering behaviors, and develop a valid measure of such behaviors. Second, from the perspective of customers, we discuss the antecedents of customer empowering behaviors (based on our preliminary exploration, we found the antecedents include but are not limited to: familiarity level, choice difficulty, trust tendency, time pressure, etc.). Third, from the perspective of employees, we investigate the dual enabling and burdening effects of customer empowering behaviors on employees. According to regulatory focus theory, we argue that employees’ regulatory focus (promotion vs. prevention) is the key factor to determine whether customer empowering behaviors engender enabling or burdening effects. For employees with promotion focus, we propose the enabling mechanism of “customer empowering behaviors→enhance employees’ psychological safety→facilitate proactive customer service performance”; For employees with prevention focus, we propose the burdening mechanism of “customer empowering behaviors→increase employees’ perceived job stress→reduce quality of service”. The beneficial exploration of this project can not only make up for the shortcomings of existing research in theory, but also provide significant implications for the enterprises’ management practice of hospitality industry in practice.