Service Management and Marketing: Managing the Service Profit Logic, 4th Edition

CHAPTER 15MANAGING SERVICE CULTURE: THE INTERNAL SERVICE IMPERATIVE

“A functioning service culture requires that providing good service is second nature to everyone within the organization.”

INTRODUCTION

In this chapter the concept of service culture will be discussed. First, two broader concepts are presented, corporate culture and climate, and their importance to the attitudes and behaviour of people in an organization. Next, the issue of a service culture and the need for such a culture is covered. Prerequisites for a service culture are analysed and ways of creating such a culture are described. Finally, barriers to and opportunities for developing such a culture are discussed. After reading this chapter the reader should understand the importance of a service culture for service providers, know the prerequisites for a service culture and know how such a culture can be created.

THE IMPORTANCE OF CORPORATE CULTURE

The concept of corporate culture is used to describe a set of common norms and values shared by people in an organization. Hence, culture is an overall concept that explains why people do certain things, think in common ways, and appreciate similar goals, routines, even jokes, just because they are members of the same organization. Corporate culture can be defined as the pattern of shared values and beliefs that give the members of an organization meaning, and provide them with the rules for behaviour in the organization.¹ Culture represents values that can be thought ...