Cross-Cultural Service Encounters in the Hospitality Industry and the Effect of Intercultural Sensitivity on Employee Performance

Cross-Cultural Service Encountersin the Hospitality Industry

and the Effectof Intercultural Sensitivityon Employee Performance

Steve SizooWilfried IskatRichard Plank

Hendrick Serrie

ABSTRACT. Foreign visitors are such important contributors to theAmerican economy that tourism officials are working hard to reassurethem that the U.S. is still a safe place to visit. The significant increase inforeign visitors over the past decade caused U.S. scholars to pay more at-tention to the unique challenges of cross-cultural service encounters.This exploratory study adds to that trend by attempting to measure the ef-fect of intercultural sensitivity on the performance of hospitality em-ployees in cross-cultural service encounters. The results indicate thatemployees with high intercultural sensitivity scored significantly (p < .05)higher on measures of service attentiveness, revenue contribution, inter-

Steve Sizoo, DBA, is Assistant Professor of International Business, Eckerd College.Wilfried Iskat, PhD, is Dean, International School of Tourism & Hospitality Man-

agement, Schiller International University.Richard Plank, PhD, is Professor of Marketing, Haworth College of Business,

Western Michigan University.Hendrick Serrie, PhD, is Professor of Anthropology & International Business,

Eckerd College.Address correspondence to: Steve Sizoo, DBA, Assistant Professor, International

Business, Eckerd College, 4200 54th Avenue S., St. Petersburg, FL 33711 (E-mail:[email protected]).

International Journal of Hospitality & Tourism Administration, Vol. 4(2) 2003http://www.haworthpress.com/store/product.asp?sku=J149

2003 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.10.1300/J149v04n02_04 61

personal skills, job satisfaction, and social satisfaction as they relate tocross-cultural encounters. There was no significant difference in scoresfor motivation-to-work, job tenure, and primary rewards (compensation,recognition, etc.). [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Docu-ment Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: <[email protected]> Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.com> © 2003 by TheHaworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.]

KEYWORDS. Service encounter, cross-cultural, intercultural sensitivity

INTRODUCTION

Foreign visitors are important to the U.S. economy. During the decadeof the ’90s, these tourists and businesspeople spent $194.8 billion more inthe U.S. than Americans spent abroad, contributing a badly needed bal-ance of trade surplus. There was even a $2.6 billion surplus for the sixmonths following September 11th (U.S. Commerce Department, 2002).And foreign tourists spend more per capita in the U.S. than American va-cationers (Waters, 1998). It is little wonder that tourism officials acrossthe country are struggling to reassure foreigners that the U.S. is not only asafe place to visit, but a bargain as well (Milman, 2001).

When foreign visitors do return to the U.S. in the record numbers of2000, they will not only create opportunities for the American hospital-ity industry, they will produce unique and formidable challenges aswell. By its nature, the sale and delivery of cross-cultural services in-volves interactions between service providers of one culture and cus-tomers of another. During these encounters, differing cultural normsand values often create misunderstandings and conflict that can result inan unhappy customer, a frustrated provider, and lost business (Cushner &Brislin, 1996).

Yet these service failures are unnecessary. Research shows that hos-pitality managers have the tools to measure and develop the cross-cul-tural skills of their service personnel. Although the value of having aninterculturally competent hospitality employee may make sense, theconcept has not been tested in the marketplace. As a result, managementis unlikely to make the investment in developing the cross-skills of theircustomer-contact employees until they see some evidence of the bene-fit. As a consequence, the focus of this study was to test the effect ofintercultural sensitivity on employee performance in cross-cultural ser-

62 International Journal of Hospitality & Tourism Administration

vice encounters. If the relationship between hospitality employee per-formance and intercultural sensitivity was found to be positive andsignificant, it could justify an investment in testing and training hospi-tality employees who are involved in cross-cultural encounters.

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

The foundation of the growing service economy is the service encounter,the time when the consumer interacts directly with the service (Shostack,1985). These are the “critical moments-of-truth in which customers oftendevelop indelible impressions of a firm” (Bitner, Brown, & Meuter,2000, p. 138). Given that a customer’s evaluation of the quality and satis-faction of a service “depends directly and most immediately on the man-agement and monitoring of the individual service encounter” (Bitner,1990, p. 69), organizations that measure, develop, and monitor their em-ployees should experience improved results. As a result, the managementof service encounters has become an important issue with service organi-zations, as have the measurement, analysis, and continued improvementof these interactions (Zeithaml & Bitner, 1996).

Given the importance of tourism in a service economy, it is not sur-prising that many service encounter studies have used a touristic setting.For example, Bitner, Booms and Tetreault (1990) studied airline, hotel,and restaurant encounters. Lundberg (1991) looked at productivity andhospitality industry encounters. Samenfink (1994) examined the effectof employee “self-monitoring” in hospitality encounters.

Clow (1992) studied consumer expectations in restaurant encoun-ters. Sparks and Callan (1992) looked at interpersonal communicationsand service encounters in the hospitality industry. Arnould and Price(1993) examined service encounters during white-water river raftingexcursions. Danaher and Mattsson (1994) examined customer satisfac-tion during service encounters using a hospitality setting. Hartline andJones (1996) studied the effect of performance cues during a service en-counter in the hospitality industry.

The theoretical basis for the service encounter is found in role andscript theory (Broderick, 1999). Role theory views people as social ac-tors who learn behaviors appropriate to the positions they occupy(Biddle, 1979). Role theory is based on a “dramaturgical metaphor,”that considers the participants as actors in a performance (Grove, Fisk, &Dorsch, 1998). For example, an appropriate service encounter “perfor-mance” would be one in which each “actor” knew his or her role and

Sizoo et al. 63

performed it as expected. When the actors do not know their roles, theresult is tension, frustration, dissatisfaction, and role conflict (Kahn,Wolfe, Quinn, Diedrick-Snoek, & Rosenthal, 1964). Closely associatedwith role theory is script theory. The script contains information about arole to be performed. If one participant deviates from the script, theother actors become uncomfortable (Hoffman & Bateson, 1997).

Cross-Cultural Service Encounters

Culture is a major cause of role conflict, where the appropriate be-havior for one culture may be inappropriate for another (Cushner &Brislin, 1996). The result is participants reading from different “scripts”and performing dysfunctional “roles.” As a consequence, researchershave begun to pay more attention to culture’s influence on the serviceencounter (Furrer, Liu, & Sudharshan, 2000).

Reisinger and Waryszak (1994), for example, examined how Japanesetourists rated their Australian tour guides. Reisinger and Turner (1998)studied the cultural interactions between Korean tourists and Australianservice providers. Winsted (1999) found that Japanese diners evaluate res-taurant service in the U.S. by dimensions that are different from those usedby Americans. Mattila (1999, 2000) examined the impact of culture andgender on customer evaluations of service encounters at a Singapore hotel.

While these initial studies have appropriately examined the cross-cultural service encounter from the customer’s perspective, less re-search has been devoted to how service providers perform during theseencounters. This paper attempts to close part of that gap by examiningwhether or not some hospitality employees are better able to adapt theirrole behavior during cross-cultural service encounters in order to con-tribute to a more successful interaction.

This is an important skill since foreign tourists often expect the ser-vice provider to accommodate their values by demonstrating some de-gree of cross-cultural competence (Katriel, 1995). If the provider is read-ing from a different script, the result is role conflict (Cushner & Brislin,1996) and behavior that will likely lead to a service encounter failure:an unhappy consumer, frustrated employee, and lost business (Solo-mon, Surprenant, Czepiel, & Gutman, 1985).

And again, these failures are unnecessary since hospitality managershave tools available that can reduce the likelihood of cross-cultural con-flicts. Specifically, research shows that intercultural sensitivity–an atti-tude that enables an individual to interact effectively with people ofdifferent cultures (Bhawuk & Brislin, 1992)–is a skill that can not only


be measured, but it can also be learned (Bhawuk, 1990; Cushner & Brislin,1996).

The problem is that while these tools exist, their benefit to the servicefirm is intuitively appealing but empirically untested. Until hospitalitymanagement sees evidence of the benefits of having interculturally ad-ept employees, they are unlikely to invest the time and money to de-velop the skill in their service employees and continue to run the riskof alienating their foreign customers through dysfunctional service en-counters. The research objective of this study is, therefore, to measurethe impact of intercultural sensitivity on hospitality employee perfor-mance in cross-cultural service interactions.

METHODOLOGY

The focus of this exploratory study was to measure whether or notemployees in the hospitality industry with higher levels of interculturalsensitivity would provide their foreign guests a higher level of service.The research setting was four- and five-diamond hotels located in thestate of Florida (with reputations for attracting foreign guests), whilethe research participants were food servers working in the fine-diningrestaurants of those hotels.

Czepiel, Solomon, Surprenant, and Gutman (1985) determined thatthe INPUTS of a service encounter are influenced by the customer’s andservice employee’s behavior. In a simplified representation of this re-search:

The customers’ behavior was effected by the:

• character of the service (motivation, cost, etc.).• customer’s expectations.• characteristics of the customer, including socio/cultural factors

and cultural norms.

The service employee’s behavior was effected by the:

• employee’s expectations.• employee’s characteristics, including the employee’s:

• expertise.• socio/demographic factors, including cultural norms.• attitude, including intercultural sensitivity.

Sizoo et al. 65

The independent variable in this study is the employee’s interculturalsensitivity.

Research by Czepiel et al. (1985), Iskat (1995), and Samenfink(1994) indicate that the OUTPUT of service encounter could be evalu-ated from the perspective of the customer, the management of the firm,and the service provider, the employee (see Figure 1).

Customer’s evaluation would consider what was delivered and howit was delivered.

Management’s evaluation would include:

• customer element: did the encounter lead to repeat purchase? in-creased usage? positive word-of-mouth?

• competitive element: did the encounter produce added value? dif-ferentiation?

• employee element:• how had the employees performed, in terms of their service at-

tentiveness? revenue contribution? interpersonal interactions(with co-workers)?

• how do encounters effect employee motivation? retention?

Service employee’s evaluation would include:

• task elements: did the encounters contribute to primary rewards(pay, promotion, recognition)? secondary rewards (increased jobsatisfaction)?

• were the encounters with the customers socially satisfying?

The dependent variables of the study were the items highlightedabove.

Research Instrument

A 60-item questionnaire was developed to measure the significanceof intercultural sensitivity on the dependent variables described above.The instrument was divided into seven sections, with the first sectionconsisting of 10 background questions (one of which asked about thefood server’s length of employment at the hotel). Section two (7 ques-tions) was designed to determine the service attentiveness of the em-ployee toward his or her foreign customers. The server was also asked(1 question) to evaluate how the tips received from his or her foreigncustomers compared to those received by fellow employees. The ques-


Cha

ract

eris

tics

ofcu

stom

er, i

nclu

ding

cultu

ral n

orm

s

Cus

tom

er’s

Beh

avio

r

Ser

vice

Enc

ount

er

Ser

vice

Em

ploy

ee’s

Beh

avio

r

Ser

vice

Em

ploy

ee’s

char

acte

ristic

s,in

clud

ing

inte

rcul

tura

l sen

sitiv

ity

OU

TP

UT

S

Cus

tom

er’s

Eva

luat

ion

Man

agem

ent’s

Eva

luat

ion

Ser

vice

Em

ploy

ee’s

Eva

luat

ions

-Wha

t was

deliv

ered

?-

How

was

itde

liver

ed?

Cus

tom

erE

lem

ents

Com

petit

ive

Ele

men

ts

Ser

vice

Em

ploy

eeE

lem

ents

Task

-Rel

ated

Ele

men

ts

Soc

ialI

nter

actio

nw

ithC

usto

mer

s

Dis

serv

ice

enco

unte

rco

ntrib

ute

to:

-R

epea

t pur

chas

e?-

Pos

itive

wor

d-of

-mou

th?

-In

crea

sed

usag

e?

Did

the

serv

ice

enco

unte

rcr

eate

:-

Add

edva

lue?

-D

iffer

entia

tion?

Job

Per

form

ance

Mot

ivat

ion

Ret

entio

n

Pri

mar

yR

ewar

ds(p

ay, t

ips,

prom

otio

n,re

cogn

ition

)

Sec

onda

ryR

ewar

ds(in

trin

sic

job

satis

fact

ion)

Ser

vice

Att

entiv

enes

s

Rev

enue

Con

trib

utio

n

Inte

rper

sona

lIn

tera

ctio

ns(w

ithco

-wor

kers

)

FIG

UR

E1.

Out

puto

faS

ervi

ceE

ncou

nter

(ele

men

tsex

amin

edin

this

pape

rin

bo

ld

ital

ics )

67

tions were based on a study of food-server behavior in the hospitality in-dustry (Samenfink, 1994).

Section three addressed the interpersonal interactions of the foodservers (3 questions) and whether or not they enjoyed interacting withcustomers who were culturally different from themselves (1 question).Section four (2 questions) dealt with the suggestive-selling skills of theserver. Section five (3 questions) related to the server’s motivation andjob satisfaction. Recall that research indicates that managers would liketo see service encounters have a positive influence on their employee’smotivation and job satisfaction. The motivation questions were derivedfrom Burner II and Hensel’s (1994) “Motivation to Work (general-ized)” scale. The job satisfaction question came from research by An-drews and Robinson (1991).

Measuring Intercultural Sensitivity

Section six measured the intercultural sensitivity of the respondent(the independent variable of the study). The most widely used and rig-orously tested measure of intercultural interaction is the 50-item Cross-Cultural Adaptability Inventory–CCAI (Kelley & Meyers, 1995; NCS As-sessments, 1995). Four interpretable scales emerged from the exploratoryfactor analysis of CCAI: Emotional Resilience, Flexibility/Openness, Per-ceptual Acuity, and Personal Autonomy. Two of those scales–EmotionalResilience and Personal Autonomy–relate to the respondent’s ability toadapt to live and function in a new culture. While Emotional Resilienceand Personal Autonomy are appropriate measures for cross-cultural adapt-ability, they do not relate to this study.

The Flexibility/Openness and Perceptual Acuity scales do relate to thisresearch, in that they can be used to measure intercultural sensitivity.Bhawuk and Brislin (1992) described intercultural sensitivity as “a sensi-tivity to the importance of cultural differences and to the points of view ofother people” (p. 414). According to Kelley and Meyers (1995), the14-item Flexibility/Openness (FO) scale measures “the extent to which aperson enjoys the different ways of thinking and behaving that are typi-cally encountered in cross-cultural experiences” (p. 15). The FO-itemscould be subgrouped according to content focus: “liking for unfamiliarpeople and ideas,” “tolerance toward others,” and “flexibility with regardto experience” (p. 15). The 10-item Perceptual Acuity (PAC) scale, onthe other hand, “focuses on communication cues and skills, and the accu-rate interpretation of those cues across cultures” (p. 16). In addition to re-flecting intercultural sensitivity, the two scales are statistically sound in


their own right. The scales have internal consistencies of .80 (FO) and .78(PAC). Their high factor loadings are also a strong determinant of theconstruct validity of the two scales (Kelley & Meyers, 1995).

The final section of the instrument consisted of elements of theMarlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (Crowne & Marlowe, 1964)to control for self-flattering answers from the respondents.

RESULTS OF DATA ANALYSIS

Response Rates

Of the 44 four- and five-diamond hotels in Florida determined to beappropriate for this study, 27 agreed to participate. These propertiestended to be larger facilities (500+ rooms), mostly located in CentralFlorida (Orlando, Tampa Bay, etc.), with 38% of their guests comingfrom outside the U.S. Food servers in fine-dining and casual-dining res-taurants of these four- and five-diamond hotels were the participants inthis study. A total of 175 participants returned their questionnaires, for aresponse rate of 68.1%.

Intercultural Sensitivity Results

The Flexibility/Openness (FO) and Perceptual Acuity (PAC) scalesof the Cross-Cultural Adaptability Inventory were used to determinethe intercultural sensitivity of the food servers, the independent variableof this study. Confirmatory factor analysis of this sample generated fourfactors that parallel Kelley and Meyers’ (1995) earlier findings. Thefirst three factors reflected FO-subgroups mentioned above: Factor 1,“liking for unfamiliar people and ideas”; Factor 2, “tolerance towardothers”; and Factor 3 “flexibility with regard to experiences.” Factor 4reflected the PAC-scale focusing on communication skills across cul-tures. Cronbach’s estimate of reliability was .79 for FO and .80 forPAC. This coincides with Kelley and Meyers’ (1995) .80 and .78 result.The FO-PAC combined was .79, exceeding Nunnally’s (1978) recom-mended minimum of .70. These findings suggest that FO and PAC makea satisfactory measure of intercultural sensitivity.

The median split procedure, widely used in behavioral and inter-cultural research (Harrison, Chadwick & Scales, 1996), was used to de-termine the level of intercultural sensitivity. Subjects with scores abovethe median for the FO-PAC scales were categorized as having high

Sizoo et al. 69

intercultural sensitivity. Of the 251 hotel food servers participating inthis study, 104 (59%) scored above the median for the two CCAI scalesand 71 (41%) below. This result suggests that this sample of hotel em-ployees had slightly higher intercultural sensitivity than the sampleused to create the median for the CCAI scales.

Social Desirability

To control for self-flattering responses, items from the Social Desir-ability Scale (SDS) were used. The correlation between the perfor-mance items and the self-flattering items was .38, which is low accordingto Churchill (1979).

Correlation of Intercultural Sensitivity

A correlation analysis was conducted to determine if certain demo-graphic characteristics were significantly related to an employee’sintercultural sensitivity. The results show very strong correlations (p <.01) between intercultural sensitivity and (1) the hotel’s diamond-rating(R = �0.1365), (2) whether or not an employees had worked outsidetheir home country (R = �0.2023), (3) the years they had worked abroad(R = �0.2075), (4) and whether or not they were fluent in a foreign lan-guage (R = �0.1751). There was also a strong correlation (p < .05) res-taurant rating–fine-dining vs. casual-dining (R = 0.1215).

Testing Intercultural Sensitivity and Dependent Variables

One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to test the effectof intercultural sensitivity on the dependent variables. Results wereconsidered significant if the F-value (Sig. of F) was less than 0.0500(p < 0.05).

Results in Table 1a show that food servers with high levels ofintercultural sensitivity demonstrated significantly (p = 0.0001) greaterservice attentiveness. That is, they were better able to “read” their for-eign customers and adjust their serving style to meet those needs–a fun-damental aspect of quality service.

Table 1b (suggestive selling) is a frequently used tool to increasesales in the hospitality industry and employees who effectively em-ploy suggestive selling techniques produce added revenue for their or-ganization. In this study, hotel food servers with high interculturalsensitivity were significantly (p = 0.0007) more effective at using sug-


gestive selling techniques with their foreign customers than those withlow intercultural sensitivity.

In the less-structured environment of a restaurant, managers wantfood servers who interact effectively with their co-workers as well astheir customers. For this sample, servers with high intercultural sen-sitivity had significantly (p = 0.0270) higher scores for interpersonalinteractions (with co-workers) (Table 1c) than servers with low sensi-tivity.

As reported earlier, hospitality managers would like to see encoun-ters between food servers and their customers contribute to the motiva-

Sizoo et al. 71

TABLE 1. Management’s Evaluation of a Service Encounter

a. Service Attentiveness

Level of Intercultural Sensitivity n Mean S.D. F-Value Sig. F*

High 103 1.7351 0.6905

Low 71 2.3762 1.4492

174 15.19 0.0001

b. Revenue Contribution (suggestive selling skills)


High 102 1.8480 1.1998

Low 70 2.3826 1.8112

172 11.91 0.0007

c. Interpersonal Interactions (with co-workers)


High 103 1.6084 0.5511

Low 72 1.8472 0.8647

175 4.97 0.0270

d. Motivation to Work


High 100 2.5300 0.6269

Low 71 2.5985 0.6741

171 0.47 0.4954

e. Retention (years at present organization)


High 102 2.8922 2.5248

Low 72 3.4028 2.6941

174 1.63 0.2030

* Significance of F-value

tion (to work) of those servers. In this study (Table 1d), however, therewas no significant difference (p = 0.4954) between servers with high orlow intercultural sensitivity. This result will be discussed later in rela-tion to the job satisfaction measure.

Hotel managers would also like to see these service encounters bepositive to the extent that they contribute to the retention of their em-ployees. Table 1e shows that, again, there was no significant difference(p = 0.2030) between the years at the present organization for serverswith high or low intercultural sensitivity. According to Samenfink (1994),in the hospitality industry–known for its high turnover–the ease withwhich employees can change jobs may influence outcomes of studieson employee personality characteristics and job tenure. In any case, thisimportant topic deserves further study.

Some in the hospitality industry believe tips are not only an impor-tant part of a food server’s compensation (their primary rewards–Table2a), but they are also thought to be a good index of service receivedby the customers (Lynn, 1996). Since service providers with highintercultural sensitivity scored significantly (p = 0.0001) higher on ser-vice attentiveness to their foreign patrons (Table 1a), one would expectthey would receive larger tips from those customers as well. Data in Ta-ble 2a, however, show that there was barely any difference at all (p =0.9569) between the tips received by food servers with high or lowintercultural sensitivity.

The result is confusing in light of the fact that employees with highintercultural skills not only scored higher on service attentiveness thantheir lower skilled counterparts, but they also scored significantly higheron suggestive selling skills as well. Since suggestive selling skills can in-crease the revenue from each customer, it would seem to follow that thisincreased revenue would result in larger tips. In this study, however, em-ployees were asked to compare the tips they received from foreign cus-tomers with the tips fellow workers receive from their foreign customers.Although a form of this question had been used before in hospitalityindustry research (Samenfink, 1994), it is possible that employees areunable to accurately compare their tips to those of fellow employees (al-though few employees marked the “not sure” responses in the survey).Also, some suggest that income tax considerations may keep hospitalityemployees from discussing tips, even anonymously.

Still another consideration might be culture: some cultures are not ac-customed to the American practice of tipping for service, no matter howgood it is. This topic obviously deserves further exploration in terms of


(1) the relationship between primary rewards in a service encounter andintercultural sensitivity, and (2) tipping, culture, and service.

Since these employees spend a major part of their working lives in-volved in service encounters, they need to receive some level of satis-faction from the job they do. Table 2b shows that food servers with highintercultural sensitivity scored significantly (p = 0.0272) higher on jobsatisfaction than those with low intercultural sensitivity.

Research cited earlier indicates that it was important for a serviceprovider to receive social satisfaction from interacting with his or hercustomers. As expected, Table 2c shows that food servers with highintercultural sensitivity received significantly (p = 0.0001) more satis-faction from interacting with customers who where culturally differentfrom themselves.

DISCUSSION

Given the importance of foreign visitors to many state and localeconomies, it is not surprising that American public and private tourismorganizations are working aggressively to reassure and attract these vis-

Sizoo et al. 73

TABLE 2. Employees’ Evaluation of a Service Encounter

a. Primary Rewards (tips received)

Level of Intercultural Sensitivity n Mean S.D. F-Value Sig.F*

High 103 3.6213 2.1653

Low 72 3.6388 2.0300

175 0.00 0.9569

b. Secondary Rewards (job satisfaction)


High 102 2.2156 0.8631

Low 72 2.5555 1.1492

174 4.96 0.0272

c. Social Interactions (social satisfaction)


High 103 1.6660 0.6649

Low 72 2.0972 0.9518

175 31.88 0.0001

*Significance of F-value

itors. As these foreign travelers return to U.S. destinations in increasingnumbers, they will bring opportunities and challenges for the hospital-ity institutions they visit. Foreign tourists not only spend more per ca-pita in the U.S. than their American counterparts, but they can alsorepresent a significant percentage of business for many hospitality or-ganizations. The upscale Florida hotels participating in this study re-ported that 38% of their guests came from outside the United States. Forcomparable hotels in Hawaii, this figure is over 50%.

However, research has also shown that service encounters betweencustomers of one culture and employees of another often result in mis-understanding and conflict because of differing cultural values and norms.The consequence can be an unhappy customer, a frustrated employee,and a loss of business for the organization.

This study shows that these conflicts are unnecessary, and thatthese interactions provide an opportunity for hospitality organizationsto differentiate the quality of their service. This research indicates thatinterculturally-sensitive employees provide their foreign customerswith better service and their managers with better results. Specifically,these service employees will be more attentive to the needs of custom-ers from other cultures. They will make greater use of suggestive sell-ing, thereby creating opportunities to generate more revenue per foreigncustomer. Their interpersonal skills in a multicultural workplace will bemore appropriate. They will also be more satisfied with their jobs, andthey will get more satisfaction out of interacting with foreign custom-ers. According to this study, hospitality management that hires anddevelops interculturally sensitive employees will be providing theirforeign guests with a better service environment and their organizationwith better results.

This research, however, showed that interculturally sensitive serviceproviders were not more motivated about work, their length of employ-ment was not longer, nor did they feel they receive greater primaryrewards (tips) than employees with low sensitivity. Still, from the per-spective of the management of a hospitality organization, as well asfrom the employees themselves, intercultural sensitivity appears to be avaluable attribute for employees working in businesses that cater to for-eign customers.

Given this result, it would be important for human resource managersto consider testing for and the training in intercultural sensitivity foremployees involved in cross-cultural service encounters. The long-termbenefits from such an investment could be more satisfied customers,positive word-of-mouth, repeat business, and increased revenue.


Recommendations for Future Research

Since this exploratory study emphasized one group (food serversin fine-dining restaurants) in a single segment of an industry (four-and five-diamond hotels) in one state (Florida), the generalizabilityof the findings is limited. As with any single-study investigation, itwould be valuable to replicate and extend the research. It would beparticularly important to test the research thesis (that interculturallysensitive service providers perform better in cross-cultural service en-counters) in different hospitality businesses and in different locales–both domestic and foreign.

Probably the most important limitation of the study, however, wasthe fact that foreign customers themselves were not interviewed fortheir reaction to the service they received. This was a function of theintimate nature of the service encounter and the limits of a field-studyresearch design. Mattila (2000) recommends the use of controlled labo-ratory experiments to validate findings on cross-cultural service en-counters. Such an experiment would allow researchers to measure thereaction of a customer from one culture to the service provided by anemployee from another culture. At the same time, the socio-demo-graphics and intercultural sensitivity of the employee could be mea-sured, as well as the cultural norms and values of the customer.

Replicating and extending the research thesis would also allow investi-gators to further test motivation, retention, and primary rewards of serviceemployees. Different measures of these constructs may be necessary.

Finally, since there is evidence to show that intercultural sensitivityis a skill that can be learned as well as measured, organizations thatserve foreign customers should give serious consideration to providingtheir customer-contact employees with this valuable skill. The resultscould be more satisfied customers and service providers, as well as amore successful organization.

REFERENCES

Andrews, F. M., & Robinson, J. P. (1991). Measures of subjective well-being. In J. P.Robinson, P. R. Shaver, & L. S. Wrightsman (Eds.), Measures of personality andsocial psychological attitudes (pp. 1-15). San Diego: Academic Press, Inc.

Arnould, E. J., & Price, L. (1993, June). River magic: Extraordinary experience and theextended service encounter. Journal of Consumer Research, 20, 24-45.

Sizoo et al. 75

Bhawuk, D. P. S. (1990). Cross-cultural orientation programs. In R. W. Brislin (Ed.),Applied cross-cultural psychology (325-347). Newbury Park, CA: SAGE Publica-tions.

Bhawuk, D. P. S., & Brislin, R. (1992). The measurement of intercultural sensitivityusing the concepts of individualism and collectivism. International Journal ofIntercultural Relations, 16, 413-436.

Biddle, B. (1979). Role theory: Expectation, identities, and behaviors. New York: Ac-ademic Press.

Bitner, M. J. (1990, April). Evaluating service encounters: The effects of physical sur-roundings and employee responses. Journal of Marketing, 54, 69-82.

Bitner, M. J., Booms, B. H., & Tetreault, M. S. (1990, January). The service encounter:Diagnosing favorable and unfavorable incidents. Journal of Marketing, 54, 71-84.

Bitner, M. J., Brown, S. W., & Meuter, M. L. (2000). Technology infusion in serviceencounters. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Services, 28(1), 138-149.

Broderick, A. J. (1999). Role theory and the management of service encounters. Ser-vices Industry Journal, 19 (2), 117-131.

Bruner, G. C. II, & Hensel, P. J. (1994). Motivation to work (Generalized). Marketingscales handbook: A compilation of multi-item measures (pp. 1020-1021). Chicago:American Marketing Association.

Clow, K. E. (1992). Conceptual and empirical identification of the variables impactingthe expectations consumers have of a service encounter. Unpublished doctoral dis-sertation. University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.

Crowne, D. P., & Marlowe, D. (1964). The approval motive: Studies in evaluative de-pendence. New York: Wiley.

Churchill, G. A. (1979). A paradigm for developing better measures of marketing con-structs. Journal of Marketing Research, 16, 64-73.

Cushner, K. H., & Brislin, R. W. (1996). Intercultural interactions: A practical guide.Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Czepiel, J. A., Solomon, M. R., Surprenant, C. F., & Gutman, E. G. (1985). Service en-counter: An overview. In J. A. Czepiel, M. R. Solomon, & C. F. Surprenant (Eds.),The service encounter (pp. 3-16). New York: Lexington Books.

Danaher, P. J., & Mattsson, J. (1994). Customer Satisfaction during the service deliv-ery process. European Journal of Marketing, 28(5), 5-16.

Furrer, O., Liu, B. S.-C., & Sudharshan, D. (2000). The relationships between cultureand service quality perceptions. Journal of Service Research, 2 (4), 355-371.

Grove, S. J., Fisk, R. P., & Dorsch, M. J. (1998). Assessing the theatrical componentsof the service encounters: A cluster analysis examination. Service Industries Jour-nal, 18(3), 116-134.

Hartline, M. D., & Jones, K. C. (1996). Employee performance cues in a hotel serviceenvironment: Influence on perceived service quality, value, and word-of-mouth in-tentions. Journal of Business Research, 35, 207-215.

Hoffman, K. D., & Bateson, J. E. G. (1997). Essentials of service marketing. Orlando,FL: Dryden Press.

Iskat, W. W. O. (1995). A thematic analysis of the service delivery act as applied to thehospitality industry: 1968-1993. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. New York Uni-versity, New York City.


Kahn, R. L., Wolfe, D. M., Quinn, R. P., Diedrick Snoek, J., & Rosenthal, R. A. (1964).Organizational stress: Studies in role conflict and ambiguity. New York: Wiley.

Katriel, T. (1995). From “context” to “contexts” in intercultural communication re-search. In R. L. Wiseman (Ed.), Intercultural Communication Theory (pp. 271-284).Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Kelley, C., & Meyers, J. (1995). CCAI: Cross-cultural adaptability inventory. Minne-apolis, MN: National Computer Systems, Inc.

Lundberg, C. (1991). Productivity enhancement through managing the service encoun-ter. Hospitality Research Journal, 14(2), 63-71.

Lynn, M. (1996). Seven ways to increase servers’ tips. Cornell Hotel and RestaurantAdministration Quarterly, 37(3) 24-29.

Mattila, A. S. (2000). The impact of culture and gender on customer evaluations of ser-vice encounters. Journal of Hospitality & Tourism Research, 24(2), 263-273.

Milman, A. I. (2001). Travel industry world yearbook–The big picture 2001. Rye, NY:Child & Waters, Inc. dissertation. Goteborgs Universitet, Sweden.

NCS Assessments (1995). 1995 catalog (Volume II). Minneapolis, MN: NationalComputer Science, Inc.

Nunnally, J. C. (1978). Psychometric theory. New York: McGraw-Hill.Reisinger, Y., & Waryszak, R. (1994). Japanese tourists’ perception of their tour

guides: Australian experience. Journal of Vacation Marketing, 1(1), 28-40.Reisinger, Y., & Turner, L. (1998). Cross-cultural differences in tourism: A strategy

for tourism marketers. Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing, 7(4), 79-106.Samenfink, W. H. (1994). A quantitative analysis of certain interpersonal skills re-

quired in the service encounter. Hospitality Research Journal, 17(2), 3-15.Shostack, G. L. (1985). Planning the service encounter. In J. A. Czepiel, M. R. Solo-

mon, & C. F. Surprenant (Eds.), The service encounter (pp. 243-254). New York:Lexington Books.

Solomon, M. R., Surprenant, C., Czepiel, J. A., & Gutman, E. G. (1985, Winter). A roletheory perspective on dyadic interactions: The service encounter. Journal of Mar-keting, 49, 99-111.

Sparks, B., & Callan, V. J. (1992). Communications and the service encounter: Thevalue of convergence. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 11,213-224.

U.S. Department of Commerce. (2002, June 20). Bureau of Economic Analysis: Com-merce News. www.bea.gov.

Waters, S. R. (1998). Travel industry world yearbook–The big picture 97-98. Rye, NY:Child & Waters, Inc.

Winsted, K. F. (1999). Evaluating service encounters: A cross-cultural and cross-in-dustry exploration. Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, 7(2), 106-123.

Zeithaml, V. A., & Bitner, M. J. (1996). Services marketing. New York: McGraw-HillCompany.

RECEIVED: 08/12/02REVISIONS RECEIVED: 02/01/03

SECOND REVISIONS RECEIVED: 02/27/03ACCEPTED: 03/06/03

Sizoo et al. 77

Documents

Cross-Cultural Service Encounters in the Hospitality Industry and the Effect of Intercultural Sensitivity on Employee Performance