Petra Kipfelsberger

This paper investigates how and when a firm’s level of customer contact influences the collective organizational energy. For this purpose, we bridge the literature on collective human energy at work with the job impact framework and organizational sensemaking processes and argue that a firm’s level of customer contact is positively linked to the collective organizational energy because a high level of customer contact might make the experience of prosocial impact across the firm more likely. However, as prior research at the individual level has indicated that customers could also deplete employees’ energy, we introduce transformational leadership climate as a novel contingency factor for this linkage at the organizational level. We propose that a medium to high transformational leadership climate is necessary to derive positive meaning from customer contact, while firms with a low transformational leadership climate do not get energized by customer contact. We tested the proposed moderated mediation model with multilevel modeling and a multi-source dataset comprising 9,094 employees and 75 key informants in 75 firms. The results support our hypotheses and offer important theoretical contributions for research on collective human energy in organizations and its interplay with customers.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore how and when customers influence organizational climate and organizational health through their feedback. Based on affective events theory, the authors classify both positive and negative customer feedback (PCF and NCF) as affective work events. The authors expect that these events influence the positive affective climate of an organization and ultimately organizational health, and that the relationships are moderated by empowerment climate. Design/methodology/approach – Structural equation modeling was utilized to analyze survey data obtained from a sample of 178 board members, 80 HR representatives, and 10,953 employees from 80 independent organizations. Findings – The findings support the expected indirect effects. Furthermore, empowerment climate strengthened the impact of PCF on organizational health but does not affect the relationship between NCF and organizational health. Research limitations/implications – The cross-sectional design is a potential limitation of the study. Practical implications – Managers should be aware that customer feedback influences an organization’s emotional climate and organizational health. Based on the results organizations might actively disseminate PCF and establish an empowerment climate. With regard to NCF, managers might consider the potential affective and health-related consequences for employees and organizations. Social implications – Customers are able to contribute to an organization’s positive affective climate and to organizational health if they provide positive feedback to organizations. Originality/value – By providing first insights into the consequences of both PCF and NCF on organizational health, this study opens a new avenue for scientific inquiry of customer influences on employees at the organizational level.

While complaint management has received much attention, customer compliments and their systematic handling have been largely ignored. Based on two empirical studies, this article suggests that customer compliments bear great potential for benefiting firms, and gives recommendations on how managers can enable, stimulate, and amplify positive customer feedback.

This study investigates the situations in which productive organizational energy (POE) and organizational performance increase through customer passion, that is, perceived customers' affective commitment and customers' positive word-of-mouth behavior. We integrate research on POE with research on customer influences on employees. Based on emotional contagion processes we develop hypotheses for the energizing influences of customers at the organizational level. We test the hypotheses using a dataset containing 495 board members and 8,299 employees of 152 organizations. The results show that customer passion is positively related to POE, which is in turn positively related to organizational performance. Furthermore, the findings indicate that the effect of customer passion on organizational performance through POE depends on top management team's (TMT's) customer orientation. By providing first insights into the linkages and contingencies of customer passion, POE, and organizational performance, this study puts forth a more holistic understanding of the energizing effect of customers on organizations.

An energetic workforce is imperative for corporate success. However, organizations often fail to reach their full potential as they do not master to create and sustain high productive organizational energy (POE). Hence, new approaches are needed in order to enable companies and employees to flourish in the long term and to achieve excellence. Whereas knowledge about intra-organizational determinants of POE is accumulating, external factors such as customers and their influences on POE have not yet been examined. In the course of this dissertation, three empirical studies were carried out providing new linkages, mechanisms, and contingencies of the energizing influences of customers on organizations. Study 1 relies on a sample of 80 companies and demonstrates that both positive and negative customer feedback has an impact on an organization's positive affective climate and thereby on organizational well-being, i.e. overall employee productivity, employee retention, and emotional exhaustion among employees. Based on 93 companies, Study 2 examines how customers energize organizations by introducing prosocial impact climate as a mechanism at the organizational level linking customer recognition with POE. Additionally, transformational leadership climate strengthens this relationship. Study 3 is based on a sample of 152 companies and establishes the positive linkages between customer passion, POE, and organizational performance. Furthermore, it reveals top management team's customer orientation as a boundary condition of the relationship between customer passion and organizational performance. Overall, across the three studies, positive customer influences are positively related to POE and organizational performance supporting the notion that customers effectively energize whole organizations. Hence, this dissertation provides a starting point for future investigations of external factors influencing POE. Moreover, an extensive discussion of the practical implications and recommendations on how to enable, stimulate, and amplify positive customer influences in the pursuit of corporate success is provided.