HOW PROFESSORS OF OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT VIEW SERVICE OPERATIONS?

Abstract

This study empirically tests assumptions that underlie operations management (OM) scholars' belief that service operations should be managed differently. Respondents were self‐classified into manufacturing and service types. There is a significant statistical difference between the views held by each group with regard to statements such as “service Om should be taught as a separate course” and “service operations should be managed differently from manufacturing.” There was general consensus on the service research agenda with the exception of three research areas: time standards, technology, and productivity. The survey also revealed that customer influence has the greatest impact on service Om strategies and decisions.

Keywords

SERVICE ASSUMPTIONS SERVICE CHARACTERISTICS SERVICE OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT ACADEMIC VIEW

References

Behrman

D. N.

and Ferreault

W. D.

(1982), “Measuring the Performance of Industrial Salespersons”, Journal of Business Research, 10, 3, 355–370.

Bell

C. R.

and Zemke

R. E.

(1987), “Service Breakdown: The Road to Recovery”, Management Review, 76, 10, 32–35.

Berry

L. L.

Parasuraman

, and Zeithaml

V. A.

(1988), “The Service‐Quality Puzzle”, Business Horizons, 31, 5, 35–43.

Bitran

G. R.

and Lojo

(1993), “A Framework for Analyzing the Quality of the Customer Interface”, European Management Journal, 11, 4, 385–396.

Bowen

D. E.

and Schneider

(1985), “Boundary‐Spanning‐Role Employees and the Service Encounter: Some Guidelines for Management and Research”, in The Service Encounter, Czepiel

J. A.

Solomon

M. R.

, and Surprenant

C. F.

(eds.), Lexington Books, Lexington, MA, 127–147.

Brown

R. A.

and Sowder

W. F.

(1979), “Performance Rating for Service Jobs”, AIIE Transactions, 11, 2, 121–128.

Chase

R. B.

(1978), “Where Does the Customer Fit in a Service Operation Harvard Business Review, 56, 6, 137–142.

Chase

R. B.

(1981), “The Customer Contact Approach to Services: Theoretical Bases and Practical Extensions”, Operations Research, 29, 4, 698–706.

Chase

R. B.

(1996), “The Mall is My Factory: Reflections of a Service Junkie”, Production and Operations Management, 5, 4, 298–308.

10.

Chase

R. B.

(1997), Survey Response.

11.

Chase

R. B.

and Tansik

D. A.

(1983), “A Customer Contact Model for Organizational Design”, Management Science, 29, 99, 1037–1050.

12.

Chase

R. B.

and Aquilano

N. J.

(1998), Production & Operations Management: A Life Cycle Approach, 8th ed., Irwin, Homewood, IL.

13.

Chase

R. B.

Northcraft

G. B.

, and Wolf

(1984), “Applications and Implementation: Designing High‐Contact Service Systems: Application to Branches of a Savings and Loan”, Decision Sciences, 15, 4, 542–556.

14.

Collier

D. A.

(1983), “The Service Sector Revolution: The Automation of Services”, Long Range Planning, 16, 6, 10–20.

15.

Collier

D. A.

and Wilson

D. D.

(1997), “The role of automation and labor in determining customer satisfaction in a telephone repair service process”, Decision Sciences, 28, 3, 689–708.

16.

Davis

Aquilano

, and Chase

(1999), Fundamentals of Operations Management, 3rd ed., Irwin/McGraw‐Hill, Burr Ridge, IL.

17.

Fitzsimmons

J. A.

(1997), Personal Correspondence.

18.

Fitzsimmons

J. A.

and Fitzsimmons

M. J.

(1997), Service Management: Operations, Strategy, and Information Technology, Irwin McGraw‐Hill, Boston.

19.

Haywood‐Farmer

and Nollet

(1985), “Productivity in Professional Services”, The Service Industries Journal, 5, 169–180.

20.

Heizer

and Render

(1996), Production & Operations Management, 4th ed., Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ.

21.

Johnston

(1994), “Operations: From Factory to Service Management”, International Journal of Service Industry Management, 5, 4, 49–63.

22.

Kellogg

D. L.

and Nie

(1995), “A Framework for Strategic Service Management”, Journal of Operations Management, 13, 4, 323–337.

23.

Kimes

S. E.

(1989), “Yield Management: A Tool for Capacity‐Constrained Service Firms”, Journal of Operations Management, 8, 4, 348–363.

24.

Klaus

P. G.

(1985), “Quality Epiphenomenon: The Conceptual Understanding of Quality in Face‐to‐Face Service Encounters”, in The Service Encounter, Czepiel

J. A.

Solomon

M. R.

, and Surprenant

C. F.

(eds.), Lexington Books, Lexington, MA, 127–147.

25.

Kotler

(1997), Marketing Management, 9th ed., Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ.

26.

Lovelock

(1992) “Seeking Synergy in Service Operations: Seven Things Marketers Need to Know about Service Operations”, European Management Journal, 10, 1, 22–29.

27.

McColgan

E. A.

(1997), “How Fidelity Invests in Service Professionals”, Harvard Business Review, 75, 1, 137–143.

28.

McLaughlin

C. P.

and Coffey

(1990), “Measuring Productivity in Services”, International Journal of Service Industry Management , Jan 46–64.

29.

Mills

P. K.

and Moberg

D. J.

(1982), “Perspectives on the Technology of Service Operations”, Academy of Management Review, 7, 3, 467–478.

30.

Mills

P. K.

and Morris

J. H.

(1986), “Clients as Partial Employees of Service Organizations: Role Development in Client Participation”, Academy of Management Review, 11, 4, 726–735.

31.

Phillips

L. W.

(1981), “Assessing Measurement Error in Key Informant Reports: A Methodological Note on Organizational Analysis in Marketing”, Journal of Marketing Research, 18, 4, 2395–2415.

32.

Quinn

J. B.

(1992), Intelligent Enterprises, Free Press, New York.

33.

Roth

A. V.

(1993), “Performance Dimensions in Services: An Empirical Investigation of Strategic Performance”, Advances in Services Marketing and Management, 2, 1–47.

34.

Sampson

(1997), “October Newsletter On‐line Posting. Newsgroup SOMA. byu.edu. Oct. 1, 1997.

35.

Schmenner

R. W.

(1986), “How Can Service Businesses Survive and Prosper Sloan Management Review, 27, 3, 21–32.

36.

Schmenner

R. W.

(1995), Service Operations Management, Prentice Hall, NJ.

37.

Shostack

G. L.

(1982), “How to Design a Service”, European Journal of Marketing, 16, 1, 49–63.

38.

Stevenson

W. J.

(1996), Production/Operations Management, 5th ed., Irwin, Chicago.

39.

Stevenson

W. J.

(1999), Production/Operations Management, 6th ed., Irwin/McGraw‐Hill, Burr Ridge, IL.

40.

Thomas

D. R. E.

(1978), “Strategy is Different in Service Businesses”, Harvard Business Review, 56, 4, 158–165.

41.

Thompson

J. D.

(1967), Organizations in Action, McGraw‐Hill, New York.

42.

Wemmerlöv

(1990), “A Taxonomy for Service Processes and Its Implications for System Design”, International Journal of Service Industry Management, 1, 3, 20–29.

43.

Wyckoff

D. D.

(1984), “New Tools for Achieving Service Quality”, The Cornell H. R. A. Quarterly, 25, 3, 78–91.

44.

Youngdahl

W. E.

and Kellogg

D. L.

(1997), “The Relationship Between Service Customers' Quality Assurance Behaviors, Satisfaction, and Effort: A Cost of Quality Perspective”, Journal of Operations Management, 15, 1, 19–32.

45.

Zeithaml

V. A.

and Bitner

M. J.

(1996), Service Marketing, McGraw Hill, New York.

46.

Zeithaml

V. A.

Parasuraman

, and Berry

L. L.

(1985), “Problems and Strategies in Service Marketing”, Journal of Marketing, 49, 2, 33–46.