Customers Happy Research Articles

Author Correction: Customer support ticket escalation prediction using feature engineering

Understanding and keeping the customer happy is a central tenet of requirements engineering. Strategies to gather, analyze, and negotiate requirements are complemented by efforts to manage customer input after products have been deployed. For the latter, support tickets are key in allowing customers to submit their issues, bug reports, and feature requests. If insufficient attention is given to support issues, however, their escalation to management becomes time-consuming and expensive, especially for large organizations managing hundreds of customers and thousands of support tickets. Our work provides a step towards simplifying the job of support analysts and managers, particularly in predicting the risk of escalating support tickets. In a field study at our large industrial partner, IBM, we used a design science research methodology to characterize the support process and data available to IBM analysts in managing escalations. We then implemented these features into a machine learning model to predict support ticket escalations. We trained and evaluated our machine learning model on over 2.5 million support tickets and 10,000 escalations, obtaining a recall of 87.36% and an 88.23% reduction in the workload for support analysts looking to identify support tickets at risk of escalation. Finally, in addition to these research evaluation activities, we compared the performance of our support ticket model with that of a model developed with no feature engineering; the support ticket model features outperformed the non-engineered model. The artifacts created in this research are designed to serve as a starting place for organizations interested in predicting support ticket escalations, and for future researchers to build on to advance research in escalation prediction.

Impact of Innovation in the Food and Beverage Industry: Challenges and Opportunities

It is a well-known fact that the tourism business, which covers many sectors like housing, catering, transport, visitor attractions, entertainment, etc., may significantly contribute to the growth of the economy of any nation. Operations for serving food and beverages are advancing in both development and quality while also improving. Because most tourists spend money on food and beverages, the travel and hospitality sector depends on providing services of high quality. People today prefer novel food and beverage service methods that are also entertaining, alluring, and presentable. The physical environment, which includes the service staff, ambiance, table settings, and lighting, is also crucial in attracting visitors. A key factor in keeping customers happy and encouraging them to return to the restaurant is service quality. Numerous trends affect the sector of food and drinks, and these trends can make or break a restaurant business. The research topic focuses on recent advancements in the provision of food and beverage practices and the significance of the physical environment for any restaurateur.

Customer support ticket escalation prediction using feature engineering

Understanding and keeping the customer happy is a central tenet of requirements engineering. Strategies to gather, analyze, and negotiate requirements are complemented by efforts to manage customer input after products have been deployed. For the latter, support tickets are key in allowing customers to submit their issues, bug reports, and feature requests. If insufficient attention is given to support issues, however, their escalation to management becomes time-consuming and expensive, especially for large organizations managing hundreds of customers and thousands of support tickets. Our work provides a step toward simplifying the job of support analysts and managers, particularly in predicting the risk of escalating support tickets. In a field study at our large industrial partner, IBM, we used a design science research methodology to characterize the support process and data available to IBM analysts in managing escalations. In a design science methodology, we used feature engineering to translate our understanding of support analysts' expert knowledge of their customers into features of a support ticket model. We then implemented these features into a machine learning model to predict support ticket escalations. We trained and evaluated our machine learning model on over 2.5 million support tickets and 10,000 escalations, obtaining a recall of 87.36% and an 88.23% reduction in the workload for support analysts looking to identify support tickets at risk of escalation. Further on-site evaluations, through a prototype tool we developed to implement our machine learning techniques in practice, showed more efficient weekly support ticket management meetings. Finally, in addition to these research evaluation activities, we compared the performance of our support ticket model with that of a model developed with no feature engineering; the support ticket model features outperformed the non-engineered model. The artifacts created in this research are designed to serve as a starting place for organizations interested in predicting support ticket escalations, and for future researchers to build on to advance research in escalation prediction.

The Power of Customer Relationship Management: A New Marketing Trend for Hospitality in Globalization Context (Case study of Hanoi Old Quarter)

Customer Relationship Management is known as an effective method which helps administrations solve many problems customers may have. Customer Relationship Management is a global way for businesses to set up, maintain, and extend their customer network. Nowadays, every business which wants to survive and develop needs to improve its customer relationship management department. Researchers have shown that in every decision-making process the most important factors concerning customers are the following: price, promotions, processing speed and response time, and these are among the key factors which are going to be covered in this article. In the hospitality sector, especially for hotel business in the old city center of Hanoi, 90% of visitors are foreigners and mainly through online (OTA) sources. About the booking process for foreign visitors when traveling to Hanoi was presented in the study of Dr. Nguyen Van Ha “The power of online marketing for hospitality in Vietnam in globalization context” showed that before booking a room, they were able to find out the hotel by reading reviews of customers who had experienced the hotel through the channels such as tripadvisor, booking.com .... The Old Quarter hotel is primarily concerned with customer reviews, customer service aimed at keeping customers happy and satisfy about the hotel. And these good reviews are the most effective way to help hotels boost sales, boost hotel branding, and promote the image of the hotel. This research has a scope of surveys which were done in Hanoi, Vietnam. Nevertheless, it serves as the grounds for all travel agencies and hotels doing business in Hanoi to re-examine their online marketing activities and consider the findings of this paper as reference for further research.

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a driver for sustainable positive employment relationships-A comparative analysis

Job quality should be a key objective of any employer. Happy employees create happy customers which produce business results. Employees want fair, respectful, healthy and democratic workplaces that value their participation. Every individual at the workplace shares a certain relationship with his fellow workers. Human beings are not machines who can start working just at the push of a mere button. They need people to talk to, discuss ideas with each other and share their happiness and sorrows. An individual cannot work on his own, he needs people around. If the organization is all empty, the employee will not feel like sitting there and working. An isolated environment demotivates an individual and spreads negativity around. It is essential that people are comfortable with each other and work together as a single unit towards a common goal. The key determinants of job quality include: the pace of work and work stress; opportunities for input; job security; work-life balance; workplace relationships; individual development and physical working conditions.

Can Engaged and Positive Employees Delight Customers?

The Problem Although there have been a plethora of studies on the determinants of customer delight in marketing literature, less attention has been given to understand the role of employees’ work engagement and psychological capital (PsyCap) in satisfying and delighting customers. The objective of the present study is threefold—the first is to examine how engaged employees are positive and efficacious; the second is to investigate how engaged, positive, and efficacious employees delight patients specifically in the health care sector; and the third is to examine how the relationship between employees’ positive PsyCap and customer delight is mediated by beneficiary contact, which is the perception of employees about the meaningful impact of their efforts on their patients. The Solution Previous studies have shown that employees who are absorbed, dedicated, and immersed in their work are more confident and positive at their workplace. Engaged, positive, and confident employees not only keep themselves but also their customers happy and positive through their optimistic outlook and efficacious work behavior. Responses are collected from 200 employees and their 200 patients from different hospitals of India. Hierarchical regression analysis shows a significant and positive relationship between work engagement, PsyCap, and customer delight. Work engagement is found to predict PsyCap and customer delight. Beneficiary contact is found to mediate between the relationship of PsyCap and customer delight. The originality of the article lies in its interdisciplinary approach to understand how engaged and dedicated employees keep themselves and their patients positive and delighted. The Stakeholders This study is of relevance to human resource development (HRD) professionals, customer relationship managers of the health care sector, and also academicians belonging to the disciplines of marketing and human resource management. The findings of this study would help them understand how engaged employees lead to employees’ positive PsyCap and customer delight. Furthermore, they will also understand the vital role of the interface between employees and customers, as beneficiary contact mediates the relationship of employees’ PsyCap and customer delight.

Employee Engagement; Tool of Talent Retention: Study of a Pharmaceutical Company

Research article is a study of employee engagement at a pharma company located in Hyderabad. The main focus of this study is to understand the factors which influence employee engagement and to find the level of employees engaged at this pharma company located in Hyderabad. Research indicates that companies whose level of engaged employees are higher have less attrition rate than other companies and also is marked higher in productivity and customer satisfaction, so this proves that result of employee engagement are impacting the result in bottom line. For the purpose of the study a questionnaire was prepared based on understanding various aspects of company, relationship with the manager and the job. The questionnaire was checked for validation and reliability and responses were collected from employees who are working at a division on this pharma company in Hyderabad. The data analysis of the responses has resulted in some findings on gender & flexible policies, experienced employees & interaction, experienced employees & appreciation and level of engaged employees. If it is not taken care on time such issues can lead to high attrition rate in company. Happy employees keep customers happy. Pharmaceutical sector being a sector of critical talent, the retention of talent is a huge responsibility for HR. To improve the engagement among the employees, based on findings some of the engagement activities like opportunities to share feedback on manager, acknowledge employee contribution on real time basis, paternity leave policy were suggested in the study to retain employees.

The role of information management in project management success: Narratives from entrepreneurs operating within the South African construction industry

Background: The South African construction industry is noted to be one of the most popular industries heavily dependent on projects. Calls exist for research that ascertains not just how entrepreneurs act as project managers but also the evaluation of project success and the role information management plays in all this.Objectives: The aim of this study was to understand the views and experiences of entrepreneurs in how: (1) project management success is conceptualised, and (2) the role that information management played to this within a South African construction industry space.Method: The study adopts a qualitative research approach using semi-structured interviews to generate narratives and themes around how: (1) project management success is conceptualised, and (2) the role that information management played to this. A sample of 15 entrepreneurs working within the construction industry was used for this study.Results: Based on the analysis of the narratives of the 15 entrepreneurs, project success was conceptualised mainly along three themes. Firstly, project success was about keeping the customer happy. Secondly, project success in the construction industry meant meeting the set targets, especially those of a financial nature. Finally, project success was about channelling internal synergies to realise external gains. Further, the 15 entrepreneurs espoused one main sub-theme around the role of information management to this conceptualisation of project success. This posits the role of information management to be a currency in effective decision-making.Conclusion: The study concluded by focusing on the implications and recommendations based on the identified themes.

Bonnie Strong at Inditex

Inditex, Zara's parent company, is known for its success in “fast fashion,” the ability to respond quickly to changes in the retail apparel industry. This case examines the reasons for its success by tying its strategy to its design, production, distribution, and retailing practices from both a process and people perspective. The links between this strategy and performance measures such as ROE and ROA can be discussed. Inditex's strategy can be directly linked to retail apparel industry challenges such as long lead times, fickle customers, and constantly changing fashions. Links among customers, capabilities, control, coordination, competition, context, culture, community, and cash (profitability) can be emphasized. Excerpt UVA-OM-1558 Rev. May 11, 2018 Bonnie Strong at Inditex Bonnie Strong had only been working at Industria de Diseno Textil, S.A. (Inditex), at the company's Arteixo, Spain, headquarters for two months in June 2016 when the email popped into her in-box one morning. It was an invitation to be a breakfast speaker at the Darden School of Business's Spanish alumni meeting and describe her experiences working for Inditex. In one week. With the dean in attendance! Strong set down her coffee and began to type a response. Her mind was already racing with ideas for a presentation for the alumni breakfast. Strong worked in the product store team for Zara, Inditex's flagship “chic cheap” clothing store, which accounted for 65% of Inditex sales and 67% of its EBIT. (See Exhibit1 for Inditex income statements and balance sheets.) In 2015, Inditex opened 77 net new Zara stores. Due to Zara's unique focus on store-level sales trends and an iron grip on each stage of its supply chain, the fast-fashion company was able to migrate product designs to its stores in three to five weeks—something that took the typical retailer six to nine months. This meant fewer fashion misses, fewer markdowns, and happier customers. Over the previous decade, this strategy had driven enormous global growth for Zara and parts of the promising business model had been replicated in seven other retail brands Inditex owned. Optimism—and opportunity—was high for customers, stockholders, and employees. At 28, Strong was young for someone holding such an important role at Inditex—responsibility over the Zara stores in the East Coast region of the United States—but she felt ready. While she had only been store manager at the New York Zara store on an interim basis for one year before heading to Darden for an MBA, Strong's passion for retail and her natural leadership abilities had convinced Inditex to take a chance on her. The breakfast meeting was Strong's chance to synthesize all she had learned and to show Darden that it should be proud of her as a graduate. Armed with the analytical tools gained at business school, Strong hoped to impress the alumni chapter with her take on the company's logistics, marketing, design, manufacturing, supply chain, and financial performance. She had a lot of work to do to prepare. . . .

How to Better Frame Problems

Before managers can solve problems or take advantage of opportunities that may arise in their businesses, they must frame those problems or opportunities. Typically, leaders identify and frame problems intuitively and without much conscious deliberation.Framing problems is more an art than a science. It is also profoundly linked with the way our brains work, especially the intuitive processes we use to make sense of the world around us. This technical note illustrates how this process unfolds and how one can find a better frame, thus discovering actions that actually work to solve problems. Excerpt UVA-G-0630 Jul. 13, 2012 How to Better Frame Problems In mid-2009, a global clothing retailer found itself in an unexpected and difficult situation. The past decade had seen unprecedented growth and expansion of the company. The company's number of retail stores in the world had risen from 50 in 1995 to 852 in 2009. Despite this spectacular growth, the company's profits had remained stagnant in recent quarters, and thus its stock price had fallen—in part because investors had lost faith in the company's ability to grow revenues and decrease costs. Executives in the company were also concerned about the decrease in profitability. They framed the problem as one of revenue growth, and as a result, the company began efforts to open more stores, hire more associates, and cross-sell more items to each customer. Despite throwing tens of millions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of employee work hours at the problem, the company's profits continued to decline. At the end of 2010, the board enlisted a new CEO who framed the profitability problem in a different way. For the new CEO, revenues were dropping because the company was not fulfilling its value proposition to customers. When the profitability problem was reframed from a growth problem to a customer satisfaction problem, it became clear to the new CEO and her team that the old tactics used to grow revenues were actually hurting the customer experience and further eroding profitability. Thinking about the problem as a customer satisfaction problem offered different opportunities for action. The new CEO reduced the number of new retail locations, trained new staff to deliver a high-quality customer experience, and reduced the number of items that were available in stores to sell to customers—all in an effort to restore the brand experience and make customers happy. Over the following year, these measures slowly restored profitability to the company. Problem Framing . . .

Customer Experience and Loyalty Leads To Relationship Drive: Special Reference to Fun Republic Mall Coimbatore

Happy customers are loyal customers and a world-class customer experience is essential to not just their satisfaction but their loyalty as well. However, balancing the needs of customers with the needs of the business can prove challenging. Customer loyalty and Customer experience is a vital part of a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) program for any business, where service and hospitality are primary part of the value proposition. Other major CRM components besides mystery shopping include: Guest Surveys/comment cards, Focus Groups, Warehousing guest etc. Customer Experience Management goes far beyond simple customer satisfaction measurements. After all, such measurements alone are the equivalent of looking in the rear view mirror. It is important to keep in mind that the customer is not just an one time sales transaction, but some drive which keeps the customers emotionally attached to a particular product, service, brand or a firm. A factor analysis is used to club the various listed factors into apt headings and a path analysis model is used to throw light on the R square value which predicts the power of the path between variables. Bootstrap analysis predicts the t value where the value of 1.96 and above indicates that the path independent variables to the dependent variable, reached a significant level and its route to the solid line. The path analysis is done using smartPLS and inference is drawn with a final SEM model.

Is share of wallet exclusively about making customers happy or having more customers? Exploring the relationship between satisfaction and double jeopardy

Purpose – The satisfaction and loyalty research argues that customer satisfaction is an antecedent to share of wallet (SOW). The double jeopardy view, however, argues that satisfaction and SOW levels are driven exclusively by penetration levels. Customer satisfaction and penetration, however, are not always positively related. The purpose of this paper is to explore the relevance and validity of these two divergent perspectives to creating growth in customer share of spending. Design/methodology/approach – The authors examine a series of models evaluating the impact of both the relative penetration of a brand, and the satisfaction ratings of its customers on SOW using data covering 11 industry sectors, 188 brands, and 4,263 customers. Findings – The authors find that part of the problem in reconciling these two views has been in how satisfaction is measured and analyzed. When using absolute satisfaction ratings of the firm/brand, the explanatory power of satisfaction on SOW is very weak at both the individual and firm level. When using satisfaction metrics relative to other competing brands, however, satisfaction is a strong predictor of customers’ share of category spending. Research limitations/implications – As predicted by double jeopardy, penetration is a strong predictor of firm-level SOW, but has almost no explanatory power at the individual level. Practical implications – Managers need to focus on both improving penetration/reach and becoming the preferred brand in a customer’s usage set. Originality/value – The research examines if (and if yes, how) satisfaction and penetration contribute to customers’ SOW allocations both at the individual and brand level.

Creating Distinct Strategies for Marketing Campaigns Enterprise Dadevarzan Virtual Corp

Objectives: As a service-based economy emerging phenomenon in the business world, an important contribution of the service sector in the economy and considering the improvement of the quality of services.Methods/Statistical Analysis: Nowadays, organizations are obliged to survive the quality of their products and services so that they can consider their current customers happy and attracting new customers and revenue sources to ensure and increase. Findings: Since the marketing services dedicated to the important issue of marketing and with regard to the intangible characteristics of the services and the role of the proper relationship any more attention to the quality of communication with customers by service providers as an undeniable fact considered. Concepts of service companies, especially banks and financial institutions require that in order to create a positive relationship with your customers and take steps. In this article we create distinctive strategies for marketing campaigns Parsian Virtual Dadevarzan. Application/Improvement: In this paper, analysis of competitors and compare them with the company and assessment of opportunities and threats, as well as by examining the strengths and weaknesses of the strategy for have found it.Keywords: Creating Distinct Strategies, Parsian Virtual Dadevarzan

Keeping the Customers Happy: The Importance of Morale on Cruise Ships

Cruise businesses face unique challenges in providing vacations at sea. For a start, the business model is predicated upon the establishment and operation of a floating resort with guests enjoying high levels of service against an ever-changing backdrop. This article considers how perceptions of crew morale impact guest satisfaction with their cruise vacation. The research project reflected on theories concerning perceptions of service quality, the notions concerning service experience as theater, performativity and emotional labor, and the rather underresearched focus on the meaning and implication of morale. An online survey, completed by over 800 respondents, confirmed the importance that guests capture an impression that crew are happy in their workplace. There is a connection between an impression of high morale with guest satisfaction, both in terms of service quality and the overall cruise experience. This research draws attention to the challenge of maintaining high levels of performance for lengthy contracts. It also demonstrates that most cruise passengers are aware of, and sensitive to, crew morale.

SOCIO-PSYCHOLOGICAL ASPECTS "HAPPY OLD AGE" AND OPPORTUNITIES OF SOCIAL SERVICES IN ITS PROVISION

In this article the authors examine the anthropological, physiological, socio-psychological, medical background happy old age; analyze the data of a number of domestic and foreign experimental work to identify factors, conditions that ensure comfortable livelihoods of the elderly person. Special attention is paid to the role of the sociogerontological competence of managers of the sanatorium and resort sphere in the creation of socio-cultural gerontology centre environment to ensure a happy old age customers, as well as the traditions of the Kuban Cossacks in relation to older people. A separate section of the article is devoted to the development of the Institute of foster families for older people in the Krasnodar region. Significant place in the article devoted to the analysis of various areas of professional activity of specialists of social service agencies within the community to enhance the revitalization of the manifestation of older people in different types of cultural and educational activities. The article reveals the essence and content of the concept of "socio-gerontological competence of the specialist institution of social service of the population". The authors examine the nature and structural components of the socio-cultural environment gerontology centre (pension) sanatorium profile, which is a special kind of communicative space of the Board, determining its existence and prospects of development as a specialized Agency for the elderly.

Customer Satisfaction towards ATM Services: A Case Study of State Bank of India in Nadia District, West Bengal

The advancement in information technology in banking sector has resulted in innovation of alternative delivery channels. ATM, internet, telephone/mobile banking, call centres etc. are the main non-branch delivery channels. ATM is one of the alternative delivery channels that allows the customers to have banking services without being physically present in the brick-and-mortar branches. It is designed to perform the most important functions of bank. Banks have been installing ATMs to increase their reach. Customers using ATMs can easily withdraw cash, deposit cash, transfer funds from one account to another and engage in many such transactions. These services make the customers happy, content and satisfied. In this backdrop, this paper attempts to discuss about the ATM services in different forms provided by different banks; examine and analyse whether ATM services provided by the banks satisfy the customers; and provides suggestions to improve customer satisfaction.

Design and development of intelligent electronic tutorial software for GSM maintenance in Nigeria

<p>The Global System of Mobile communication (GSM) technology has permeated every facet of human existence ,that man can no longer do away with it. This piece of work was motivated by the nagging problems, which include poor quality of service by telecom service providers, which attempts to negate the value of this revolution, inaccurate and interrupted service delivery which have resulted to delayed and aborted calls, traffic congestion, low bandwidth and oversubscription errors, inter alia. So the primary objective of this article therefore, is to design and develop intelligent electronic tutorial GSM software that would be capable of providing relevant answers to some GSM-based service challenges raised above. The Structured Systems Analysis and Design Methodology (SSADM) was employed as research methodology. The expected results shall include, among others, broadened scope of knowledge in GSM tutorial software engineering, provision of user friendly environment and cost effective communication system for a happy customer and a better society; provide an effective and feasible solution for a reliable and accurate GSM management system that would improve the efficiency and productivity of Nigerian information and communication infrastructure.</p>

Instrumenty wspomagające aktywną sprzedaż stosowane w spółce gospodarki żywnościowej – studium przypadku

Changing environment requires enterprises to meet the needs of customers. Being on the market, survival and development of the company are determined not only by well qualifi ed staff but above all a happy customer. Therefore, it is important to use appropriate instruments to support active sales of the company. The study was conducted among 64 employees working in the organization studied. The study aimed to assess the knowledge and expertise of the staff in terms of the tools used in the enterprise for communication with the market. The study shows that the company has a well-developed system of communication with the market. Advertising agents that are used in the audited company are primarily the Internet, magazines, and outdoor advertising. Company’s gadgets are as well as awards for regular customers are the most popular among the target group consumer promotion tools.

CHISA 2014 – Worldwide Chemical Engineers Meet in the Heart of Europe

Imagine a perfect chemical engineering scenario. At the beginning, you, a chemical engineer, in the lab together with your colleague, an organic chemist, come up with a formula and process for a product that will make the customer happy. The lab-scale synthesis is not straightforward; it includes granular powder, multiphase flow and harsh conditions. The production scale is multi-ton per year and the product is expected on the market soon. In the past, a similar scale-up from the lab to the production would have meant a tedious if not impossible work, pilot plant tests, and a portion of good luck to deliver the production process in time. This time, you use the multi-scale numerical simulation to transfer the multiphase flow from the lab to the reactor scale at once and to design the optimized continuous reactor geometry at the same time. Using the process intensification guidelines, you select the proper heat exchanger with micro-structured elements and calculate the operating expenses. The product is at the market soon, profits are high, customers are happy. The job is well done. This might sound like fiction, but it is not that farfetched as will be documented with this special issue of Chemical Engineering & Technology, which is dedicated to the International Congress on Chemical Engineering CHISA 2014, held in Prague, Czech Republic, indeed in the heart of Europe. The CHISA 2014 congress traditionally addressed the full spectrum of chemical and process engineering practice, including the current trends and future needs in reaction engineering, catalysis, separation processes, fluid flow and multiphase systems, computer aided engineering, and other engineering fields. Ten specialized symposia were organized to cover the broader research areas such as environmental engineering, food processes, biotechnology, process intensification miniaturization and others. Due to the high number of quality contributions, another CHISA 2014 focus issue is in consideration for publication in Chemical Engineering & Technology later this year. During a CHISA 2014 plenary, Prof. Wei Ge presented a systematic co-design of the physical model, numeric software and computer hardware conducted by his team at the Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing. This approach can be applied in multi-scale simulations of discrete systems at different levels from molecular dynamics to multiphase fluid flow with micron-scale particles at reactor scale. Prof Ge believes that with further optimization of the model and algorithm, the speed and scale of discrete simulation can be elevated again by several orders in the near future, resulting in real-time simulation of industrial systems without scarifying its resolution and accuracy. That means the virtual reality of industrial processes is turning from fiction to practice. More details can be found in the related article in this issue. In one of many CHISA 2014 keynote lectures, Alberto Simoncelli (PrimaRatio) explored the frontiers of processing, mentioning the concurrent early formulation and processing, timescale management, and fast, lean and targeted approach. I believe that challenging these frontiers with the research, approaches, and methodologies not only presented at CHISA 2014, but also published in Chemical Engineering & Technology in general, we can pursue the chemical engineering scenarios similar to the one described above. I want to thank the CHISA 2014 Scientific Committee and Organizing Committee for providing an excellent information-exchange platform for engineers, scientists, technologists, students and others. The journey has already started. Welcome to the chemical engineering of the 21st century. Jiri Kristal Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals, Czech Academy of Sciences

Human resource management, services and relationship marketing: the potential for cross-fertilisation

This conceptual paper notes the re-casting of marketing from a focus on products and transactions to a focus on services and relationships – strongly implying that people are core to the delivery of promises. In so doing, it highlights that the recruitment, training, development, retention, rewarding and management of people are therefore central in achieving strategic marketing objectives, building on extant research which confirms that a satisfied workforce contributes to the creation of happy customers. This highlights that marketing has a great deal to learn from human resources (HR), and perhaps the means to achieve key strategic marketing objectives already exist within the domain of HR theory and practice. Structurally, the paper summarises the evolution of marketing from the transactional to the relational and focuses on selected areas in which value could be obtained for marketers in drawing on the existing HR literature and concepts before considering what the future relationship between marketing and HR could, and should be.