Moving beyond the direct impact of using CRM systems on frontline employees' service performance: The mediating role of adaptive behaviour

Renee Rui Chen,Wei Wang,Zhuo Peng,Robert M Davison,Carol Xiaojuan Ou

doi:10.1111/isj.12265

Abstract

AbstractDespite substantial investments in customer‐relationship‐management (CRM) systems, companies continue to experience pain rather than profit. Meanwhile, the concept of “adaptive behaviour” of frontline employees has received little attention in the literature related to CRM systems in which the frontline employees are the primary users. In this study, we propose that with the aid of CRM systems, individual employees are able to immediately access information about customers and service offerings, thus enabling their adaptive behaviours to provide personalized service to individual customers. Based on coping theory, we develop a CRM system‐driven adaptive behaviour model that explains how CRM systems facilitate individual employees' service performance by enabling adaptive behaviour during their service encounters. Multisourced data from a financial company in China largely support our proposed model, showing that employees' postadoption of CRM systems (routinization and infusion of use) enables interpersonal and offering adaptive behaviours, which in turn enhance employees' service performance. In addition, forming a postadoption behaviour of CRM systems relies on the frequent use. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of adaptive behaviour in service encounters with the aid of CRM systems.

Highlights

The promise of customer relationship management (CRM) systems is their effectiveness in documenting market-relevant information, managing customer contacts, as well as facilitating customer-oriented coordination of employees across the whole organization
In order to establish compelling arguments to support the critical role of CRM systems in facilitating employees’ adaptive behavior, and their downstream impacts on service performance, we develop theoretical arguments drawn from the theory of adaptation (Spiro and Weitz 1990; Weitz et al 1986) and the theory of IT post-adoption (Hsieh et al 2011; Sundaram et al 2007; Wang and Butler 2006)
Based on the theory of adaptation, we propose that the deep usage of CRM systems facilitates the development of two aspects of adaptive behavior, viz., interpersonal and offering adaptive behavior

Summary

Introduction

The promise of CRM systems is their effectiveness in documenting market-relevant information, managing customer contacts, as well as facilitating customer-oriented coordination of employees across the whole organization. Managers anticipate that by adopting CRM systems, frontline employees (hereafter referred as employees in this study) would more effectively target individual customers, engage in personalized dialogues with them, and personalize the product and service offerings. As a result, increasing numbers of organizations are currently implementing CRM systems in order to satisfy customers’ individual needs, retain valuable customers, and reap the economic benefits (Ahearne et al 2008; Hsieh et al 2012). According to a report from Gartner, the worldwide CRM systems market grew 13.7% from 18 billion in 2012 to 20.4 billion in 20131. Understanding how organizations leverage CRM systems to realize potential business benefits is of great practical significance

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