The consequences of customer-oriented constructive deviance in luxury-hotel restaurants

Abstract

Prior research has illustrated the antecedents of customer-oriented constructive deviance. However, research on their consequences has been limited. To clarify the relationship between customer-oriented constructive deviance and its outcome, the present study is based on affective event theory and posits that customer-oriented constructive deviance predicts customer gratitude and employee guilt, which in turn lead to customer and employee satisfaction and loyalty, respectively. This research also investigates how service and ethical climates moderate these relationships. Based on a dataset comprising 223 matched employee–customer pairs collected from luxury hotel restaurants, we found that customer-oriented constructive deviance is positively related to customer loyalty, but negatively related to employee loyalty. Furthermore, service and ethical climates are found to have disparate impacts on these relationships. Our findings call attention to a potential risk that managers should be aware of when they manage customer-oriented constructive deviance to achieve greater customer service.