Antecedents and outcomes of emotional labor a study of front line employees of the tourism industry in vietnam

UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY International School of Business Nguyen Anh Phuc ANTECEDENTS AND OUTCOMES OF EMOTIONAL LABOR: A STUDY OF FRONT-LINE EMPLOYEES OF THE TOURISM INDUSTRY IN VIETNAM MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2018 UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS HO CHI MINH CITY International School of Business Nguyen Anh Phuc ANTECEDENTS AND OUTCOMES OF EMOTIONAL LABOR: A STUDY OF FRONT-LINE EMPLOYEES OF THE TOURISM INDUSTRY IN VIETNAM MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION SUPERVISOR: Nguyen Thi Mai Trang Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2018 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Firstly, I would like to say thank you very much to Assoc Prof Nguyen Thi Mai Trang (my supervisor) for her valuable instructions and kind supports in helping me finish this academic research I also appreciate the members of the thesis defense committee’s comments and meaningful suggestions to help me to complete this thesis My sincere thanks are given to all of my professors at International Business School – University of Economics of Ho Chi Minh City for their teaching during my master course Finally, I would like to express my deepest thanks for my family, friends for always being my side during studying the master course CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ABSTRACT ABBREVIATION Introduction Theoretical background and hypotheses 2.1 Emotional labor 2.2 The relationships among emotional labor and its antecedents and its outcomes 2.2.1 The relationship between emotional intelligence and emotional labor 2.2.3 The relationship between job autonomy and emotional labor 2.2.4 The relationship between emotional display rules and emotional labor 2.2.5 The relationship between emotional labor and job burnout 2.2.6 The relationship between emotional labor and job satisfaction 2.2.7 The relationship between job burnout and job satisfaction 2.3 Research model Method 3.1 Procedure and sample 3.2 Measurement (see Appendix D) Results and discussion 4.1 Respondents Characteristics 4.2 Scale validation 4.3 Results of structural equation modeling analysis (SEM) 4.4 Discussion Conclusion and managerial implications 5.1 Conclusion 5.2 Managerial implications 5.3 Limitations and future research References APPENDICES LIST OF FIGURES Figure Research model……………………………………………………………… 10 Figure Standardized coefficient path ……………………………………………… 24 LIST OF TABLES Table Respondents’ characteristics .17 Table Means, standard deviations, and standardized CFA loadings of items 19, 20 Table Correlations (final measurement model) 20 Table Unstandardized structural paths 21 ABBREVIATION CFA Confirmatory Factor Analysis EFA Exploratory Factor Analysis EFL English as Foreign Language HRM Human Resource Management CR Composite reliability AVE Averaged variance extracted SEM Structural equation modeling SPSS Statistical Package for the Social Sciences ABSTRACT The new trend of successful tourism companies is truly engaging their front-line service employees by applying emotional labor theory to maximize service quality, satisfaction, and behavioral outcomes This study investigates the antecedents of front-line service employee emotional labor in the tourism organizations in Vietnam It also examines the role of emotional labor toward employee job burnout and job satisfaction Employing the CFA & SEM analyses with a sample of 302 front-line employees, the research findings reveal that emotional intelligence, job autonomy, and emotional display rules has the positive relationships with emotional labor and emotional labor has a positive relationship with job burnout Furthermore, emotional labor negatively relates to job satisfaction of Vietnamese employees Finally, job burnout has a negative relationship with job satisfaction Key words: Emotional intelligence, job autonomy, emotional display rules, emotional labor, job burnout, job satisfaction, tourism Introduction The service sector in Viet Nam is identified as one of the key industry to develop the overall economy growth rate In the trend of transitioning to the freedom economy, the service sector, consisting of tourism industry in Vietnam, has always played an important role The World Travel & Tourism Council (2014) mentions that the contribution factors of Travel & Tourism sectors to GDP will be hotels, airlines, airports, travel agents and leisure and recreation services that deal directly with tourists The total contribution of Travel & Tourism to GDP of Vietnam was VND311, 117 Billion (9.6% of GDP) in 2013 and directly created 1,899,000 jobs (3.7% of total employment) Vietnam is one of the most popular destinations in Asia, the number of international visitors to Vietnam has been rising every year It means that tourism industry will have to focus more on better human resources policies so that they can fare well in the competition and satisfy their customers due to its special feature is an interaction between service providing by the service employees and service accepting by customers Travel agencies (both traditional and online) dominate the market for Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines with a 62%, 66% and 52% share, respectively However, direct booking is still getting to the most popular booking channel in Vietnam and accounts for significant sales in this country (Thornton, 2016) Therefore, creating the organizations’ reputation is crucial to take advantages the new trend of direct booking channel The main characteristic of a service sector is “the contact and interaction between service providers (employees) and service acceptors (customers)” (Tsaur, Chang & Wu, 2003, p 435) The main products provided by tourism organizations are services and the employees who play role as service providers will provide those services to customers Thus, employee in the tourism industry becomes a part of service products and their excellent performance help to form image of organizations (Kusluvan, 2003) Vietnam tourism industry needs to overcome these issues to optimize its potential at least by using “professional smiling front-line service workers” to be as “country ambassadors” Today, the new trend of successful tourism companies is truly engaging their front-line service employees by applying emotional labor theory to enhance satisfaction with their external customers As stated by Grandey (2000), interest in emotional labor for research has been gradually started basing on the work of Hochschild (as cited in Grandey, 2000) Nowadays, business in the tourism is very competitive so that travel agencies must focus more on "service with a smile" to improve their reputations basing on customer satisfaction, employee behavioral outcomes As mentioned above, front-line service worker’s performance is one of the key points to obtain customer service using and royalty Service workers are therefore requested to regulate their feelings well in acting when interacting with customers (Karatepe, 2010) Hochschild (1983) uses the definition of emotional labor to indicate front-line service worker’s actions of trying to regulate both inside feelings and external appearance of showing these feelings to satisfy company’s expected emotions This researcher mentions that emotional labor may involve showing, pretending to express or suppressing emotions (e.g showing smiles and good humor…) and in each case, managing emotions of front-line service workers will result in more effective workplace interaction Then, emotions have evolved to help employees act adaptively to customer behaviors and working situations (Grandey, 2000) Additionally, emotional intelligence shows that employees are able to recognize and understand any emotional signal Based on that ability, front-line service employees may use suitable ways to manage their feelings and encourage intellectual growth (Salovey & Mayer, 1990) Therefore, emotional intelligence becomes a critical factors to make emotional issues easier for service workers to regulate While front-line service employees perform their jobs, they always interact to customers face-to-face So they are asked to show appropriate manners and control their feelings well (Karatepe, 2010) Thus, a study of both emotional labor and emotional intelligence for understanding service employee individual emotional expression to help the service employees keep smiling faces is really important The reality is that front-line service workers in Vietnam are facing to different kind of stresses Vietnamnet (2017) reveals that employees have to deal with a lot of unexpected troubles or customers’ bad attitudes leading to work stress and job burnout Sexual harassments while contacting with the customers is not an easy case for employees to handle and these challenges will hurt employees’ emotion (VOV, 2016) Moreover, these workers admit that they are tired of fixing the frequent bad tourism environment of destinations in Vietnam or tired of how using their relationships with intermediaries to perform the best services for customers (Vietnamnet, 2017) Employees in the service sector also share their anxieties on balancing their times for families and for working (Tap Chi Du Lich, 2016) Chowdhary and Prakash (2010) show in their study Pham Anh Ly – 30 years old, Tour guide Ly Anh Tuan – 38 years old, Tour guide Appendix D: Questionnaire (English Version) Dear Ladies & Gentlemen, I am Nguyen Anh Phuc I am doing my final MBA thesis with a project to examine antecedents and outcomes of emotional labor at your workplace Kindly, your favor to have your answers about your understanding about emotional intelligence, job autonomy, emotional display rules, emotional labor, job burnout and job satisfaction Please know that your ideas are just only used for this thesis If you have concerns or questions over this study, please contact me via email anhphuc2410@yahoo.com.vn or phone number: +84 932108880 I Section A This section helps you to be clearer about emotional labor at your workplace address: Emotional labor in this survey is known as “the process of managing feelings and expressions to fulfill the emotional requirements of a job (e.g services)” Have you been working your current job as a front-line service worker in the tourism industry? If your answer for question is “No”, you can stop your work here Thank you for your cooperation in completing this questionnaire If your answer for question is “Yes”, please continue answering the questions in Section B and Section C II Section B This section explores your attitude and perceptions regarding emotional intelligence, job autonomy, emotional display rules, emotional labor, job burnout and job satisfaction To what extent you agree with each of the following statements, please indicate your answer using the following 7-point scale where: = Strongly disagree = Disagree = Somewhat disagree = Neither agree nor disagree = Somewhat agree = Agree = Strongly agree Question I can often know why I have certain feelings I understand my own emotions very well I always know whether or not I am happy I know my friends’ feelings from their external manners all the time I am a very good person who can see others’ emotions I can recognize emotions of people surrounding me 7 I always have objectives and have big efforts to get them I always trust my competences I encourage myself for being well 7 12 I regulate my own emotions very well 13 I have freedom choose the ways to my job 14 I can manage my work timetable 15 I can arrange my work activities (when I do) 16 It is possible for me to decide when to specific work 7 18 I am allowed to change my job objectives 19 I am allowed to manage what I am asked to achieve by my 7 10 I can regulate my manner so that I can control difficulties critically 11 I calm down quickly when I lose my temper activities 17 My job allows me change how to be evaluated so that I can highlight my job and play down others supervisor 20 I am requested to only express positive emotions to customers 21 I am requested to never express negative emotions to customers 22 I am requested to place myself in the situation of customers 23 I am requested to be sincere and authentic with customers 24 I just want to my job without being annoyed 25 I try to recognize the emotions that I need to show to others 26 I try my best to feel the emotions that I need to show to 7 28 I give an appropriate action to deal with customers 29 I just pretend to have the emotions I need to display for my 7 7 33 My work does not sound enthusiastic to me 34 I have uncertain feelings about the importance of my job 35 I am more skeptical about my contribution 36 I am extremely tired from my work 37 I think my job enjoyable 38 I am quite satisfied with my current job 39 I love my work very much 40 My job is very special 41 I really enjoy doing my job interactions customers 27 I try to develop my internal feelings that I need to show to my clients job 30 I express my emotions to client that are different from what I feel inside 31 I fake a good mood when interacting with customers Within six months ago: 32 I feel less interested in doing my work since I began doing this job III Section C – Background Information This section of the questionnaire refers to background or biographical information The information will allow me to classify and compare groups of respondents Gender Age group (years old) – – – Income per month (1,000,000vnd/month) –b – How long have you been doing your job? The travel agency you are working for is:……………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………… Thank you for your co-operation in completing this questionnaire! Appendix E: Questionnaire (Vietnamese Version) PHIẾU KHẢO SÁT Kính chào Anh/Chị, tên Nguyễn Anh Phúc, làm luận văn tốt nghiệp thạc sỹ với đề tài nghiên cứu yếu tố tác động đến lao động cảm xúc ảnh hưởng lao động cảm xúc đến nhân viên (cá nhân) quan nơi anh chị làm việc Rất mong Anh/Chị nói lên quan điểm Anh/Chị phát biểu đề cập Phiếu khảo sát Tất ý kiến anh chị sử dụng phục vụ cho nghiên cứu Trong trình thực phiếu khảo sát này, Anh/Chị có thắc mắc nào, xin vui lịng liên lạc với tơi thông qua địa email: anhphuc2410@yahoo.com.vn điện thoại: +84 932108880 I Phần A Phần giúp bạn rõ ràng lao động cảm xúc Lao động cảm xúc khảo sát định nghĩa "quá trình quản lý cảm xúc cách thể cảm xúc nhằm đáp ứng yêu cầu cơng việc” Cơng việc Anh/Chị có tiếp xúc trực tiếp với khách hàng ngành du lịch hay không? Nếu câu số anh/chị trả lời “Khơng”, anh/chị dừng việc trả lời khảo sát Chân thành cám ơn giúp đỡ anh chị Nếu câu số anh/chị trả lời “Có”, xin anh/chị vui lịng trả lời tiếp câu hỏi phần B phần C II Phần B Phần thể thái độ cách nhìn nhận Anh/Chị yếu tố tác động đến lao động cảm xúc ảnh hưởng yếu tố cảm xúc đến người lao động Xin cho biết mức độ đồng ý Anh/ Chị phát biểu sau cách đánh dấu ( X ) vào tương ứng, với: Ơ số 1: Hồn tồn khơng đồng ý Ơ số 2: Khơng đồng ý Ơ số 3: Khơng đồng ý phần Ơ số 4: Trung dung/khơng có ý kiến Ơ số 5: Đồng ý phần Ô số 6: Đồng ý Ô số 7: Hoàn toàn đồng ý Câu hỏi Tôi hiểu nguyên nhân gây cảm xúc Tôi hiểu biết tốt cảm xúc Tơi ln biết tơi có vui hay không Tôi nhận cảm xúc bạn bè từ hành vi họ Tôi người quan sát tốt cảm xúc người khác Tơi có hiểu biết tốt cảm xúc người xung 7 quanh Tôi luôn đặt mục tiêu cho thân sau cố gắng để đạt chúng Tơi ln tự nói người có khả Tôi người tự tạo động lực cho 7 12 Tơi có khả kiểm sốt tốt tình cảm 13 Tôi tự lựa chọn phương pháp để thực công việc 10 Tơi kiểm sốt tính khí để tơi xử lý khó khăn cách hợp lý 11 Tơi ln bình tĩnh lại cách nhanh chóng tơi tức giận tơi 14 Tơi có quyền kiểm sốt việc lên kế hoạch cho cơng việc 15 Tôi kiểm sốt trình tự hoạt động cơng việc 16 Tôi định thời điểm thực hoạt động công 7 18 Tơi sửa đổi mục tiêu cơng việc mà tơi phải hồn thành 19 Tôi kiểm sốt mức độ hồn thành mục tiêu cơng việc mà 20 Cơng ty địi hỏi tơi thể cảm xúc tích cực với khách hàng 21 Cơng ty địi hỏi tơi khơng thể cảm 22 Cơng ty hy vọng tơi đặt vào vị trí khách hàng 23 Công ty mong muốn chân thành chân thật tiếp xúc 24 Tôi muốn làm công việc mà không bị làm phiền 25 Tôi nỗ lực để thực nhận cảm xúc mà cần để 7 28 Tơi có hành động phù hợp để chăm sóc khách hàng 29 Tơi giả vờ có cảm xúc mà cần phải thể cho việc 17 Tôi phép sửa đổi phương thức đánh giá kết cơng việc nhằm mục đích nhấn mạnh vai trị tơi giảm nhẹ vai trị người khác cấp giao phó xúc tiêu cực với khách hàng với khách hàng thể người khác 26 Tôi nỗ lực để nhận cảm xúc mà cần để thể đối khách hàng 27 Tôi cố gắng phát triển cảm xúc bên mà cần thể với khách hàng công việc 30 Tôi thể cảm xúc với khách hàng khác với tơi 7 33 Tôi trở nên nhiệt tình cơng việc 34 Tôi nghi ngờ tầm quan trọng công việc 35 Tơi trở nên hồi nghi việc cơng việc tơi có góp 36 Tôi cảm thấy bị kiệt sức với cơng việc 37 Tôi coi công việc thật dễ chịu 38 Tơi cảm thấy hài lịng với công việc 39 Tơi chắn thích cơng việc 40 Công việc thú vị 41 Tơi tìm thích thú thực cơng việc cảm nhận bên 31 Tôi cố thể tâm trạng vui vẻ tương tác với khách hàng cảm xúc thật bên Trong sáu tháng vừa qua: 32 Tơi trở nên hứng thú cơng việc kể từ tơi bắt đầu cơng việc phần cho cơng việc chung hay không III Phần C – thông tin cá nhân Phần liên quan đến thông tin cá nhân Xin Anh/ Chị cho biết số thông tin sau để phục vụ cho việc phân loại so sánh nhóm đối tượng khảo sát Giới tính Nữ Nhóm tuổi – – – Thu nhập/tháng (đvt: triệu đồng) – dướ – dướ Kinh nghiệm làm việc anh chị: tháng đế Công ty mà anh chị cộng tác là: ………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………… CẢM ƠN ANH CHỊ ĐÃ THAM GIA KHẢO SÁT - Appendix F: Correlations between items (final model) Sa1 Sa2 Sa3 Oa1 Oa2 Oa3 Ue1 Ue2 Ue3 Re1 Re2 Re3 Ja1 Ja2 Ja3 Ja4 Ja5 Ja6 Ed2 Ed3 Ed4 Da1 Da2 Da3 Da4 Sa1 Sa2 Sa3 Sa4 Jb1 Jb2 Jb3 Jb5 Js1 Js2 Js3 Js4 Js5 Sa1 Sa2 Sa3 Oa1 Oa2 Oa3 Ue1 Ue2 Ue3 Re1 Re2 Re3 Ja1 Ja2 Ja3 Ja4 Ja5 Ja6 Ed2 Ed3 Ed4 77** 84** 54** 55** 50** 52** 50** 41** 45** 43** 46** 13** 14* 15** 19** 10* 18** 17** 23** 20** 22** 17** 14* 19** 26** 21** 21** 19** 10* 12* 11* 17** 12* 16** 16** 15* 10* 84** 60** 52** 52** 50** 50** 38** 46** 41** 48** 11 12* 14** 15** 07 14* 18** 20** 20** 24** 23** 18** 24** 24** 17** 19** 15** 15* 16* 11* 12* 39** 19* 16* 16* 46** 53** 51** 52** 50** 55** 32** 40** 38** 44** 17** 16** 17** 19** 15** 20** 17** 19** 15** 20** 17** 20** 17** 26** 25** 22** 28** 23** 24** 17** 14* 15** 12* 13* 17** 18* 77** 77** 47** 41** 43** 41** 44** 17** 18** 20** 18** 11** 18** 14** 16** 12** 19** 18** 13** 17** 15** 10* 11* 14* 20** 18** 18** 17** 17* 14* 11** 12* 17* 12** 74** 40** 40** 35** 42** 36** 43** 16** 14* 18** 16* 17* 19** 14** 19** 16* 21** 17** 14** 15** 14* 10* 11* 12* 16** 15** 17** 13* 19* 18* 11* 24* 37* .40** 44** 35** 42** 40** 46** 17** 17** 18** 42* 63** 16** 12* 19** 18** 19** 17** 14* 17** 14* 11* 11* 11* 14* 15** 17** 14* 27** 15* 24** 22** 68** 77** 56** 34** 44** 45** 62** 15* 17* 11* 28* 23* 18** 23** 16** 10* 17* 13* 16** 12* 11* 13* 11* 16** 18** 13* 19** 16* 19** 40** 14** 18** 58** 34** 44** 42** 19** 13* 15* 17** 19* 10* 23** 21** 12* 14* 10* 10* 16** 16** 12* 14* 13* 11* 13* 11* 126 12* 15** 17** 16* 30* 65** 61** 62** 19 15** 14* 17** 18** 13* 15** 24** 21** 12* 19** 13* 18** 11* 11* 11* 19** 13* 15** 13* 15* 16** 17* 17* 04 15* 79** 78** 10* 11* 15** 16* 14* 18* 19** 26** 22** 21** 18** 10 14* 25** 24** 22** 22** 12* 09 10 02 11* 11* 13* 02 61** 76** 15** 12* 10* 19** 18* 10** 18** 23** 26** 21** 18** 12* 17** 25** 23** 22** 18** 16** 11* 11* 06 13* 10 13* 07 35** 79** 77** 72** 12* 50** 88** 16** 18** 22** 25** 13* 06 13* 21** 23** 17** 12* 11* 08 07 01 07 09 09 01 19* 85** 88** 84** 77** 86** 13* 11* 15* 25** 26** 26** 13** 19** 21** 23** 24** 18** 15** 10 11 12* 02 07 10 18* 82** 84** 74** 85** 15** 13* 17** 22** 26** 26** 24** 20** 21** 23** 21** 19** 15** 10* 10* 11* 04 06 09 18* 85** 74** 86** 14* 11 07 24** 25** 25** 23** 20** 20** 23** 23** 16** 14* 08 10 10 04 07 09 18* 79** 89** 17** 11* 11* 27** 31** 30** 27** 26** 26** 30** 25** 17** 16** 10 09 07 01 04 06 30** 77** 17** 10* 17** 22** 30** 32** 28** 26** 24** 26** 23** 17** 15** 09 08 -.04 -.06 -.04 04 10* 17** 12* 10* 28** 27** 26** 23** 21** 22** 25** 27** 17** 14* 07 09 10 02 05 07 -14* 47** 48** 28** 26** 20** 21** 19** 13* 16** 22** 16** 13* 11* 13* 05 01 03 04 -.61** 59** 21** 15** 13* 09 18** 14** 16** 23** 22** 20** 19** 22** 04 06 06 01 -35** 21** 19** 14* 10 16** 10 19** 22** 21** 15** 14* 17** 03 06 01 -.16 -.69* 64 Da1 85** Da2 Da2 Da3 Da4 Sa1 Sa2 Sa3 Sa4 Jb1 Jb2 Jb3 Jb5 Js1 Da3 73** 77** Da4 71** 76** 84** Sa1 56** 60** 63** 67** Sa2 52** 58** 59** 62** 85** Sa3 54** 59** 64** 66** 88** 82** Sa4 61** 55** 59** 55** 72** 68** 74** Jb1 23** 25** 31** 27** 27** 24** 29** 28** Jb2 21** 26** 31** 27** 25** 25** 26** 25** 76** Jb3 19** 22** 28** 25** 22** 22** 23** 21** 75** 75** Jb5 20** 23** 26** 23** 20** 17** 25** 28** 71** 73** 70** Js1 -.17** -.22** -.19** -.20** -.23** -.21** -.24** -.18** -.23** -.19** -.12* -.19** Js2 -.10 -.16** -.14** -.17** -.21** -.19** -.22** -.17** -.21** -.17** -.14* -.17** 794** Js3 -.12* -.20** -.17** -.18** -.21** -.20** -.24** -.18** -.26** -.22** -.16** -.20** 877** 82** Js4 -.14* -.19** -.17** -.19** -.22** -.19** -.25** -.17** -.22** -.20** -.16** -.18** 771** 69** 75** Js5 -.17** -.21** -.16** -.18** -.24** -.19** -.26** -.18** -.30** -.27** -.21** -.23** 808** 78** 80** Note: **correlation is significant at the 0.01 level; *correlation is significant at the 0.05 level; numbers on the diagonal are variances; n = 302 Js2 Js3 Js4 79** Js5 Appendix G Summary of studies focusing on antecedents and outcomes of emotional labor Authors (year) Morris & Feldman (1996) Antecedents Face to face contact, job autonomy, negative emotions, positive emotions Outcomes Emotional exhaustion, job satisfaction Findings Face to face contact positively related to emotional labor Job autonomy negatively related to emotional labor Negative emotions and positive emotions positively related to emotional labor Emotional labor positively related to emotional exhaustion and negatively related to job satisfaction Grandey (2000) Display rules, job satisfaction Emotional exhaustion Mikolajczak et al (2007) Emotional intelligence Emotional exhaustion Kim, 2008 Job characteristics (frequency, duration, variety, job autonomy), Burnout(exhaustion, cynicism, professional efficacy) Display rules positively related to surface acting & negatively related to deep acting Emotional labor positively related to emotional exhaustion Emotional intelligence negatively related to emotional labor Emotional labor positively related to emotional exhaustion Frequency, duration, variety, job autonomy positively related to deep acting and negatively related to surface acting Emotional labor positively related to job burnout ... quality, satisfaction, and behavioral outcomes This study investigates the antecedents of front- line service employee emotional labor in the tourism organizations in Vietnam It also examines the. .. for interview Introduction Thanks for answering the questions of the research ? ?Antecedents and outcomes of emotional labor: A study of front- line employees of tourism industry in Vietnam? ?? Kindly... From the study to examine the role of emotional intelligence and job autonomy in emotional labor and subsequently in job burnout and job satisfaction of employees who are working in tourism industry,